Lavender brought the rope with her and lowered it, but as she already knew, it wasn’t long enough to reach Osric. She could see the rock slipping and shifting under his weight, with earth and stones falling out of sight into the valley below.
“Lavender!” Osric called to her. “Take this!” He pulled his hand from the rock and put it into his cloak. He removed the Elf Queen’s crown and heaved it onto the cliff beside her. “Don’t forget me when you tell the story,” he said.
“Hang on a little longer,” she cried. “I can finish the rope.”
“The rock is giving way,” Osric said. “Goodbye, Lavender.”
She dropped the unfinished rope and took an apple from her bag. “Osric, catch!” she called, throwing the apple to him. He caught it with his left hand as the rock pulled away from the cliff. He pushed the rock away from him with his right hand as he began to plummet.
“Take a bite!” she shouted, her voice almost too small for him to hear. The wind whipped through his hair and his cloak as his speed increased through the fall. The distance to the bottom was considerable, but it was rushing toward him with frightening speed.
“At least the last thing I’ll experience is something sweet,” he thought, and he bit off half of the small apple. As the sweetness filled his mouth, his fear floated away as well. He smiled, closed his eyes, and waited for the darkness.
Comments