Lillibeth Tripp's Arc

Chapter 9 of 9

The drop swallowed them, then spat them sideways onto a rusted grate jutting from the cliff face. Lillibeth caught the edge with both hands. Tala landed beside her, breathing hard. Bright fungus dripped from the underside of the platform, casting soft teal and pink light on their boots. It was a perch, not a place to stay. Lillibeth crawled to the railing and looked down. Through a huge stone arch below, dark shapes swept and banked. Six of them. Maybe more. Their wings were wider than her whole body, and their heads tilted side to side as they flew. Not searching with eyes. Searching with noses. "They smell us," Tala said. Flat. Certain. "The wraps hide light. Not scent." Lillibeth's hand went to her pack. She pulled out a small resin globe her teacher had left behind — heavy, full of swirled oils and old preserved insects. She had never known what it was for. She knew now. She cracked the seal with her knife. A thick, musky smell poured out, sharp enough to make Tala flinch. Lillibeth smeared the oil on her cloak, on Tala's wrap, on the breathing sack where the small pink rabbit twitched its nose. Below, the circling broke. One hunter peeled off, confused, then another. The flock scattered through the arch, sniffing at nothing, chasing a trail that was suddenly everywhere and nowhere. Lillibeth waited until the last shape vanished past the stone. "Now," she whispered. They dropped from the grate together and caught the wind clean. They flew until the cliff was a line behind them. Lillibeth's hands shook on the empty globe. The oil was used up. Whatever came next, she would meet it without her teacher's gift, and smelling like something no predator would soon forget.