Free Restless Soul by Alex Archer

make it to the needlelike opening.
    Her world went to blackest black. She blinked furiously, but nothing changed. She could see nothing.
    She could no longer see the slit overhead, or maybe she was looking right at it but was unable to differentiate it from the deepest of shadows cast by the stone. There was nothing as resolutely dark as a cave. She had a flashlight, but with both hands needed for climbing, she couldn’t safely reach for it.
    Luartaro must have dropped the lantern in the rush of water, or perhaps it merely gave up the last of its gas, she thought.
    She knew he was all right. She could hear him calling for Zakkarat, and could hear the Thai man shouting nervously back.
    “Annja!”
    “I’m fine, Lu.”
    “The lantern’s gone. We can’t see anything.”
    “I’m still climbing, Lu.” She took in a deep breath, then closed her eyes and concentrated. She fought against the blackness to remember the image of the cave wall.
    She pictured a section that looked like the spine of some large beast and felt a rocky vertebrae shape in front of her face. She stretched up with her right arm, fingers groping against the stone until they wedged themselves in a crevice. She pushed off the last of the pitons she’d embedded and ascended higher.
    No use going for more pitons, she thought. While she could probably do that by feel—find the pitons in her pack, place and hammer them in—she decided instead to spend all of her energy on finding natural handholds.
    Free me.
    Annja let out the breath she’d been holding and centered herself. She couldn’t afford panic. Despite the rising water, the voice in her head and the frantic words of her companions below, she had to stay cool.
    Annja could not allow herself the luxury of even a moment’s doubt. Concentrate, she told herself. Remember what the wall looked like.
    Falling could mean not only her death, but the deaths of Zakkarat and Luartaro. The whole trip had been her idea, as had her need to go cave exploring, and so she was responsible for them.
    She thrust the sounds of the water and the men to the back of her mind and focused on the image of the wall. Slowly, feeling the nubs and cracks in the rock, she pulled herself higher and higher.
    She worked slowly and methodically and was rewarded with the smell of earth and wood. She was nearing the section of wall where they’d spotted roots.
    She wasn’t terribly far from the slit she envisioned herself squirming through. But could she free-climb to it in the absolute dark?
    She often amazed herself with her physical feats, but the notion of reaching the slit under the current conditions might be impossible. But what other choice did she have? She had to try!
    And she was going to use the stretch of earth to help her. She’d dig handholds there to gain a better position to work from and to hopefully retrieve her flashlight so she could get a look at the ceiling.
    Luartaro called to her again, but she ignored him. Mind made up and plan conceived, she couldn’t risk dividing her attention at the moment.
    Annja felt dirt with the fingertips of her right hand. It was hard packed, but presented a good possibility.
    While she couldn’t dig through stone with her sword, she could dig through dirt to make some hand-and footholds. Her mind stretched out and wrapped around the pommel of Joan of Arc’s ancient weapon.
    At the same time, she reached up with her left hand and wrapped her fingers around an exposed root. She let go with her right hand.
    In that instant she felt the familiar weapon and gripped hard, driving the powerful blade into the earth.
    It went in easier than she’d expected. Do it again, she thought, pulling herself up, withdrawing the blade and plunging it in again a little higher. Her arms burned from the exertion of climbing, but she was in too perilous a situation to pay attention to the sensation.
    “Annja!” Luartaro called once more. This time his voice was accompanied by a beam of light