“Climb,” commanded Uncle Press.
He didn’t have to tell me twice. I grabbed the rope ladder and started up. I tried to go fast, but climbing a rope ladder is not like climbing a regular ladder. A regular ladder is solid. A rope ladder is soft and swings. As soon as you put your foot on one rung, it bends down under your weight. If you’re not completely balanced the ladder will twist. And if you aren’t careful where you put your foot, it can easily slip off and that would be disaster. So I tried to climb fast, but the faster I climbed, the tougher it got.
Alder called down from above, “Hurry, Pendragon.”
Yeah, thanks for the tip. My foot nearly slipped off a rung and I had to hang on for my life. The movement caused the ladder to swing and I had all that I could do to get my balance back. Uncle Press wasn’t holding the ladder at the bottom either, which made it more tricky. I looked down and saw that he was staring off into the depths of the cavern. He must have sensed that I was watching him because without looking up he shouted, “Climb!”
Another bellow came from deep within the cavern. Only this was louder and closer. The quig had definitely picked up the scent and was on its way.
“Come on!” I shouted down to Uncle Press.
“No!” yelled Loor. “It is not strong enough for two.”
“There it is!” said Alder, pointing into the cavern.
As I kept climbing I glanced back. A quig appeared from out of the shadows, stalking closer. It was hunched down like a hunting cat, with its belly grazing the ground. Any moment now it would pounce. All Uncle Press had to defend himself was the Bedoowan spear. Why had he thrown away the whistle? If I still had it, he would be safe. Now he was back in the same position he was in at the stadium, only this time I couldn’t help him. I was near the top and stole a quick look down to see that Uncle Press was sliding a heavy, flat rock toward the bottom of the ladder. What was he doing? I climbed up two more rungs and was high enough now to reach up for Alder and Loor. They each grabbed one of my hands and hoisted me up.
“I’m up!” I shouted down to Uncle Press. I quickly scrambled around and the three of us looked back down into the cavern. The quig was only a few yards from Uncle Press and stalking closer. Its horrible yellow eyes were focused on him. If Uncle Press started to climb, the quig would pounce and easily pick him off. His only choice was to fight, and fighting a quig could only end in death. Not for the quig, but for Uncle Press. History was repeating itself. Someone I cared for was about to die so that I would live.
The quig stopped advancing as if it sensed that Uncle Press was more dangerous than the average Milago miner. It crouched, facing Uncle Press, who stood holding his spear at the ready.
I was surprised to see that the first one to make a move was Uncle Press. But he did a curious thing. He relaxed. He lowered the spear and held it down at his side. Why was he doing that? It was like he was giving himself up. He stepped over the heavy rock that he had pushed under the ladder and held his hands out in surrender. To the quig it must have looked as if Uncle Press were opening himself up to be eaten without a fight. The quig didn’t move. It must have been just as confused as I was. But its hesitation didn’t last long. It was suppertime. The quig coiled, wagged its butt, and with a snarl it launched itself at Uncle Press.
Uncle Press barely moved. As soon as the quig had committed itself, he jammed the tail of the spear against the rock that was now behind him. At the same time he dropped to one knee and angled the spear up toward the flying quig. The quig realized too late that Uncle Press had set a trap and that it was now sailing toward a six-foot spike! Yes!
The quig landed on the spear. It impaled him through the chest and came out his back. The weapon didn’t move because it was anchored by the heavy rock. Uncle Press let go of it and did a dive roll to the side just before the wounded quig fell to the ground. But the battle wasn’t over. The quig was injured, but the spear didn’t seem to have pierced anything major. The angry animal squirmed and screamed and writhed on the ground like a fish out of water, but it was still very much alive…and dangerous. Uncle Press had to get out of there fast.
He leaped for the rope ladder. The quig saw this and swiped at him, but his claws bit into the air below his feet. Uncle Press was much better at climbing than I was. He flew up the ladder as if it were rock steady. Yet the quig wasn’t done. Judging from its pained bellows it was in horrible agony, but it still wanted a piece of Uncle Press. It squirmed over to the rope ladder and with a sweep of its mighty paw, grabbed on to it and began to pull. The quig must have been eight hundred pounds. There was no way this flimsy rope ladder could withstand that kind of pressure. I looked next to me to see that the top of the rope ladder was tied to a tree. The point where it was tied was dangerously frayed as if it had been rotting in the rain.
“Look!” I shouted.
Loor and Alder looked to see how the rope ladder was going to break right on top. Loor didn’t stop to think. She jumped over me and grabbed on to the rope. This was crazy. The rope ladder was going to break and if Loor were hanging on when it went, she’d go down with it. Alder realized this and ran to Loor. He sat behind her, grabbed her waist and dug his heels in. Maybe the strength of two would be enough. Or maybe the strength of three. I had to help. It was crazy, but it was the only thing to do. I dove behind Alder and grabbed him around the waist. That’s when I heard thesnap! The rope ladder broke from the tree. Loor held on tight and became the only link that kept it from falling into the pit. I could see the muscles in her arms bulge as she fought desperately to hang on. Alder held on to her and I held on to Alder but we all started to slide toward the edge of the hole. We dug our heels in, desperately trying to stop. I felt the tension in both of their bodies as we strained against the weight of the ladder, of Uncle Press, and of the quig that was pulling from below.
It felt like we were hanging on for hours, but it was probably only a few seconds. Where was Uncle Press? Did the quig get him? Were we hanging on just so that the quig could pull its bad self out from the hole and eat us? It didn’t really matter, because we weren’t going to be able to hang on much longer.
Then, finally, just as we were about to go over the edge, I looked up and saw the welcome sight of Uncle Press’s head poke up from below. He crawled to the surface, rolled away from the rope and shouted to Loor, “Let it go!”
She did. The rope whiplashed away and we all fell back. A second later I heard the heavy sound of the quig hitting the ground below. It let out a yelp of pain. Good. Served it right.
As we all lay there, trying to catch our breath, I looked down the bluff toward the stadium. It was about three hundred yards behind us. We had traveled quite a way in the quig pen. It was hard to believe that a huge stadium was dug below the surface, and even more amazing was how, beneath the stadium, was an elaborate, multileveled palace.
A moment later I realized that we weren’t safe yet. The Bedoowan knights had finally figured out what we were doing. Several of them were now climbing up out of the stadium to come after us.
“We gotta move,” I announced while pointing back to the palace.
Without another word we all jumped up and ran for the woods. Our best hope was to lose them in the dense forest that surrounded the Milago village. Compared to what we had just come through, this was going to be a piece of cake.