We Are Not Eaten by Yaks

We Are Not Eaten by Yaks

Author:C. Alexander London
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Penguin Group US
Published: 2011-01-23T16:00:00+00:00


19

WE DESCEND INDECENTLY

THEY LEFT THEIR MAKESHIFT camp as the sun came up, after a breakfast of fruit and nuts that Lama Norbu had scrounged from the forest. Oliver smelled the food before eating it to make sure it wasn’t poisoned. Celia, who knew from soap operas that good poison couldn’t be smelled or tasted, watched Lama Norbu eat first.

Mist still hung heavy over the forest. Birds chirped their morning songs, and monkeys called to each other. The twins stumbled down a narrow path behind Lama Norbu. Celia let Oliver carry the backpack because she was tired. They heard a roar nearby and froze where they stood. Lama Norbu swung his gun from his back and they stood in place for a few minutes, listening to the forest.

“Is that the yeti?” Oliver whispered to his sister.

“Shhhhh,” she said.

They waited, but when nothing burst from the mist to attack them, they continued on their way. Some of the bushes and trees had mysterious ribbons tied to them. Others had what looked like hubcaps hanging from their branches.

“Prayer wheels,” explained Lama Norbu. “Pilgrims journeying from the valley to the sacred mountains above us will leave these wheels and banners along their path to mark their progress and to bless others who pass this way.”

They continued on under the flapping banners and spinning wheels for another hour. The day started to get hotter and stickier. The cold air from the mountains pressed down on the hot air in the valley, coating the forest in a heavy mist that made everything feel like a dream. Shadows moved in the mist and the flapping banners sounded like the whispering of ghosts. This was not a friendly forest. The twins felt like they were being watched.

Suddenly, as they passed through the haze, the path simply ended in front of them. They stood at the edge of a cliff that went straight down to the river at the bottom of the canyon. They could hear the roaring of the Hidden Falls below.

“Where do we go from here?” Celia wondered.

“We must cross the gorge,” Lama Norbu said. “I hope you do not fear heights.”

He pointed to a thin wire that stretched from one side of the gorge to the other high above the rapids. The other side was at least the length of a football field away.

“I wasn’t afraid of heights before,” Celia said. “Though I might be now.”

Oliver didn’t say anything because he could feel his stomach in his throat. The memory of falling out of the airplane was still fresh. Oliver couldn’t help but notice that the wire was about as thick as the kind of wire used to hook up cable television. It looked about as sturdy too.

What would Agent Zero do? Oliver thought to himself, and then he remembered that Corey Brandt, the actor in Agent Zero, had a stunt double. Agent Zero would probably hang out in his trailer drinking Fanta while someone else took all the risks. Some unlucky kid like Oliver.

Lama Norbu pulled out a few scraps of cloth from his robes and handed them to the twins.



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