[Chrono Trigger Novel - Episode 49] Those Who Share the Fire
Across the fire, the woman sewing a piece of leather stopped her needle when Marle finished speaking.
“What do you want on the Mountain of Woe?”
“We're looking for a man named Melchior. We heard he's being held there.”
The woman left the needle in the leather and looked them over. Her gaze moved from Marle to Crono's ragged clothes, then to Lucca's bag. A child lying near the fire stirred. She pulled the covering back over the child's feet before she answered.
“Try farther down. The elder should still be awake.”
Marle took up the bow resting across her knees. As she started to rise, the woman turned over one of the bowls beside the pot.
“Eat first.”
Small pieces of root floated in the clear broth. Marle accepted the bowl with both hands, then shifted her grip as the inside of her left arm pulled. The woman noticed but asked nothing. She simply put a little more food in the third bowl and passed it to Crono.
The low dwelling ran deeper than it had seemed from the entrance. A few steps beyond the firelight, the floor fell away and a ladder descended into darkness. The small chambers opening off the walls were full of ordinary sounds: the dull knock of a stone pestle, a spoon scraping a pot, a voice telling someone to go to sleep. Cold air from above brushed Marle's ankles. Farther down the ladder, the smell of damp stone mingled with the warmth of crowded rooms.
She ducked beneath the ceiling. In the palace, she could look up and scarcely judge how high the roof was. Here, whenever someone came the other way, she had to turn sideways to let them pass.
The elder was pushing scraps of cloth into a crack in the wall. When Lucca raised her lamp, he tipped his chin in thanks. Air hissed through the wet stone. Only after he had worked the cloth deep into the gap did he brush off his hands.
“This is Algetty. We get visitors from the sky now and then. Been a long time since anyone wanted to go up that mountain.”
Lucca spread her map on a low rock. She folded back the part showing where they had left the Epoch and pointed to the direction they had come from. The elder touched the edge of the drawing, then, to Marle's surprise, pointed straight down at his feet.
“You'll have to go through the beasts' nest. Farther below us, there's a passage to the east. At the end of it is the chain that holds the mountain.”
“You mean we climb the chain?”
“I wish I knew another way.”
He asked Lucca to turn the map a little. Tracing the bends of the passage with a fingernail, he warned them that keeping close to the wall would not make them safe. The beasts' fur was much the same color as the rock, he said, and there were claw marks well above a person's head.
“Have you been up the mountain?” Marle asked.
“Only as far as the foot of the chain. Since they took Melchior, we haven't been able to get even that close.”
“Do you know why they imprisoned him?”
The elder looked at the pendant that had slipped out of Marle's clothes. Then his eyes lifted to her face.
“Because when the queen was wrong, he told her so.”
Someone coughed in the chamber behind him. He paused, then went on without lowering his voice. The Earthbound had been summoned to carry materials for the palace beneath the sea. Some had returned at first. Lately, there had been little word of them. He did not know when the work would be finished.
“They say there's no shortage of power up in the sky. Yet there's always more for us to carry.”
Marle remembered the queen's audience chamber. That voice, able to decide anything while everyone waited for an answer. At the time, she had not seen how many people down here would have to lift another load once the queen had finished speaking.
Lucca folded the map.
“Could we have somewhere to sleep before we go down?”
Crono looked up. Lucca's eyes went first to the hand pressed against his side.
“You could barely get down the ladder just now.”
He started to move his hand away, and Marle caught his elbow. She could feel how weak her own grip was. The injuries from the palace, the exhaustion of the sewers—only now did they seem to be settling into her body. The warm broth had made her eyelids heavier, not lighter.
“I need to rest too,” she said. “If you want me to have anything left to heal you with up there.”
The elder led them into the next chamber. Dried grass lay thick on the floor, and there was an empty space along the wall. Crono watched the entrance for a while. Then he unfastened his scabbard and laid it beside his bedding.
There was plenty to do before they could even take off their shoes. Wet clothes needed drying, torn seams needed drawing together, and everything in their bags had to be taken out and wiped down. When Crono lifted his shirt, Marle caught her breath. Even in the firelight, the bruising across his lower chest was unmistakable. As she stared at it, he offered her the end of a bandage.
“You hold it this time.”
She put it back into his hand. While he kept the end in place, she passed the cloth around his back. She made him take a deep breath to check the tightness, then loosened it a little. The faint chill she gathered in her palm cooled only the swollen, heated patches. His shoulders eased as the pain subsided, but he still flinched when he turned.
Lucca waited until she was finished, then changed the dressing on Marle's left arm. Before applying the fresh cloth, she asked her to move her wrist.
“How is it when you draw the bow?”
“Drawing's all right. Holding it hurts more.”
“Then we'll plan on you not having to hold your aim for long.”
Marle was grateful for that. If Lucca had told her to put the bow aside, she might have argued before thinking. Instead, Lucca took out the two remaining metal arrows and rolled them to check for bends. Marle watched them lying side by side, then picked up a spool of thread that had escaped from the tool bag.
“Your sleeve's torn too.”
“Most of it's still attached.”
“Give me your arm.”
Lucca obliged. Each time the needle passed through the fabric, the arm inside bent carefully to accommodate it. While they worked on each other's clothes, Crono lay down and closed his eyes. It was a long while before his hand relaxed, though there was no sword in it.
At first, the coughing and dripping water kept Marle awake. Near the entrance, someone was turning the dried grass. Someone else was quietly counting out the next day's firewood. She followed the numbers until, at some point, they stopped making sense.
When she opened her eyes again, Lucca's glasses were blocking the firelight.
“Apparently the sun's up.”
Marle looked at the ceiling. It was the same rock as yesterday.
“How can you tell?”
“I asked.”
Lucca nodded toward the entrance. A child was collecting empty bowls. Meeting Marle's eyes, the child pointed at the breakfast they had brought. Marle smiled and pushed herself up, then caught her lip between her teeth when she put weight too quickly on her stiff arm.
Beside her, Crono was carefully testing how deeply he could breathe. His color had improved since the night before, but a full breath still took time. They did not leave as soon as they had eaten. They reviewed the elder's directions and divided what they would need for the walk. When Crono reached for the heaviest bag, Lucca placed the map and lamp in his hands.
“Take these up front. I'll carry them again when we reach the chain.”
Marle took the waterskin and some of the lighter dried food. Once she had chosen what she could manage and secured it at her waist, they were ready far sooner than if Crono had tried to carry everything and set off ahead of them.
Before leaving, they returned to the woman by the fire. She accepted Marle's empty bowl and pointed at her shoes.
“Let me see the soles.”
The worn leather would slip on wet rock, she told them. She brought out short leather thongs and showed them how to wrap them around the fronts of their shoes. Her rough hands gave each one a final tug to keep the knot from working underneath the sole. Crono sat beside her and bound his own shoes the same way.
Lucca asked whether they could find a length of rope. The woman fetched a coil used for tying loads from the next room. They examined the frayed places together, and Lucca practiced the knots again. No one promised that the rope would bear whatever weight they put on it.
“Bring it back when you're safely down.”
Marle's hands stilled as she accepted it. The woman was already spreading another piece of leather across her lap.
A man with a spear stood in the lower passage. He had received word from the elder and stepped aside. Just beyond him, the village firelight ended. Lucca lifted the lamp, revealing a low ledge and footprints worn smooth by water.
“Don't only watch your feet,” the man said. “Some of them hang overhead.”
Crono examined the passage before entering. Rather than press straight ahead, he chose a level patch large enough for all three of them. Marle followed with one hand on the wall. After a few bends, the smell of people gave way to damp fur and old bones.
The grooves in the floor looked as though something heavy had been dragged along them. But they did not stop at the rock ahead. They continued up it. As the lamplight followed them, thick toes appeared, gripping the stone.
The beast clung to the wall well above their heads.
Crono raised an open hand. Marle and Lucca stopped. Dust matted the creature's back, exactly the color of the rock. Its eyes moved first. Then its hind legs drew in, and Crono pointed to the open space on their right.
They scattered as it dropped. Its forefeet struck the floor, spraying chips of stone. Crono was close enough to reach its neck, but the speed with which it turned made him step back. A long arm swept through the place where his waist had been. Marle took her hand off an arrow and sent cold across the floor. The wet stone froze, and the beast's rear feet slid apart.
Lucca's fire struck through the opening. Singed fur gave off a sour smell. The beast threw back its head and lashed out harder. Crono's blade grazed the outside of its arm without slowing it. Instead, it crouched and charged with enough force to shift a boulder.
Marle glanced at the passage behind them. It was too narrow for all three to retreat at once.
“Crono! Not this way!”
He veered aside. Lucca raised a hand and waited. Rather than spread the cold farther, Marle hardened the patch she had already frozen. As the beast turned after Crono and slipped, fire engulfed the gap between its forelegs. Seeing the flames strike home, Crono closed in and drove his sword beneath its body. He pulled clear before its weight fell, but could not straighten. He dropped to one knee.
Marle went around the fallen beast to him. He raised a hand to tell her he was all right. She waited for it to come down, then checked his breathing.
“Small wounds just make it more vicious,” Lucca said.
She too was catching her breath. When she raised the lamp again, its light found deeper claw marks farther inside. Crono did not get up at once. They withdrew to a dry patch of ground and drank a little water. Whatever else lay ahead, they could not keep fighting like that.
Marle settled her bow more securely across her back. The two remaining arrows clinked in the quiver. She looked at the water pooled between the rocks, then traced the angle from which Lucca had cast her fire. They had to watch for more than beasts in the dark now. They needed to find room for one another to move.
As they set off again, metal scraped somewhere beyond the passage. The long, low vibration reached the soles of Marle's feet. Wondering whether it came from the chain the elder had described, she closed the distance to the person ahead.
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