Bram Möller's Arc

Chapter 46 of 63

The storm did not ease. It leaned harder on the bag. Bram kept one hand on the brass ring of the orchid at the rail and one on the south line. Sleet raked the fabric above him. The bag bucked with each gust, and every buck ran down the two lines into stone. Omondi crouched by the south pin now, ear near the collar. He looked up through fogged glasses. "South's talking too. Not grinding. Squeaking. The iron's flexing in the seat." Bram followed the line up with his eyes. The north line ran to the ring bolt twelve feet above. The bolt held, but the line sawed against the lip of rock each time the bag pitched. He could see a bright scar where the rope had already skinned itself. "If the south goes, the bolt takes the whole load at a bad angle," Bram said. "It'll shear the line on that lip before we get another rope up." "So we take load off both," Omondi said. "Vent the bag down." "We vent, we lose lift. If the pins hold, we still can't launch after." "If the pins don't hold, we don't launch at all." Bram opened his journal against his chest. Water beaded on the page. His old margin note for this face showed the south pin with a small circle and two letters: DP. Deep pit. He had cut a pit under the pin one summer to seat it against a downhill pull. The pit was for pull, not lift. The storm was lifting the bag, and the pin was rocking in its socket the wrong way. "Cora," he said. "Tie off the owl. I need you on the ring." She set the mechanical owl in the lee of the rail and came. He put her hand on the brass ring of the orchid. "When I say, ease it a quarter turn. Not more. Watch my hand." "A quarter," she said. Bram nodded to Omondi. Omondi braced the south line. Bram raised his hand and dropped it. Cora eased the vent. Steam hissed. The bag settled half a yard. The south pin stopped squeaking. The north line went slack against the lip, then took weight clean off the scar. "Hold there," Bram said. They held. The storm kept coming. The bag rode lower now, closer to the rock, but the load on both anchors had dropped. The scar on the north line stopped growing. Omondi wiped his glasses. "You've spent your climb margin. The crown seam won't like a hard lift out of here." "I know," Bram said. Cora kept her hand on the ring. Sleet ran off her sleeve. "We wait it out?" "We wait it out," Bram said. "Then we find a low way off this face." The pins held. The bolt held. The bag rode the wind at half height, and the route went on without them for another hour.