The drainage cut smelled of rust and drowned leaves.
Mara stood at its upper end with two empty containers while Gideon crouched beside the grating. The local guide had reached them by the south approach and pointed out the section that lifted. It had been inspected from both ends before anybody promised to put a loaded carrier through it.
A broken fixing made one corner rise higher than the rest, rusted loose from the masonry by decades of autumn runoff. Gideon tested the supporting wall with a short ash pole, then put his weight on the sound edge. The metal complained with a dull, wet groan, but the remaining anchor held.
“Keep your feet here,” he said. “Right on the concrete lip. If you drop onto the silt, the gravel underneath will slide before you catch the rail.”
Mara looked at the strip of concrete. It was wide enough for one foot and the side of the other. The ditch beneath held a shallow current that hid its bottom under brown leaves.
She put the empty containers down on a patch of dry weed before reaching for the rail. Her right palm stung beneath its linen dressing, the raw skin sticky where the handle had rubbed during the walk from Candlewake.
