[ Mace can absolutely tell Ian's laughing at him internally and resolutely does not look him in the eye until after he redeems himself with the thrown rock and takes his hand again, with a half-smirk.
That drops immediately when the clang rings out, and his head whips around in the direction it'd come from as Ian starts next to him. But —
Wait, of course. It has to be the metal sheet he'd just thrown into the water, and the flicker of hope inside him grows to a small flame; the metal might've hit the exit point of the river, and if that's the case, that means it's not too far.
Ian's hand flexes around his own and Mace tightens his grip reassuringly as they start to carefully cross the bridge. Just because he's hopeful doesn't mean he's trusting it fully, though, and it's slow-going; Mace keeps himself ahead of Ian same as he had in the tunnel, using his foot to feel along the stone as they walk, testing for the slightest hint of structural weakness.
There's none. The only thing strange is the water, because while it had looked impenetrably dark from the mouth of the tunnel, up close it's startlingly clear. Mace thinks he can even make out the riverbed, although what he's seeing is both troubling and outright strange.
It almost looks as though there's a railroad running along the length of the river.
By the light of Ian's torch, they make it almost all the way across when Mace looks up from his intermittent bridge-watching, and curses sharp and quiet. Up ahead, some distance after the bridge ends, is a steep wall of rock that looms up into the darkness.
In the wall itself, a thin outline unmistakably in the shape of a door. ]
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That drops immediately when the clang rings out, and his head whips around in the direction it'd come from as Ian starts next to him. But —
Wait, of course. It has to be the metal sheet he'd just thrown into the water, and the flicker of hope inside him grows to a small flame; the metal might've hit the exit point of the river, and if that's the case, that means it's not too far.
Ian's hand flexes around his own and Mace tightens his grip reassuringly as they start to carefully cross the bridge. Just because he's hopeful doesn't mean he's trusting it fully, though, and it's slow-going; Mace keeps himself ahead of Ian same as he had in the tunnel, using his foot to feel along the stone as they walk, testing for the slightest hint of structural weakness.
There's none. The only thing strange is the water, because while it had looked impenetrably dark from the mouth of the tunnel, up close it's startlingly clear. Mace thinks he can even make out the riverbed, although what he's seeing is both troubling and outright strange.
It almost looks as though there's a railroad running along the length of the river.
By the light of Ian's torch, they make it almost all the way across when Mace looks up from his intermittent bridge-watching, and curses sharp and quiet. Up ahead, some distance after the bridge ends, is a steep wall of rock that looms up into the darkness.
In the wall itself, a thin outline unmistakably in the shape of a door. ]
Ian, you seeing this?