At The Sign Of The Happy Helg

Chapter 14

They had reached the end of the cavern where the walls narrowed toward a black crevice.  John's eyes flicked to Teyla's and he saw his own uncertainty reflected.  If Smeadon had struck a bargain for their release, these troops would not want their hostages, their barrier against attack by Atlantean forces, to be spirited away.

The muzzle of a gun pressed into his cheek and Karron's harsh voice whispered threateningly over his shoulder.

"Just try it.  Try it and I'll shoot her.  Do you think these men care if there's one or two of you?"

"They'd care if there's neither.  They'd care that you're a traitor."

The muzzle pressed more harshly.  "Try it, then, and see your friend killed."

John allowed himself to be pushed forward into the narrow passageway.

oOo

"Rodney, wait!" Carson struggled up the narrow defile, labouring under the load of his heavy kit.  Rodney didn't hear, and Carson was losing sight of him on the overgrown path.  It was like a steep tunnel, earth and rock underfoot, overhung by briars and thorn bushes, sometimes narrowing so much that Carson had to force his way through, his arms protecting his face.  He could no longer even hear Rodney, and then the way became so overgrown that he had to get down on his hands and knees and crawl, the damp seeping through the knees of his pants.  His pack snagged on something; he was stuck.

"Rodney!" Carson tried to push forward but the tangle of briars didn't yield.  Then he felt himself unhooked and there was a hand in front of his face.  He grasped it and was pulled, feet flailing, out into the open, onto coarse, tussocky grass.  Carson heaved himself gratefully up and stood, bent, hands on his knees, puffing.

Fresh, blustery wind pushed at him in gusts, splattering large drops of rain in his face.  Banks of low cloud rolled across the gray-brown, undulating landscape; they had emerged onto the high moorland.  Carson turned and looked back the way they had come.  The slope below was steep, rocky and, in places, sheer.  A sweep of hostile vegetation plunged down through overlapping buttresses of land; if he hadn't known it was there, Carson would have struggled to trace any route passable without climbing equipment.

"Rodney, what are we doing up here?" Carson had to shout over the roaring of the wind in his ears.

"Following!" yelled Rodney.  Carson was surprised; he knew his friend was not usually enthusiastic when it came to physical activity, and the exhilaration in his face, the pink cheeks and gleaming blue eyes made him look like a stranger.  He supposed the release of pent-up frustration and helplessness must have given Rodney a burst of energy.

"Come on!" Rodney grabbed Carson's arm and pulled him along the faint animal trail between the winter-brown heather and stalks of tough grass.  A cloud-bank tumbled across in front of them and they could only follow the trail and hope Boudicca was ahead.  Carson felt the cold clamminess against his face and settling in his hair.  Rodney, only a couple of yards ahead, was a dim, dark gray shape amidst the paler gray surroundings.  Then he came into focus and Carson realised he had stopped.  He could hear Rodney's panting breath and his own, but nothing else.  Rodney spoke, and his words were muffled and dead, damped by the engulfing grayness.

"What's that?"

Carson moved up alongside him.  A great mass of darkness reared high above them, looming out of the threatening unknown, seeming to shift in the swirls of obscuring vapour.  They stood, unmoving, silent.  Then there was an eerie, hollow-sounding call and Carson's stomach dropped and his teeth clenched in fear.  Rodney, however, stepped forward and, with a great gust of wind, the rolling grayness was swept away into ragged streamers and Carson could see a huge outcropping of black rock.  On a ledge halfway up, stood their guide.  She called again, turned, and disappeared into the solid mass.