The four-strand hemp safety line bit hard into the heavy wool of Kezra Venn’s coat as she lowered herself backward over the granite curb of the southern sounding shaft. The rope was an old friend. Water-cured river hemp, three-quarters of an inch thick, rubbed with sheep fat to prevent frost stiffening during high-sky ascents. It had been anchored twenty paces back across the courtyard around the massive stone drum of the central water tank. There, Yseld Arken stood with her boots braced against a drainage curb, managing the main friction turn with steady, calloused palms. At the shaft lip, Fellis Dain knelt on his good right knee. His braced left forearm was tucked safely behind his ribs. He watched the paid-out cord with a rigger’s critical eye.
“Rung four,” Kezra called up into the opening, her voice bouncing flatly off the damp stonework. “Rung five. The iron is pitted with red rust and scale. But the lead-poured sockets are tight in the granite cut stone.” She paused at every step, testing each cross-bar with the heavy heel of her boot before transferring her weight. Ten feet below the courtyard cobbles, the smooth dressed granite of the upper collar gave way suddenly to native limestone. It was rough, water-streaked, and cold as river ice. The air here was stale, trapped beneath the closed hatch for half a century. It carried the sharp stone stink of wet pyrite, decaying timber, and ancient coal dust.
