Check out the update to The Eyes of God:

Grabbing another root, I turn and face the wall in earnest. My arms quake as I lift myself, one handhold at a time, up to the ledge, the final step out of this pit. Blindly, my hand searches above for something to grasp. Brushing the frayed end of a cord, my fingers curl around the rough coils of a rope. Drawing this into my chest, I feel the increasing resistance of a bending limb, the complaining creaking wood above accompanying my movement. Curling the rope around my hand, I give it two tugs.

In my mind I see it, letting go of the roots and trusting the rope: the branch cracking, splitting from the trunk, myself falling. I imagine my own screams as I descend, and wonder if I’ll die before the bleached wood of the dead tree falls upon me, or if I’ll survive even that only to be pinned, a feast for those ravenous blind insects.

“You’ve tried once without the rope, and nearly fell,” Oraculi caws. “You cannot stay in the roots forever: your tired grip will fail and you’ll fall. Try the rope.”

Letting go of the roots, I clutch the rope in both hands. Descending, the branch complains at my weight. I wait for the loud crack ensuring my demise. Swinging back and forth, I stay in the air. The limb, though boisterously threatening to give, holds. Planting my feet once again into the wall, I begin walking up the side of the canyon, and finally come up out of the hole.