“Kitalia!” Kre gasped when he regained his ability to speak. “You scared the living spirit out of me.”
His head flicked up, towards the opening, and then back down at her again. “How did you…?”
“Turns out,” she said with a smile, “those rabbits did a really great job at building a den. Up on top of the cliff, do you see that big tree?” She moved next to him and pointed.
“No,” he said, sighing. It was now quite obviously clear that Ylveryan night vision was hands down better than any Tehynshins.
“Well, there is a large tree up there, and the rabbits dug out just under some of it’s roots as well, linking the cliff den to the opening beneath the tree. Our new home for the next couple of days has a built-in escape tunnel.”
“How about built-in ah-bahn-issa?” he asked, worried about her answer.
“It is ahb… ah with the exhale… niss… Abanis. And there are none in there. There were no rabbits either. My guess is that this den’s creatures were caught out by something else while searching the area for food.
“In any case,” she said, patting him on the shoulder, “start climbing and get in there so we can call it a night… or more accurately, a morning.”
“I can’t remember the last time I stayed up to see the sunrise. I think it was almost always accidental, rather than purposeful.”
“You have had a very strange youth, Kre.”
He nodded his agreement as he reached out to start his climb. A few feet from the ground, he heard Kitalia snicker, “Perhaps you should put pants on first, as there will be very little room to move about up there.”
He suddenly lost his footing, slid down, and landed hard on his partially covered rear-end. With his face red with embarrassment, he tried to play off the fall, “I had that same thought, and figured I’d just get down here just as fast as I could to get pants on. Why don’t you get up there while I do this?”
She snickered again and shrugged her shoulders. Tossing her hair behind her, she scrambled up the cliff face with significantly more grace than her previous ascent, as if she were trying to be showy.
Kre grumbled as he pulled his spare trousers out of the bag and pulled them on, barely bothering to tighten the belt. He figured that in the cramped space, they would need any amount of comfort they could muster, and a loose-fitting belt would make it far easier to crouch and hunch for long periods of time.
By the time he was dressed, there was no sign of Kitalia. Though his stomach grumbled to the point that he wondered if she would have any food warmed up yet, he was more interested in getting some sleep. The life of a fugitive was clearly one filled with dread, suspicion, and midnight flights.
Moving much slower and causing more rocks and dirt to break free than his companion did, he finally succeeded at reaching the small opening. He looked at it incredulously, as if wondering just how he was going to make his larger frame fit through.
“Head-first,” came Kitalia’s answer to his unspoken thoughts, as she often did. “Arms above your head, reach in as far as you can, and I shall help you by pulling once I see your hands.”
“Well,” he muttered to himself, “what’s the worst that can happen?”