The Disillusion Mountains

Chapter 18

They took a day to sleep in the safety of the cliffs before moving on. Thankfully the rain held off while they rested. Unfortunately it started back up again the next morning with extreme prejudice as they moved toward the canyon. Grant was very quiet and his shoulders were tense. Nimma didn't want to push him into an unwanted talk so she stayed quiet too. Luckily the regular sounds of a wilderness had returned. Birds sang overhead and they heard wolves howl in the distance. This led them to believe they truly had passed beyond the ghost's domain where nothing but unnatural silence met the ear.

They moved slowly as Grant's ankle still hurt and Nimma was slightly dizzy from blood loss. It made the trek even more tedious as the distance to the canyon was only thirteen more miles. That was a distance they could have easily covered in a single day had they been in full health. Their medical kit had also sustained damage from the ghost attack and their pain pills were crushed or scattered along the forest floor. Luckily the infection fighting hydrogen peroxide was still intact or Nimma might have been in trouble but that did nothing for her pain or Grant's.

Their MRES had also been reduced to powder. The ghost of Regina had done far more damage than they originally thought and quickly too. Nimma prayed there were no more surprises like that one. While the MRES were still edible it made the already gross bars even grosser which didn't help the mood between them.    

To make matters worse Grant slipped and injured his ankle far more. The cliff path was so narrow that they couldn't walk side by side. The walls were too slippery and jagged for Grant to use them to support his weight. Nimma and Grant were forced to do a sort of sideways walk with Nimma supporting Grant's injured side. This slowed them down even more.

Eventually they decided that they were going to camp in one place with the tarp fastened over them until Grant was feeling up to travel. On the third night they were awakened by the scream they'd become familiar with.

"Oh God not again." Nimma jumped up and swiveled her head from side to side to see where the ghost would come from. The scream happened again but this time the shock had worn off.

"Are you hearing what I'm hearing?" Grant asked.  

"It's not coming closer. It sounds like it's far away."

"Something must have wandered into her territory."

"Its territory," Nimma corrected.   

"Fine. I don't think it's coming for us. You should get back under the tarp before you get soaked. Catching pneumonia wouldn't be fun up here." Another scream started and then was abruptly cut off and didn't repeat.

"I guess it caught it or the victim ran out of range. It was probably an animal we didn't hear anyone else scream." 

"I hope so," Grant said.

🌺

"How are we getting down? I can't repel down there without my ankle being a hundred percent." The poem map did spit them out at the edge of Shadow Cat Canyon. Nimma knew this was good. Despite being sullen she could tell Grant was also happy about this. The problem–there was no other obvious way down. It was a hundred and fifty feet to the bottom.

"Regina managed it while she was pregnant there must be another way." The fading light made Grant's face look hard. Nimma watched as the sun continued to sink lower on the horizon.

"Maybe she jumped and used magic to glide to the bottom." Grant sounded pretty snarky but there was also a bit of teasing in his tone that Nimma hadn't heard in a while. Besides for all Nimma knew that could have been exactly what Regina did so she let it go.