Absolute was her certainty that she had been in a situation like this before, though she could not remember it. In her childhood she had never been near a body of water as cold and as deep as this. Like the rope end she had felt but been unable to grasp, the memory eluded her the more she reached for it. It was one of those memories Elshield had tried and failed to extract from her mind during the ride down the mountain.

Still pointlessly trying to climb her body, the Beedle wrapped an arm around her waist. She reached down to push him away and found his face with the palm of her hand, but had nothing like the strength needed. Rough stone skidded along her shoulder: the wall of the quay, along which they were slowly descending. She groped at that with her free hand but could not find purchase.

She knew that the Beedle would not release her until death took him. Would she still be alive? Which of them would drown soonest? She desperately wished that he would. That now, while she still had the strength to swim to the surface, he would just die.

Her hand—which had been shoving at his face—felt nothing but water now. The arm was no longer around her waist. She was free, and beginning to float upward. She kicked her legs in case the Beedle had any thoughts of making another grab for her, and felt nothing. Looking down she saw nothing where the Beedle had been save an amorphous bubble of faint light—like the gleaming of a formless soul newly spawned.

A crevice between stones gave her a handhold she used in a panicky ascent. That and a few kicks and arm strokes took her to the surface. She erupted from it head and shoulders, and threw one arm up over the edge of the quay—where it was immediately pinned down by Elshield’s knee. It felt like he was putting his full weight on her wrist. She’d have cried out in pain were she not simultaneously coughing up water and whooping in air. She got her other hand out of the water; he caught it in his, then stood up and hauled her full-length into the air and flopped her down on the pavement like a landed fish. “Got her!” he called. “Call off the search!”

“No!” she gurgled. “Brindle! The rope!”