They made their way through the last section of the sewer, which seemed to wind on forever. Dougal kept peering into the darkness, hoping to see even the faintest glow of light.
The first clue he had that they were near the exit was the way the walls of the tunnel seemed to vibrate in a tone lower than his ears could hear. He could feel it in the air, though, and eventually through the soles of his boots.
The silent thrumming slowly grew in pitch and volume until it became a dull roar. This, Dougal knew, must be the sound of the stream spilling out of the tunnel and tumbling down onto the mountainside beyond.
"We should be coming up on it soon," Kranxx said. Dougal detected a hint of worry in the asura's voice.
"You don't know? Haven't you been here before?" asked Riona.
"Of course not," said Kranxx. "Don't you know how dangerous this is? I've studied the maps many times, though."
Dougal did not find that reassuring. He was about to say something about it when Wynne disappeared.
The walkway in front of them had tilted under their weight. Pitching forward, it had thrown Wynne into the fast-moving waters. She floundered about at the surface for a moment, flapping her dead arms in some horrible mockery of an attempt to swim, and then disappeared beneath the surface.
Killeen screamed as she nearly toppled in after her undead servant. When the walkway tipped downward, she lost her balance and spun her arms in a vain attempt to recover it. Moving faster than Dougal had thought he could, Kranxx leaned forward, bending at the waist, and tapped Killeen on the shoulder with the hook attached to his back.
Killeen managed to snag the hook with her hand, but instead of the hook hauling her back, her weight pulled Kranxx forward, dragging him along to share her fate. However, this gave Dougal enough time to react, and he pushed past Riona to snag the asura by the top of his pack. For a moment he thought he might tumble in after the others, and the trap would manage to kill all three of them at once. But he dug in his heels and leaned back hard, bringing their forward progress to a halt. With Riona's help, he yanked both Kranxx and Killeen back to a solid part of the walkway, where they all collapsed in a heap.
"The bottom of the stream must drop off just ahead too," said Ember. "I can feel the undertow from here."
"Thanks for saying something before it became a problem," Riona said as she struggled to catch her breath.
Dougal checked to make sure the others were all right, then knelt down to examine the floor and see what had happened. Kranxx stood next to him, giving him plenty of light to work with.
There was a hinge on the floor, almost impossible to see, especially by a lantern's light. Dougal recognized the type of trap they'd triggered, and he cursed.
"Bear's breath! What's wrong now?" Gullik asked. "This filth is too cold to just stand here in it!"
"Lots of traps only work once," Dougal said. "This one resets itself automatically. From this hinge here onward, the walkway is actually a ramp. A set of counterweights underneath it holds it up horizontally, right up until there's enough weight on the end of the ramp. Then the ramp tips forward and dumps you right into the worst part of the sludge."
"And then you die," said Ember.
Dougal shook his head. "And then you find yourself trapped against the grating that covers the end of the tunnel, held up against it by the force of thousands of pounds of filthy water pressing you into it until you drown."
"And then you die," said Killeen.
Dougal nodded. "And then you're held there until your body rots enough for the water pressure to tear you into pieces so small that you flow out through the grate with the rest of Ebonhawke's waste."
Dougal pointed at Kranxx's glowing light. "Can you put that out?"
Kranxx pulled a heavy sack from his pack and hooded the stone with it, blocking its glow. Dougal stared ahead into the darkness until his eyes adjusted to it.
"Yes," he said, "I can see some light up ahead. I think we're near the entrance."
"Good," said Riona. "Now we just need to figure out how to get there-without dying."
Dougal glanced around, and his eyes fell on Gullik. He pointed at the norn's axe and said, "Give me that."
"You're as mad as Raven," said Gullik. "No warrior gives up his weapon until the fight is finished."
"I'm going to use it to fight the trap." Dougal put out his hands. "Trust me."
Gullik screwed up his lips as he evaluated the man and the moment, then reversed his axe and handed it to Dougal by the handle. "I expect it back in one piece."
Holding the weapon, Dougal realized just how heavy the thing was. He wasn't sure he could swing it over his head. Fortunately, he didn't have to.
He set the axe down on the walkway, then lowered himself into the sludge. It was just as nasty as it had been before. No matter how much he braced himself for the stench and the cold, it was horrible.
He took the axe and put it headfirst into the sludge before Gullik could stop him. Then he bent down deeper into the sludge until it came up to the tops of his shoulders. With a bit of wiggling, he managed to wedge the ax up under the ramp. He tested it for a moment, then let go. It was jammed in there hard enough that it stuck.
"I want my axe back," Gullik said. "I haven't lost a weapon since an icebrood I was fighting took my spear from me and used it as a toothpick."
"I just need to release the grating," said Dougal. "Then you can have it back."
He climbed out of the muck again and then beckoned Kranxx to come with him. "I need your lamp," he said, "and you're light enough to not trigger the trap with me." He looked past the aura. "The rest of you stay here. We'll be right back."
Dougal worked his way forward along the ramp on his hands and knees, waiting for the axe's handle to snap or to feel the telltale tipping sensation that meant his life would soon end. As he drew closer to the end of the ramp, he saw the outside.
The sewer exited the mountainside beneath a rocky overhang, which was why they could not see any daylight sooner. Even so, the light seemed muted, and Dougal guessed that the valley beyond the grate was probably still deep in shadow. The end of the sewer was sealed with an iron grate that had been coated with rust and slime over the past two centuries. The water surged through the grate, forming a cascade of muck that disappeared in fog below. The grate swung outward, but there was a lock on the grate that functioned only from this side, and it looked serviceable enough.
With Kranxx's light over his shoulder, Dougal crept forward until he could reach the grate and put his weight on it instead. It held as steady as the rocks in which it was anchored. He slipped his pouch of lock picks out of its pocket in his jacket and went to work. Because of the rust and filth, it took him another half-minute longer than it should have to force the lock to give, but it did.
The grate, however, was stuck.
Dougal smacked it with his hand, but that didn't do a thing. Then he tried a shoulder, but that only bruised his arm. Standing up, he charged right at it.
It gave, suddenly and too well.
As the grate swung wide, Dougal lost his footing on the wobbly ramp and pitched forward. Kranxx reached for him with the hook but missed. Unable to recover his balance, Dougal did the only thing he could think of instead: he kicked off from the ramp and stretched out into the gaping maw of fog and shadow before him.
His fingers closed on the slimy, slippery bars of the grate as it swung away from him, and he clung to them for his life. He glanced down below his dangling feet and saw that he hung over a dizzying drop that deposited Ebonhawke's sewage onto a cluster of jagged rocks. Despite himself, he shouted in terror, sure that he would not be able to maintain his tenuous grip on the treacherous grate.
"Hold on!" Riona said.
He could not turn to see what she and the others were doing, but he hoped it involved saving his life, and soon. A moment later he heard Kranxx's voice saying, "What? Wait! No!"
Then the asura came sailing past Dougal's head and straight over the grate. A rope attached to his waist drew taut, and someone on the other end of it held it fast so that Kranxx did not tumble to his death. Then that same someone yanked on the rope to bring Kranxx closer.
Once Kranxx had the grate in his grip, Dougal glanced back to see that both Ember and Gullik held the far end of the rope and were pulling hard. The grate swung shut with a satisfying clang, and the flowing sewage pushed the lower half of Dougal's body hard up against it. He used this opportunity to find a foothold and then haul himself up out of the flowage.
"Thanks!" Dougal shouted backward.
"Hey! What about me?" Kranxx shouted from the other side of the grate.
"What can you see, Kranxx?" Dougal asked.