It’s only at the very last second, right when my legs are about to leave the branch entirely, that I realise what I have to do.
My left leg is still in contact with the branch. I swing my right leg upwards, fighting against gravity, forcing my burning muscles to react.
My ankles slam together, locking me to the branch. I start swinging, upside down now, swinging back and forth. I look down, and a pair of jaws slams shut inches from my face. The wolf falls back to earth, vanishing in a sea of barking, growling fur.
Harlan is reaching down for me, his face contorted in pain. He grabs for my hand, misses, tries again. I’m swinging too wildly. I have to tighten my ankles on the branch, slow myself down. As I do so, I feel them slipping, inching away from each other.
I bend from the waist, my torso screaming at me. It’s just enough. Harlan snags my fingers, then his other hand grabs my wrist. I can see the sweat standing out on his face.
But he’s got me. He’s pulling me up, around the side of the branch. Away from the pack.
He wrenches me upright, and I sit, my legs dangling on either side of the branch, breathing hard, trying not to let the panic take over. The branch itself is bending and creaking, threatening to break under our weight.
The wolves are milling around below us, growling and snapping at one another, as if arguing about what to do. I risk a look down, and several pairs of eyes meet my own, bright with hunger.
Harlan is talking, more to himself than me, his words coming fast. “That was much too close. Too close. Not like that time in Dawson when we had warning. Goddamn spray. It should have worked, it should have. Eric’d know what to do. He’d get us out of here.”
My nose is running, and the stinging in my eyes has changed to a horrible, maddening itch. “We have to go,” I say, forcing the words out.
Harlan is still muttering to himself. I swing round and look at him. “Hey. We can do this. All right?”
He looks up. He’s trembling, although I don’t know if it’s exhaustion, or fear, or both, but I see him nod. Moving as slowly and as carefully as I can, I make my way across to the next branch. The wolves see the movement, snarling, grinding up against the trunk of the next tree. Some howl: a noise which feels like it’s going to pierce my eardrums. They’re frenzied at the thought of prey, nostrils flaring, teeth bared.
Harlan is slower than I am, but he’s staying with me. We move higher into the trees, testing branches, contorting our bodies as we stretch between them. It’s hard going: several of the branches are covered in slippery moss, and there are others that won’t take our weight. Once or twice I place a foot on one, only to have it snap and fall, crashing down onto the pack. It feels like there are more of them, like they’re calling their friends from all over to join them. There’s no way to tell. Everything down there is teeth and fur and horrible, burning eyes.
Even as we make progress, I know we can’t keep going like this. My arms are already burning with exhaustion, and Harlan looks like he’s about to fall over.
I can see sky through the trees ahead of us, the grey clouds level with my eyeline. There must be a hill, with the forest sloping down it, away from us. We can deal with that. We just have to be careful.
Then I reach the edge of the forest, and a horrified moan escapes from my lips.
It’s not a hill at all.
It’s a cliff.
The trees run right up to the edge of it. I could take a few more steps out onto the branch I’m on, and have nothing below me but air. The cliff itself must be fifty feet high, formed of weather-beaten rock, grey and white. It extends a long way to our left and right, curving away from us, as if we’re at the apex of an enormous circle. Here and there, plants cling to the surface, small branches thrusting outwards, like they’re trying to escape.
The wolves reach the cliff. We’ve managed to get a little way ahead of them, and at first there are only three or four, growling, running in mad circles. But then the rest arrive, bunching up against the edge.
I don’t see it happen, but, suddenly, one of the wolves is falling, legs kicking at nothing. It gives a puzzled bark, and then it smashes into a jutting part of the cliff. Its head detonates, gore exploding across the rock, and the pack’s howling gets even louder.
Harlan is whimpering. “We have to go back,” he says.
“What?”
“We can’t go down there. We can’t.”
“We don’t have a choice.” I say it knowing full well that I have no idea how we’re even going to get to the cliff, let alone down it.
I look at the wolves. The small one, the leader, is staring up at me. Every other wolf is in a mad rage, pacing and turning, but the leader is still. He’s waiting. Calmly, patiently. He knows that sooner or later we’ll need to come down.
I lean out over the edge and scan the cliff, looking for something, anything, that will help us.
I see it.
Then immediately wish I hadn’t.
“Harlan, listen to me,” I say. “We’re going to have to jump.”
“What?”
I have to force the words past my lips, because what I’m proposing is completely insane. “We grab hold of that,” I say, pointing. There’s a tree growing out of the cliff face, fifteen feet down, slightly to the right of us. It’s got two branches, shooting out at right angles to the rock face, sprouting tufts of leaves. They’re not nearly as thick as the branch we’re standing on, and there’s every chance that they’ll snap the second we hit them. But it’s our only shot.
Harlan has stopped talking. Now, he’s just shaking his head rapidly, back and forth, hugging the tree even tighter.
I’m not going to convince him. I could stay up here forever, and never talk him down. I’ve seen panic before. If you try to take a panicked person somewhere, they won’t just refuse to go–they’ll fight you, desperate to stay where they are.
I have to show him.
The howls get louder, rippling up from below. I look down at the plant on the cliff. It seems impossibly far away. If I miscalculate this, if I’m off by even a foot…
No. Don’t get scared. Stay angry. Stay focused.
I inhale once. Exhale. And jump.