Fall Down Dead

1

For one second, she was floating. Sailing out into grey nothingness like a bird released from its cage. Cold, damp air wrapped round her body as she flung out her arms and kicked her feet in a desperate attempt to find solid rock.

She tried to scream, but the breath was torn from her throat as she fell. All she could hear was a faint, distant cry, the mewl of a terrified animal, bouncing back from the muffling curtain, drowned by the crashing of water. Her waterproof rattled against her shoulders like battered wings; her hair blew free and smothered her face. She could see nothing, feel nothing, taste only the bitter tang of fear in her mouth.

It happened so fast that her brain wasn’t quick enough to work out what was going on. The fall was too quick, too short and too sudden. The impact killed her instantly.

As she lay on the rock, with her blood dripping between the gritstone slabs, a bird called from the plateau. It was a long, mournful shriek like the voice of a spirit, a phantom that haunted Kinder Downfall.

Almost before she’d stopped breathing, a swirl of mist snaked across her legs and settled in her hair, clutching her in its chilly embrace, hiding her body from view. It would be hours before she was found, a day before they carried her down.

But hers wasn’t the first death on the mountain. Another woman had lain here, decades before. She’d left the memory of herself on this rock, though not her name. The Downfall had seen more than its share of blood.

And that was why they called this place Dead Woman’s Drop.