The mud in the drainage gutter was icy and smelled of old iron. Ysabet pulled herself forward on her left elbow and her knees, keeping her right hand tucked against her collarbone so she would not jam her stiff fingers into the rough gravel. Halfway in, the stone roof pressed down on her shoulder blades and squeezed a dull ache through her healing left ribs, where the trap-line beam had struck her weeks ago, but the settled limestone arch held steady above her back.
Ten feet inside, the gutter widened into a shallow sump directly beneath the rusted iron bars of the alcove floor.
Above the bars, Ashaun sat wedged in the corner between a weeping limestone pillar and the rough back wall. Her ankles were lashed together with braided hemp cord, and a heavy iron staple held a second rope around her waist. A purple bruise swelled across her right cheekbone, and her lips were cracked white with thirst, though she had braced her translucent stone left forearm squarely against the pillar to keep her spine upright so she could watch the catwalk through the outer bars.
Ysabet reached her left hand up through the gap where two rusted sump-bars had rotted away from their sockets and touched the heel of Ashaun’s boot.
