Page 34 of Mr. Darcy's Folly
A muffled voice echoed through the chamber from above.
“Darcy? Can you hear me? Is Miss Bennet with you?”
Mr. Darcy stilled, tightening his hold. “Fitz!” he called back, his voice hoarse but sharp with urgency. “She is!”
“Ah, excellent!” the colonel called again, his tone edged with relief. “Follow my voice. We have found a way through!”
“Come, this way,” Mr. Darcy said. He helped her to navigate the shifting rubble as they followed the colonel’s voice. It rang clearer with every precarious step.
As they reached the lowest part of the path that ran along the wall, just before it began to rise up towards the colonel’s voice, there was a three-foot gap between where they stood and the other side of the trail.
Elizabeth shuddered.
“Stay here.” Mr. Darcy hopped across the divide with ease, and then reached back across, his hands held out.
She stared at them, then glanced down. Even in the dark she could see that the drop was an exceedingly long one.
“Miss Bennet,” Mr. Darcy said sternly, “do not look down.”
“Too late.” She closed her eyes. With a deep breath, she opened them again and grasped his hands.
He waited. “You must be sure before you jump,” he told her. “Are you ready?”
She shook her head. Took a deep breath. “I am ready.”
“Very good. I shall count to three and then you will jump and I will help pull you across.”
Elizabeth nodded.
“One . . .”
“Two,” she replied.
“Three,” they said together. Elizabeth bent her knees and jumped, more on her good leg than her bad, but just as he had promised, Mr. Darcy pulled her to him. She landed with the toes of her boots resting atop his, his arms around her. She looked up at him.
“I have scuffed the leather,” she said in a faint attempt to tease. “I hope your current valet will not resign too.”
Mr. Darcy did not respond, only tightened his hold upon her and led them both up the remaining path, one arm remaining around her as they climbed.
The air grew thinner, the dust choking, but then—light.
Colonel Fitzwilliam’s face appeared through a small hole ten feet above them, grinning despite the dirt streaking his face. “You both look positively dreadful.” Then, his voice dropped, firm with command as he addressed Mr. Darcy. “The hill will not last long. We are working as quickly as we can, but you must both be ready to move the moment we can make the opening wide enough.” He extended an arm down to pass a small flask to his cousin. “Water,” he said. “You two must be parched.”
Mr. Darcy handed her the flask and insisted she drink.
She wrinkled her nose as she drank. It was terrible. “The water tastes like spirits, but at least it is wet. Here, you should drink.”
He took the flask and drank what remained.
A low, ominous groan echoed through the cavern walls, the sound reverberating in his bones—a dreadful promise that they were not yet safe. Above them, the rock shuddered, small stones raining down in warning.
Darcy ignored the pain in his head and a new one that burned in a straight line from between his shoulders to the centre of his back. He stepped up on a larger chunk of stone and grasped the edges of the small opening, pulling himself up far enough to peer through, blinking in the painfully bright light of the day. Through it he could see Fitz’s grim face as he worked a few feet away, the men beside him digging around and hacking away at the fallen stone with the desperation of those who knew that time was not favourable to their cause.
“Step back,” Fitz called when he saw Darcy, urgency sharpening his voice. “We are nearly through.”
Darcy dropped back down with a grunt. Just a bit more exertion now, and then he could rest. He took Miss Elizabeth’s hand and pulled her to him, bending over her once more as the tremors returned yet again, strong ones that shook loose a fresh cascade of dirt and pebbles from above.
“Hurry, Fitz!” he barked.
