Ico stopped.
There was something in the cage. But it wasn’t black; it was white. And not just any white, but a gentle, glowing white, like a firefly flitting along the water’s edge at dusk.
It wasn ’t a shadow, but a person.
“Is somebody there?” Ico approached the handrail and called out toward the cage. “Who are you?”
Behind the bars, the white silhouette moved.
“What are you doing in there?” Ico asked, then hastily added, “Hold on. I’ll get you down.”
Ico resumed climbing the staircase, feeling his heart dancing in his chest. There was a prisoner in the Castle in the Mist! Is that person a Sacrifice like me? Why are they in a cage instead of a sarcophagus? I have to get them out!
As he ran, his mind whirling, he suddenly came to a place where the staircase had collapsed, leaving a large gap. On the far side, the stairs continued up. But even with a running start, he didn’t think he could jump across.
Ico looked at the window in the wall to his right. It was higher than the staircase, yet if he jumped, he might be able to grab on to the edge. He couldn’t be sure where it led, but he was running out of choices. Heaving himself up, he grasped the edge of the window and stuck his head outside. Ico gaped when he saw that it opened above a wide veranda. He could hear the distant roar of the sea and the faint cries of seabirds.
Out on the veranda, Ico squinted against the bright light. Clean, crisp air filled his lungs. He was up on one of the towers. The sky felt much closer here, as though he could reach up and grab one of the clouds. Nearby rose another of the castle’s towers, with causeways connecting the intricate structures below. Everywhere there were windows, but no life stirred behind them. Cliffs towered in the distance, and far below, the sea crashed against the island. But nowhere could he look that was not shrouded in mist.
I’m really here.
A strong wind blew. Ico circled the veranda and climbed back in through a window a little farther around the circumference of the tower. Even inside, the wind whistled in his ears. But Ico was not afraid-to the contrary, the air encouraged him. Smelling the sea on the wind and seeing the bright sky above meant he was not stuck here, unable to move. The natural world around the castle was alive and thriving. If he could just find the way out, he would be back in that world.
A little farther up the staircase, he came to a true dead end. The railing blocked off two sides, and there was a wooden door on the right. The door was the same shape as the one Ico had gone through when he left the great hall, only slightly larger. Next to the door he saw a lever similar to the one he had found in the hall, only this one was set in the floor. It offered no resistance as he pulled it. He thought that it might open the door, but he was wrong. Instead, behind him, the cage moved.
With a loud squeal, the chain holding the cage began to play out from a winch against the ceiling, and the cage began to descend toward the base of the tower. Ico went up to the railing to look down after the cage. It descended farther and farther, until he was practically looking down at its top. Inside he could see the white figure lying on the floor of the cage.
He was just thinking he was right about the round dais being a platform for the cage to rest on, when the chains let out another squeal, and the cage stopped its downward motion. The sudden halt made the cage rock from side to side. It hadn’t yet reached the platform-it had stopped midway.
Ico tried the lever again, but nothing happened. He thought that the cage might have caught on something along the way, but it was too far down for him to see clearly from where he stood. Ico darted down the stairs, wiping the sweat from his brow as he ran. His throat ached with thirst.
The cage had stopped with its base hanging roughly at the height of the heads of the four idols. Ico reached the bottom of the staircase, where he could look directly inside the cage. The white figure stood at its center. It was a woman.
Her body was slender, with an elegant curve to her neck, and she wore a strange white dress that came down to her knees. She was looking down at her feet, and though she must have noticed Ico by now, she did not look at him. Ico went to call out to her again, but stopped himself. He didn’t know what to say. She hadn’t answered him before. Perhaps she couldn’t hear him at all.
He had a bigger problem, though. How could he lower the cage the rest of the way to the floor?
Ico caught his breath and pondered. He could feel the sweat drying on his skin. If I could only get a closer look at that cage. A narrow ledge ran around the edge of the room, and it looked like it might lead him just above the place where the light was peeking through over the heads of the idols. The ledge widened there, protruding almost like an awning. He would have a clear view of the cage.
Ico scrambled down the ladder and ran to its twin on the other side of the room. He climbed it and began running across the ledge, never taking his eyes from the girl inside the cage. She stood motionless. For a moment he wondered if that glowing white form wasn’t human after all, but some kind of spirit given shape.
He recalled the forest sprites Oneh had told him about in stories. They were kind, gentle creatures who loved all life in the woods, and even protected those people who lived off the bounty of the forest. When they found a lost traveler or wounded hunter, they would appear in the form of a young girl to help them.
Ico paused when he reached the wall above the four idols. The woman inside the cage had her back to him, and she still wasn’t moving. From here there could be no doubt that she would be able to hear him if he spoke. Should I call out to her? Maybe she can force open the cage door. Ico dismissed the thought as soon as it occurred to him. Her arms were even more slender than his. She could scarcely rattle the bars of that sturdy cage, let alone break them.
Now what?
Ico looked more closely at the chain holding the cage and saw to his surprise that though the links were thick, they were covered with rust. Some even seemed damaged. Maybe the cage wasn’t as sturdy as he’d first thought.
Ico knew what he had to do. From the top of the cage, he and the girl might be able to work together, using their combined weight to free her. As long as he avoided the dangerous-looking spikes protruding from the top and bottom edges, it didn’t look that difficult.
Ico jumped and landed easily on the roof of the cage, sending it lurching to one side. He had been half right about the chain-though it was damaged, it was far weaker than he had imagined. His added weight was enough to break one of the links, and the cage dropped to the platform below, landing off balance. The shock of the impact knocked Ico from the roof and sent the broken chain rebounding upward to slap against the wall, knocking down a single torch, which fell with a soft sound beside him. It was still burning. He gave it a quick glance before returning his attention to the cage. Still sprawled on the ground, he watched in wonder as the woman in white stepped through the cage’s door.
The woman crossed over the threshold of the cage gingerly, like someone wading in the shallows of a stream. Ico’s eyes fell on the gentle curve of her leg. She was barefoot, and a white light suffused her skin down to the very tips of her toes.
She looked back around at the cage that had held her, then at the stone walls of the room, and then finally down at Ico. She was definitely a woman, but much younger than he had guessed from a distance. She was more of a girl, really. Still, she stood taller than Ico and looked a bit older.