She wept a little more, then tried to make her hand unclench. It was a claw, hard and stiff. She slid it a few centimeters to one side, then struggled to make it grasp again. After a moment, biting her lip until it bled to keep her mind off the pain in her extremities, she slid her foot a tiny way along the ledge. Her leg burned like fire and her knee began to buckle.
"Keep moving," !Xabbu said from somewhere ahead of her. She stared at the black rock. Stephen, she told herself. He has nobody else. Help him.
She slid the other foot. The pain, although shatteringly bad, did not grow worse. She breathed through her nose and inched the other hand along, then started the whole horrible process again.
Renie risked a look to the side and wished she hadn't. !Xabbu had reached the place where the mountain bulged out, and was performing a terrifyingly intricate series of maneuvers—crouching to get his head beneath the worst of the outcrop, then moving sideways at a snail's pace, bent at the waist, with only his toes on the path and fingers resting lightly on the stone so he could keep most of his weight forward. As he moved, centimeter by agonizing centimeter, he made minute adjustments of balance, tilting head and shoulders a tiny degree here, an equally tiny degree there, moving slowly around the protrusion. Renie felt tears come again and wiped her burning eyes on her upraised arm.
!Xabbu vanished around the edge. She slid a few more steps, then reached the spot where the outward tilt began. She clung, knowing it was all pointless, waiting in dull horror for the cry that would mean he had fallen.
Instead, he spoke. "There is a place here."
It took a moment before she could calm the sob waiting to burst out. "What?"
"A place. A flat place. If you can only make it around the edge. It is a place to lie down, Renie! Hold on! Tell the others!"
"Liar." She gritted her teeth. She knew it had to be false—she would do the same herself, say anything to help the others find the strength to try to get around this horrible obstacle. "There's nothing but more of the same."
"I am telling you the truth, Renie." His voice was hoarse. "By the heart of Grandfather Mantis, I am telling you the truth."
"I can't make it!" she wailed.
"You can. Come as far toward me as you can. Lean to the side instead of back, to keep your balance. Try to reach your hand around to me. When you touch me, don't be frightened. I will hold your hand tightly and help keep you up."
"He says there's a place to stop on the other side," Renie told the others, trying to sound like she believed it. There was no reply, but she could see Sam Fredericks from the corner of her eye, feel the girl's exhaustion and panic. "A safe place. Just a tiny bit farther." She relayed !Xabbu's directions so the others would know what to do when they got there, not believing for a moment any of it would work, then slid a little closer to the outcrop. She leaned as !Xabbu had instructed, pushed her throbbing feet a little closer to the bump. For a moment she thought she had leaned too far, and only the stiffness of her limbs kept her from making a fatal grasp for a better handhold. She hugged the black stone tight, edged her left arm as far around it as she could, out of sight. . . .
. . . And something touched it. Despite !Xabbu's warning, the surprise was so great she almost lost her grip again, but the fingers around her wrist were tight and sure. She sidestepped again, having to lean back a little now as the stone bulged out above her, and suddenly she felt her balance shift back, back toward nothingness. She had only a moment to draw breath for the pointless reflexive scream, then her arm was jerked hard and she scraped along the stone. Her right foot slipped off the path, but the rest of her caromed out, swinging on the pivot of her other foot, and !Xabbu was there, still holding on with blessed, blessed strength as he flung himself backward into a wide cleft in the mountainside so that she tumbled in on top of him. He quickly dragged himself out from under her; a moment later Renie heard him shuffling back to the edge of the fold in the mountainside, calling to Sam, but Renie herself could only lie facedown on the floor and cling as hard as she had gripped the mountainside, rubbing her face against the precious horizontal stone.
She was dimly conscious of !Xabbu bringing the others in safely. Sam fell gasping beside her, whimpering at the cramping of her fingers and toes. A more stolid Jongleur followed and tumbled silently to the ground. Even as the adrenaline diminished and her heart began to slow, Renie suddenly realized that !Xabbu had gone back to the rim of the crevice, risking his life to help the brain-damaged Ricardo Klement to safety. She struggled to her knees, every muscle shrieking in protest, and crawled to the edge. !Xabbu was leaning out at an angle that made her heart begin triphammering again, talking slowly and softly to someone she could not see, his slender arm stretched out of sight around the outcropping.
"I'm behind you, !Xabbu." Her voice was a dry croak. "Do you want me to grab your hand?"
"No, Renie." His voice was muffled against the rock. "I need it where it is for balance. But if you held my leg, I would be grateful. Let go quickly if I ask."
As her fingers closed around his ankle he leaned out farther. Renie could only watch for a moment before having to shut her eyes. The sky's strange lack of depth did not prevent vertigo.
It's just as well T4b isn't here, she thought, the distracted thought keeping a greater terror at bay.
For a moment, as !Xabbu's muscles tensed beneath her touch and he leaned out even farther on his fingernail grip, she thought her pulse would explode in her chest. Then the naked body of Klement came wobbling around the edge of the stone and !Xabbu crouched and pulled backward, toppling onto Renie as he pulled Klement in on them both.
They all lay gasping for a while, until Renie found the strength to help !Xabbu away from the edge of the cleft, deeper into the dimple in the mountain's side. It was scarcely three meters to the place where Sam lay almost wedged into the back, but after that ribbon of trail the space seemed palatial.
Renie slept then, a brief dive beneath the surface of consciousness. When she woke, she dragged herself toward !Xabbu where he sat propped against the black stone and put her head against his chest, nudging until she found a spot in the hollow under his chin. The beat of his heart was soothing, and she realized she never wanted to let go of him.
"We're in trouble," she whispered.
He said nothing, but she could feel his attention,
"We can't go out on that trail again. There's nothing left of it."
She thought he drew breath to argue, but then she felt his head slowly nodding, the curve of his throat and jaw enfolding the line of her own skull like a cupping hand. "I think you are right."
"So what's left? We stay here until the thing dissolves out from under us?" She looked at Sam, as rigid as a catatonic, staring at her own hands. Jongleur too seemed lost in some inner world, all of them now wandering as distantly as Ricardo Klement. "What else can we do?"
"Wait. Hope." !Xabbu brought his arm up and drew her closer. His fingers rested lightly above her heart, on the upper slope of her breast. "We will be together, no matter what comes."
She burrowed even deeper against him, and realized that she wanted not just to be held, but to kiss him, weep against his face, make love to him. But not here. Not inches from slow-breathing Jongleur, not under Ricardo Klement's aquarium gaze.
And if not here, where? she thought with a brushstroke of sad humor. If not now, when? For it seemed fairly certain there was nothing left. Still, bone-deep weariness and the presence of hateful strangers had turned the thought grotesque. She would content herself with childlike pleasures, with being held, with falling asleep in what for the moment was as much safety as she could imagine.