CHAPTER 49

They were completely and utterly lost. Marin clasped Line’s good hand and led him forward through the trackless forest. The interlocking of their fingers was the only scrap of comfort left to them. It was impossible to measure time, but Marin figured they’d been walking at least an hour since fighting off the rat. They climbed, descended, followed animal trails that petered out, but they were always in the forest, always surrounded by trees. Every so often, Marin would stop and press her hand to Line’s burning forehead. The situation was bad—they both knew it—and it would only get worse.

Line, meanwhile, tried to ignore his fever and the raw throbbing in his hand. In fact, he tried to ignore everything and focus on Marin’s hand in his, and their breath turning into mist as they exhaled. He dreamed of blankets, hats, gloves, a fire, and—most of all—light. He remembered the way the sun felt on his skin and the way it made him squint his eyes. He wanted only to see daylight again. He wanted to feel the warmth of the sun as he and Francis ran bare-chested on the beach.

It was Line who first heard the sound of water flowing. Please, he thought. Please be the Coil. They grasped each other’s hand tighter and pushed toward the sound. Line became acutely aware of his loud, ragged breathing. Can the things hear me? Are they nearby? And what of Kana? For a moment, Line saw Kana’s pale face, lurking in the shadows. Then he shivered. What happened to Kana? And why isn’t it happening to me and Marin? One thing was clear: they had left Kana to die. Line could still recall the viselike grip of Kana’s hands on his throat. How could I not run? And yet hadn’t all this started because Kana had risked his own life for him, venturing back into the woods instead of boarding the boat? And now Line was running, abandoning him. What kind of friend am I?

Again, Line heard the sound of flowing water. It was growing louder. The Coil. Let it be the Coil.

The ground turned mushy and soft; trees gave way to bushes; and suddenly, open skies were above them. They had come upon a clearing filled with waist-high grass. A fast stream flowed through the middle of it, gleaming silver in the moonlight. Snow filled the air—softly but steadily, without remorse.

“The Coil,” Line whispered. His lips were cracked, his hair was matted wetly to his skull, and he trembled uncontrollably. He opened his mouth, tried to speak, but started coughing instead. Marin wrapped an arm around him, waiting for the spasms to stop. In the moment, she was also keenly aware of the cold. They couldn’t last much longer in these conditions. They had a few hours, at most, before hypothermia set in.

“You may be right,” replied Marin. She squinted into the darkness. The ground was now white with snow and reflecting the moonlight. Marin could see the flowing water, but for some reason, it didn’t give her confidence. “It looks awfully narrow to be the Coil.”

“I—I—I need water,” he said. “Just a few sips.”

He pushed forward, but Marin pulled him back.

“Stop. Something isn’t right.” She listened intently and realized that she heard water flowing in several places—by the stream, but also nearby, almost at her feet.

Marin knelt on the ground, groping with her hands until she found a hole that was roughly two feet in diameter. She thrust an arm inside and felt only cold air. She scooped up a handful of dirt and flung it into the hole. It vanished, as if swallowed. Several seconds later, she heard a faint thwack. The drop must have been at least fifty feet.

“Another stream is flowing underground,” she said, looking at Line. “If we had fallen into that hole . . .”

There’s no point in finishing that thought.

“Stay here,” said Marin. “I’ll come back with water.” Line collapsed into the snow-covered grass. Marin crawled toward the stream. Along the way, she had to maneuver around two more sinkholes. When she finally made it to the stream, she drank deeply, greedily. After she drank her fill, she looked around for something that would hold liquid.

Nearby, the trunk of a downed tree lay decomposing in the fast-flowing water. Marin grasped at it, and it came apart in her hands. She did, however, find a stub of a branch that was nearly intact. It wasn’t large, perhaps six inches in diameter and a foot long, but it was hollow and didn’t crumble to pieces. It would hold water as long as Marin plugged up the bottom end with her hand.

She filled it to the top and walked carefully around the sinkholes back to Line. He was still lying in the grass, and for a split second she was afraid he might have gone unconscious. But then she whispered his name, and a sound gurgled from his cracked lips. While holding the branch in one hand, Marin helped him sit upright. She carefully tipped the branch and dribbled water into his mouth.

After drinking, Line rested there, his eyes tightly closed. Marin sat by his side in silence.

Eventually, Line opened his eyes and peered at Marin.

“I’m not feeling very well,” he said. It was a simple statement, but the way he delivered it brought tears to Marin’s eyes. She looked away so he wouldn’t see.

She bent close to his face. “You’ll be fine,” she whispered. “I’ll get you more water.”

Before he could say anything else, Marin took the hollow branch and returned to the stream. As she went, she visualized Line’s pained face. It was coming soon—his arm and the knife. I can’t do it. She shuddered. Yes, I can. And I will. Unless she found lekar first.

Back at the stream, Marin paused to splash water on her face. It was so comforting that she had to tear herself away to focus on the task at hand.

The moon lit up a broad area and she spent several minutes looking for the tiny woodfern plant: a cluster of soft, round leaves surrounding three thumblike, red-brown stems. Lekar. That was what she needed right now.

Marin ranged up and down the stream, at least twenty paces in either direction. She didn’t find even a hint of woodfern. In the distance, she could hear Line coughing weakly and calling for her. Marin’s heart broke. What if he dies? As that thought surfaced, she returned to what Line had said—his terrifying suggestion—that they simply throw themselves off a cliff. End it all, quickly. Anything would be better than this: Kana gone, Line dying, me alone.

The simplicity of this thought shook loose another. What if she just ran? Get up, abandon Line, run toward the sinkhole. Leap. Headfirst. Fall. The End.

Once in her mind, it was hard to release the seductiveness of the idea. She stood still and felt her muscles tense for the final sprint. But then her mind fought back, and images of Kana as a child, and climbing with Line, formed a bulwark against any further thoughts of suicide. No. I will keep moving—always keep moving.

Marin turned back to the stream and knelt to fill the hollow branch again. She began walking back toward Line. She was so focused on not spilling the water that her foot came down too close to the edge of a hole, which crumbled under her weight. She fell, and grabbed at the grass, pulling herself onto more solid ground. Her pulse pounded in her ears. She choked back a sob. Her branch had fallen, and seconds later, she heard a distant plop far below.

Marin buried her head in the grass. Her arms and legs trembled. She rubbed her face into the icy ground so hard that it scraped her cheeks. But the pain helped bring her back. She peered down into the sinkhole. A shaft of moonlight partially illuminated the distant water rushing by, along with the hollowed-out earthen walls dotted with rocks, roots, and tiny plants. As her eyes adjusted to the murky light within the sinkhole, she saw a recognizable clump of round leaves surrounding small, red-brown stems.

Woodfern.

It was about twenty feet down, nestled around a series of embedded, fist-size rocks made slick with the constantly trickling water. She wanted to throw herself into the hole, grabbing at the woodfern as she fell—such was her eagerness. But she had to be careful. She had to think this through. Getting in was easy—getting out would be much tougher.

She extended her legs in both directions, burying them into the tall tangled grasses around her. This anchored her—a little. She then leaned her shoulders, head, and arms farther into the sinkhole.

At ground level, the hole was only two feet wide, but it steadily expanded as it went down, so that—at the level of the woodfern—the walls were about five feet apart. Marin reached in and tugged experimentally at a rock embedded in the wall of the sinkhole. As soon she touched it, the rock came loose and tumbled down. Marin scanned the walls of the sinkhole again, until her eyes fell upon a network of stringy roots that looked like a spiderweb. Marin stretched a bit farther, leaning deeper and more precariously into the hole, to get a better look. The roots appeared to continue all the way down to the water.

Suddenly, she realized she hadn’t heard Line in several minutes. She closed her eyes against the fear. It doesn’t matter now. I can’t help him without lekar.

Very carefully, Marin set her sack down on the ground beside her. She didn’t want it dropping down the hole. Then she prepared herself. She rolled away from the sinkhole and rotated her body so that her feet entered first. She grabbed handfuls of the tangled grasses with her arms, bunching together as many as she could to lessen the weight on any one strand of the thick growth. She descended slowly, bracing her legs against the walls. Just as she was about to fully enter the hole, the walls widened. Her feet lost contact and swung freely. I need to grab the roots. Now!

She let go of the grass with one hand and reached frantically for a root just as she heard and felt the clump of grass—which she was still clinging to with her other hand—begin to tear. Her free hand grazed a patch of roots and clamped down, followed by the other hand, which captured a nearby web. The roots were just strong enough to hold her weight for a few seconds before tearing. They formed a kind of rope ladder that disintegrated soon after it was used. As she climbed down, Marin became aware of her breathing—it was fast and shallow, and it was proving difficult to get enough oxygen into her lungs. Her hands became sweaty, and her grip on the web of roots began to waver.