“You ready?”
Boy. A voice. Not his. Whose? Chris didn’t know. His mind felt as if it were teetering on the brink, like the smallest tap or tiniest misstep would tip him hurtling over the edge and into oblivion and maybe, this time, for good.
“Pull,” the boy said.
A second later, a blowtorch went off in his back and scorched its way from his pelvis through his chest. The pain was enormous, like an atom bomb. Before that moment, he hadn’t realized he’d even been gone, but now he slammed back, hard and fast and all at once on a heaving red tide of agony. “Aaahhh,” he moaned.
“Is that him?” The boy sounded astonished.
“Yeah, wait!” A girl’s voice, young, and very close, almost at his ear. “Wait, stop! I think he’s awake! Hello? Are you there?”
There … yes … He lost the thread. Had he even spoken? Blacked out, maybe. He just couldn’t tell.
“Probably just reflex.” The boy, again. “Eli, let’s try—”
“Wait.” A second girl, older, her voice deeper, gently insistent. “Are his eyes open? Did they move?”
The boy: “What does that matter?”
The older girl: “If he’s conscious …”
“No, his eyes are still closed.” The younger girl, again, and now he realized that she was very close. He could feel the warm whisper of her breath. “But when you guys moved the door, his face twitched. Maybe we’re hurting him more?”
Door … what … where … He couldn’t hold the thought. He faded in and out, his consciousness like the bob of a lost balloon high above the distant lights of a faraway carnival. He thought he might be on his stomach. What was the last thing he remembered?
“I don’t know if we got a choice. Unless you guys have a better idea of how to get him out from under there?” When there was no response, the older boy said, “Okay, then let’s do this. You ready in there?”
“Just a sec,” the little girl called. Her voice dropped. “You need to go, girl. Go on.”
He sensed movement; heard the shuffle of something over snow, a crinkle, and then a strange chuffing. Dog? A moment later, the weight on his back rocked. His middle cramped against another grab of pain, and he heard the uhhh drop from his mouth.
“Sorry,” the little girl whispered. “Sorry, sorry, but I have to do this, I’m so sorry …”
“You ready?” the boy called.
“Yeah. He moaned again.” The little girl sounded shaky.
“Don’t get freaked, honey,” the older girl said. “He’s probably out.”
No … here … I’m …
“I’m okay.” Pause. “Got my feet up.”
“All right, on three,” the boy said. “You push, I’ll pull.”
That snagged his attention in a way nothing else could. No, wait … hurt, don’t hurt me again. Marshaling his strength, Chris put everything he had into the simple act of opening his eyes. But there was a strange pressure around his forehead and over his eyes, and he just couldn’t.
A second later, there came another fiery jolt. No, no. A grinding shudder rocked his hips, and he moaned. Door. That must be it. They’re trying to lift … His mind skipped, tried tripping off that cliff of what passed for consciousness again. “Nuhhh …”
“Stop, stop!” The little girl, her voice hitching up a notch. “We’re hurting him!”
“Can’t help that.” The boy again, not angry but impatient and unhappy, almost annoyed: the voice of someone who’d rather be anywhere else. “It’s going to hurt no matter what—”
“Wait, let’s think this through,” the older girl said. “If we can give him a few seconds and let him wake up, he might be able to help us help him.”
“How’s he going to do that if his back’s broken?” the boy said.
Broken. The word was a razor that sliced through Chris’s pain. Broken?
“I can’t assess him until he’s fully conscious. Even if he can’t move his legs, he could brace himself with his arms,” the older girl said.
“I don’t know,” the boy said. “You saw his hand.”
Hand. What were they talking about? Chris didn’t feel anything. God, maybe that meant his hand was—
“Maybe we can bandage it. I don’t know. But if he can help, enough for us to slide something solid underneath, get him off the snow …”
Snow. As soon as she said it, he could feel the wet against his right cheek and beneath his chest where his body warmth had melted the snow. I’m on the snow. No, that wasn’t quite right. He was in it. That had to be it. He was down in the snow. Yet he wasn’t freezing. The air felt warm and carried a scent that was strange and wet, not snowmelt or regular water but like a rusted fender.
“Hannah’s right.” Not the older boy but one closer to the little girl’s age: the kid called Eli. “I bet I could get in there with the bolt cutters. Then all I got to do is cut the spikes and we lift the door right off. Bet it wouldn’t hurt him as much. It might even be faster.”
Bolt cutters? Spikes?
“It would be better than taking a chance of ripping them out, Jayden,” Hannah said. “He’s already bleeding pretty badly.”
Blood. What he smelled—that wet rust stink—and lay in was his own blood. Hurt. Bleeding … what … But his back couldn’t be broken, it couldn’t, it—
“I thought you said he’s bleeding out,” Jayden said.
“I said maybe, and there’s no point in making this worse. The more I think about it, the more I worry that if a spike’s compressing an artery and we pull it out—”
Oh Jesus. The girl, Hannah, was still talking, but her voice receded to a buzz as the memory suddenly crashed into his mind as if the dam holding it back had burst: Nathan, the brittle snap of his neck as that gigantic log swept back to knock him from his horse. Then he’d started forward—stupid, a mistake—and there had been a monstrous sound of something crashing through trees, but not from the side. From above. Something dark, huge, rushing for his face. For a moment, he hadn’t been able to move, not only from surprise but because his feet … No, snowshoes, they were stuck, jammed into the snow … He’d spied a bottle-green glint of glass, the bristle of iron spikes, and then he’d understood: the thing was a tiger-trap made out of a huge barn door, barreling straight down from the trees, heading right for him.
Pushed off, tried getting out of the way. But he hadn’t been fast enough. He remembered the weight driving him down, that ripping in his legs, his flesh tearing. The unbelievable pain of those spikes. The sudden pulse of blood. Can’t let them move the door. He had visions of the spikes that might be both threatening and saving him being suddenly withdrawn, popping free like corks, and then his life surging in hot red rivers onto the snow.
Come on. Chris put everything he had into it; felt the twitch of small muscles. The pressure against his eyelids was huge. Or I’m really this weak, and if I am, I will die.
“Hey!” the younger girl called. “Hey, guys, he’s opening his eyes, he’s—”
“Uhhh.” His lids cranked back by degrees, a superhuman effort that brought out the sweat along his upper lip and on his neck. But he just couldn’t manage to open his eyes all the way. “Huhh …”
“Oh gosh,” the girl said, and then he felt her fingers tugging, the pressure suddenly easing as she pushed his watch cap onto his forehead. “No wonder. Is that better?”
Yes. His lids creaked open, and there she was, less than six inches from his face. He couldn’t tell much. Not only had the effort drained him, the light was dim, and his eyes didn’t want to focus. “Uhhh,” he said again.
“Hey, he’s awake! His eyes are open!” The little girl beamed. “Hi.”
“Huh,” he grunted, then raked his swollen tongue over numb, dry lips.
“Are you thirsty? Do you want a drink of water?”
“Mmm.” He thought her eyes were light blue, and she looked about eight, maybe nine years old. How had she found him? Nathan was dead. Then who? Someone else … Then he had the name, saw her face floating like a gauzy cloud across his vision: Lena. They were on their way to Oren, had taken the long way because … Rule, chasing us, Weller …
“Hey, he’s thirsty!” she called. Beyond the girl, he now saw a wide funnel trenched out of snow where she must’ve dug her way in. “He wants a drink!”
“Scoot on out, honey,” Hannah said. “Let me take a look at him.”
“Okay.” To him: “Don’t worry. There’s plenty of time before dark. We’ll get you out. We found you, me and Eli. I shook out my emergency blanket to make you a tent, and then me and my dog crawled in to keep you warm until Eli could get back with help. But it’s going to be okay now. We got you. What’s your name?”
“Cuh …” His parched throat made a clicking sound. “Cuh-Chrisss.” The word sounded like a balloon with all the air rushing out. “Chrisss …”
“Chris?” she said, brightening as he managed a nod. Sudden tears pricked the backs of his eyes because, oh God, hearing his name never had seemed quite so wonderful.
“Well, hi,” the little girl said. “My name’s Ellie.”