Ice Cold - Part One: The Dark Zone

Chapter Thirty

Alex backed up a step and turned around. He let out a loud gasp of panic and he realized now that there was no chance any of their enemies could ever breach the Citadel's wall here. Just in front of him, the ground suddenly dropped away into a steep cliffside. The cliff dropped so far down that Alex could not see the bottom in the middle of the night. One more step back and he would have fallen right down into the abyss below. The sudden sight scared him so much that could feel his balance faltering.

A hand quickly pressed on his chest and pushed him back against the wall. Alex caught his breath and saw Rowan just beside him, holding him back. He looked over at her with wide eyes of shock as he breathed heavily.

Rowan stared back at him. "Watch your step," she said calmly.

Alex was baffled by her strange sense of humor. "Thank you!" he muttered sarcastically.

"Did you put the stones back?" she asked, ignoring his astonishment. Without waiting for him to give an answer, she continued, "Then we won't be followed." She then turned to walk off. The strip of cliffside that they were now standing on sloped down around the tall body of the mountain plateau, almost like a natural staircase eroded into the rock. Alex was utterly amazed by all that he had seen in this place. However, at this point, he was not sure he wanted to know where this girl was taking him.

She led him down the narrow slope around the plateau. Alex could still barely see in the dark, but he kept his back against the mountainside and tried his best not to look down. "I'm not so sure about this," he stammered, trying to avoid hyperventilating.

"Relax," Rowan replied ever so coolly. "This is how I sneak out of the Citadel."

That was hardly reassuring to Alex. "I hope you don't come back up the same way."

"Of course not! I come back through the front door, usually after the sun rises."

"Uh-huh," Alex mumbled under his breath. As they continued winding around the cliffside, Alex looked up and could vaguely make out the natural land bridge far above them that connected the fortress to the surrounding mountains. When they were almost directly under the land strait, the narrow slope suddenly opened into a hillside that formed the base of the mountain. Feeling much better now that they were practically on the ground again, Alex caught his breath. "Why do you want to sneak out? I don't understand."

Rowan leaped from the slope and onto the hillside, stumbling slightly as she steadied herself. "Because my brother doesn't allow anyone to leave the Citadel without his permission. Of course, he never lets me leave anyway. This is the only way I get to roam the home that used to be a part of my life before it was taken from me."

Alex continued to follow her, as usual. Her sentiment had once again hit him in the deepest chambers of his heart, even though he still knew nothing because nobody would share any information with him. At this point, he was just going along for the ride. Or maybe there was a reason she refused to speak to him about it.

"Then is that why we snuck out in the middle of the night?" he asked, hoping this would go somewhere.

"Of course not," Rowan bluntly answered. "That would be against Delmar's orders; you're not to be set loose until further notice."

Alex abruptly stopped in his tracks. "Wait a minute, what??" He was more than perplexed by Rowan's words. Here he thought for a moment that Rowan would be sneaking him to the edge of their borders so he could finally get out of these God-forsaken mountains; but did she just blatantly tell him that she could not let him go because it would go against their leader's will, at the same time she was currently breaking them both out regardless? The logic had blown Alex's mind so much that he could not keep it to himself. "What kind of hypocrisy is that?" he blurted out. "How can you say that?"

Rowan stopped where she was and turned around to face Alex. She slowly stepped toward him, staring him in the eyes the whole time. "Because, Alex," she began in a serious tone, "there are two kinds of people up there in that tower: there is Delmar, our Chief, the one who led us from chaos in our darkest hour and built a new life for us in the Citadel, and he deserves all of our respect and loyalty. And then there is my brother, and my brother is not my keeper."

Alex tried to think of a proper response, but that short speech traveled right into his head and began to overwhelm him. "What's the difference?" he muttered roughly.

For a brief second, Rowan glanced away, as though she was being made to consider Alex's statement, but she was quick to return her gaze to him. "The light," she whispered in her response. Without another word, she turned to head deeper into the woods. Alex quickly followed, not wanting to find himself lost in the nighttime mountains at any given moment.

His eyesight greatly improved after about a half hour of hiking through the woods again. Despite that, walking around the mountains at night was absolutely terrifying, but it was a little bit better tonight since he was with someone. Alex's eyes were darting back and forth at the darkness as if he was expecting to see something truly horrifying, but Rowan hiked serenely and completely unfazed by the dark.

Alex caught up to her and walked by her side as best he could. "Rowan, we've been walking forever now. I thought you said you needed to talk to me. Why couldn't we do this back up at the Citadel?"

Rowan just continued to lead him down the mountain paths. Her ability to navigate was absolutely flawless. "Not exactly," she replied. "To be honest, I want to teach you something."

He was not quite sure what to make of that statement. "What is it, Rowan?" he persisted. "Please, talk to me! What are you trying to do?"

Rowan put her hand up to silence him. "We're close," she said under her breath.

"Close to what?" As they reached the lowlands of the mountains, Alex began looking around. He noticed the area they were coming to was cluttered with mountain laurel and rhododendron bushes. Their thick, wavy branches were numerous and allowed the bushes to stand up so tall that it would have been nearly impossible to see through them. The canopy of the tree tops was starting to break apart and the faint light of the moon and the stars began penetrating through to the ground. It made Alex's surroundings much more visible, and he was feeling a little less anxious in the dark of the night.

"I think you're gonna like this place, Alex," Rowan said as they began zigzagging through the clusters of the mountain brush. "No Outsider has ever seen it in our lifetime."

"Why is that, I wonder?" Alex asked, mainly to himself. As the two of them wound throughout the brush, he was absolutely amazed by Rowan's seemingly photographic knowledge of these lands. Alex would have gotten himself lost in seconds, but she navigated so flawlessly. Where she was taking him, he had no idea. He did not know whether he should be worried or remain calm.

Rowan rounded a corner on the thin path through the brush and stopped where she was. She stared out for a brief moment and then turned toward Alex and smiled. Responding to his previous remark, she said, "Because Outsiders can't find this place on their own." With that, she stepped aside and allowed Alex to come forward. The brush suddenly opened up and separated, and Alex's eyes adjusted even more as he gasped when he saw the sight before him.