At two and a half miles above the core floor, the upright dark rock chimney split into a series of staggered earth-shaking terraces.
Lin Tao hauled himself over the lip of a four-pace granite shelf, rolled onto his back. Then he took three long, disciplined breaths of thin mountain air. His palms throbbed with a dull, rhythmic ache where the coarse hemp climbing thick ship rope had rubbed against the bitter pine-resin salve. But the burn dressings had held. No fresh star-fire leaked through the linen wraps. Above him, the towering chimney curved gently to the north, funneling a brisk, clean draft that tasted of pine needles and snowmelt.
Beside him, Tie Shan pulled himself onto the ledge with a single, sweeping heave of his right arm, sitting down heavily against the granite back-wall.
The giant unslung a heavy canvas canteen from his belt with his right hand, pulled the cork with his teeth. Then he took three deep swallows of boiled spring water before passing it across to Lin Tao. The sheer mass of the man seemed carved from the same earth-shaking shelf they rested upon. His broad chest rose and fell in slow, unrushed measures that betrayed none of the cardiovascular panic common to mortal climbers at high height.
