Gift of Gold (The Year of Churning Bloods) (40 page)

              “Why did you practice if you knew it wouldn’t serve a purpose?”

              “Would you be content sitting motionless in a stupid sack of meat all hours of the day?” Umber asked in an irritable growl.

My neck grew warm.  “Well... I...” I rubbed my arms self consciously. “
Thank you
,
”
I whispered
.

The spirit blinked, obviously not expecting this as a response. Umber
seemed to nod slightly,
before
simply fad
ing
out of view.

I would be worried about this later.
Very
worried. But for the moment, I was just glad to be alive.
The top s
helf was considerably warmer than the bottom one, with patches of the metal flooring poking through a layer of melted ice. Looking around, I was somewhat pleased to see
the
area
was surprisingly empty,
with only objects present being a few sets of leather armour, a couple of strange looking bones preserved in splintered wooden crates
and a large straw sack full of clearly labeled
‘
explosive rocks.
’

              “Was Minget misremembering where his food was located?” I wondered, wandering around the shelf aimlessly. I searched inside each of the boxes for a second time and still found nothing of any importance. Warily advancing up to the bomb rocks, I reluctantly decided I should at least take the time to read the warning label:

Combination detonation devices

And “bird feed”

Highly explosive.

Do not throw.

Do not light on fire.

Do not apply pressure.

Do not shake.

Do not feed to regular birds.

             
“This is the bird feed?” I groaned in loud distress. “Why does it have to explode of all things? Seething with anger I began to pace around.

              “It wouldn’t be a complication if you just took the time to look around.” Umber said, hovering over a strange looking contraption I hadn’t noticed before.

Tucked quietly back near the edge of the shelve was a heavy looking cart
resting on a sturdy track that went all the way down to the ground floor.
Attached to the
backside of the cart was a thick rope connected to an oversized pulley for what I assumed only was for retrieving the cart.

              “So all I’ve got to do is send the rocks with the cart, then climb back down and retrieve the explosives?” I bit my lower lip and nodded. “That doesn’t sound too difficult.”

              “Mortal,” Umber began uncertainly. “I don’t mean to dampen your enthusiasm, but I would like to bring to your attention the fact that the rope ladder going back down is no longer there.”

I stopped moving and slowly turned to look at Umber, not understanding what he was saying. Before he could speak again, I rushed to the side of the shelf and let out a cry of distress as I saw only a fragment of the twine from before dangling over the side of the structure.

              “How?” I asked, throwing myself away from the edge and sinking to my knees.

              “I had to slice it with the fractured pipe in order to save us. Don’t you remember?” I shook my head furiously and buried my head in my arms.

              “What would you have done if there was no way to get back to the bottom floor?” I asked angrily.

Umber sniffed, looking deeply offended. “I imagine we would have to improvise. If you wanted to keep hanging by your ankle you should have told me. I would have been more than happy to let us fall to our dooms.” Umber shot forward, pressing his entire steely gaze on me. “Now are you going to keep complaining, or begin thinking of a way out of this predicament?”

I wrinkled my nose and folded my arms crossly. I would need to find a way to bring both myself and the bomb rocks to the bottom floor safely with only a rickety mineshaft wagon.
Looking at the track leading down
the shelves
I could see that there were an amazing amount of sharp turns. No doubt the explosive
material
would get shaken up very badly
and potentially explode while traveling down the shaft.

             
I carefully opened the bag of bomb rocks and reluctantly began picked one up.
E
ac
h of the forty-something stones in the bag was the size of a large fist. The ovular rocks looked almost like cracked chickens eggs, except slightly rounder, darker in colour and covered in a fine black powder that smelled of smoke. “I need to do a test run to see if the rocks can make it the entire journey.” I said to myself after a long period of careful observation.
I quickly stuffed the cart with
about five
of the rocks and the crate of the exotic and foul smelling bird skeletons.
Once in the car, I gave the mechanism a massive heave, and watched breathlessly as the cart started its descent.
The first turn came, and although
it looked sharp,
the rocks handled it fairly well. A
ccelerating much more quickly than I anticipated, I flinched when the cart hit the next turn with far greater force. One of the bomb rocks began to sizzle slightly as if it were a moist piece of meat hitting a hot grill.

              After only a third of the way down, the rocks exploded powerfully.
The bones that were once in the cart had been flung out by the explosion, and
singed
by the flames. They hit the
distant floor
with a quiet
resonating
clink many seconds later. Obviously
, j
ust sending them down
by themselves wouldn’t work.
Using the heavy pulley tied to the cart fift
een floors down
, I began to turn the various cogs and gears of the mechanism that brought
the wagon back to me
. I not
iced
the remainder of the black power and rubble that coated the inside of the cart when it returned for its next victims.

              I grabbed one of the three remaining crates and this time stuck six bomb rocks
inside
the crate, hoping that the wood could be a little
more gentle
on the bomb rocks tha
n
the steel on the cart. I let the
mechanism
go and
again watched as the cart progressed.
For a moment
i
t almost looked like it was going to make it to the very bottom
,
h
owever on the final drop the pebbles decided they had enough and exploded in resignation.
I w
heel
ed
the cart up once more and
wondered
how I could get the bomb rocks more protection from the impacts of the turns. The leather armor! Of course! Stuffing an explosive rock into each individual piece of armor and then into the
mine cart
, I watched with intense satisfaction, as the cart reached its destination safely. While the
accomplishment was big, it was truthfully only half of the journey.

              “It’s your turn now,” Umber said calmly.

I nodded fiercely in an attempt to ward any fear I may have had looking over the ledge.
The cart
was
smelly and hostile as It rolled up to the stop with a loud screech
.
As if
sinking into a hot bath, I slowly eased myself into the container, making absolutely sure I didn’t even so much as brush up against a rock.
I was waist deep in a sea of leather and death
.

I flinched as my right leg stroked something odd and angular, but calmed as I realized that I was resting on a brake that I could use to gently lower myself downward.
My best hope I figured, was to hold and release the brake every second or so, so as not to upset the rocks. The cart would be a whole lot
heavier
with me in it, but at the very least, I could stop
it
whenever I wanted. Without even thinking, I released the brake.
The first ramp came and before I had time to
take a breath, the cart
shot down
it like water through a pipe
. I yanked the brake
with as much force as I could muster
but
it
jammed on a
leather glove, preventing it from activating properly.
A
cascade of sparks poured out of the
back in response to the halfhearted attempt at stopping.

              My blood almost turned to ice as o
ne of the rocks in the cart
began
to fizz. I wailed in alarm
and threw it out of the contraption which was in the process of hurtling down another quick corner
.
The explosive
rebounded off the ice wall and landed square
on
the floor third to the top.

              It
combusted
with
impressive might
,
damaging two of the four columns
holding the other
couple
floors up.
In frozen flashes of trepidation, I watched
the
top most shelves
slowly crumble into rubble which began hurtling towards the ground. A large falling stone ripped apart the track behind me
,
snapping the rope connecting the cart to the pulley and sending thick splinters flying in all directions.
The
clattering boom of metal and stone debris hitting the floor caused me to instinctively l
et go of the brake and
fling my hands
to my ears to protect myself from the
deafening
noise
.
With the cart now completely free it continued to accelerate, rounding
a corner with
enough speed to nearly detach itself from the track.

              The cart fell like a lead balloon
and while that's realistically what it
was, it seemed to zoo
m down the ramp faster than physically possible.
I had to get the brakes unjammed and stop the cart before the end, otherwise
it
would fly off the end of the track
s. I grabbed the piece of leather wedged in between the brakes and eventually dislodged it, sending two bomb rocks flying in the process. One of them landed on the track in front of me, and began to fizz in preparation for detonation.
I released the grip I had on the brake and leaned forward
, ignoring
everything else. Nothing more mattered than this
unlikely survival
. I had to make it over this bomb rock before it exploded. The cart
flew
over the
bomb rock just as it blew up and the force of the explosion sent the cart careening down the final hill even faster than before.

              I
gripped
the brake firmly and leaned back
, hoping against all hope that this would be enough to spare my life. A
cascade of sparks made from frict
ion
flooded from behind the
car
, turning the track red hot. I ignored this and
tugged back hard enough to make me tremble from sheer force
.
To my relief, the cart slowly came to a stop and stopped with a small tink as the head of the cart lightly tapped the end of the track. I forced a single eye open and practically floated away with creamy relief as I realized I had made it down to the bottom floor safely. I opened up the grubby straw sack and carefully began to place the bomb rocks one by one back into their original container. A distant echo sounded out from somewhere far above me.
“It's the other rock,” I
assured
myself. “It
’
s the other rock that got launched out of the car.”
As soon as I said this though, I knew something wasn’t right.
. This explosion lasted far too long. It was
a
loud crack, followed
by
deep sinister
rumbling.