Lilt unfolded her wide grey fins at once, stepping out of the warm vent draft with a low trill in her throat. She could not carry Chaska in the narrow cave with Chaska’s left shoulder bound in a sling, but the big female sandray knew the weight and balance of that waxed canvas better than any handler in the room.
When Chaska hooked the upper brass grommets of the sailcloth over the stone horn on the eastern side of the breach, Lilt waded into the knee-deep surge, caught the outer boom-hem in her front claspers, and glided ten feet across the foaming chute to pin the far edge against the dry limestone lip.
The heavy waxed sail bellied out like a spinnaker as the water hit it, absorbing the rhythmic thump of the bell’s pulse without cracking and curving the torrent away from the lake chute toward the grounding beds.
“Bottom corner’s lifting!” Corporal Vane shouted from the waist-deep water on the left bank, where the lower leather harness-loop of the sail thrashed wildly in the undertow.
Before Kiv could wade across the slick sill, old Siv lunged off the dry shelf, planted all four iron-clawed feet in the gravel pocket above the drop, and clamped his jaws hard over the thrashing leather buckle-strap at the bottom corner of the canvas.
