“We’re already dead,” Arden snapped.
I nodded, knowing that she was right. I had felt it in the storehouse with Leif, my spirit bending, bending, agonizingly close to a break. Fletcher would not change his mind. He would not show some sudden decency. There would be no moral awakening in the middle of the night.
I shifted toward Lark and Arden, covering the side of my face with my hair so Fletcher would not see my lips move if he glanced toward us.
“We can go when he sets up camp,” I said, my nerves awakening.
I looked out beyond the bars, hoping to see a road sign, an arrow, some indicator of where we were, but there was only darkness.
HOURS LATER, THE TRUCK PULLED OFF THE ROAD, ITS tires bumping over rocks and broken tree limbs. We stopped in a clearing. The sky was overcast, with no moon in sight. The landscape had changed. The thick trees gave way to open land, short shrubs, and sand that glowed red in the headlights. Rock formations towered above us, something between mountains and cliffs, their shapes cutting strange shadows in the stars. Fletcher climbed out, stretched his arms, then turned to urinate in the short brush.
“Just do what we said,” Arden whispered, grabbing Lark’s wrist.
“I know,” she said, pulling away. Her voice was rigid. “You told me already.”
“We need to go to the bathroom.” I banged against the metal bars. “Please, we need to get out now.”
Fletcher zipped up his pants. “What?”
“She said,” Arden continued, wiping her black hair off her forehead, “we need to take a piss.”
Fletcher nodded, as though he understood that wording much better. He shined a flashlight into the cage, then out into the shrubs, where a battered house stood at the base of the giant rocks. “All of yous?”
“All of us,” Arden responded. Even Lark offered a convincing nod.
Fletcher moved the beam over Arden’s face, then Lark’s, then mine. I squinted at the stinging light. “You’ve got two minutes. You can go over there, in the woods.” His flashlight moved over the patch of charred trees, black and twisted from where a fire had swept through. “But if you dare even take one step without my permission—” He pulled his gun from his belt, wielding it in the air.
Lark’s breaths quickened as Fletcher opened the giant padlock. We filed out, Arden first, then me, then Lark. Fletcher kept the beam on our backs as we made our way to the trees.
The woods looked more menacing in the glow of the flashlight. The branches, now stripped of their bark and leaves, reached toward us, beckoning us inside.
“Not yet,” I whispered, unsure if it was Lark or myself who needed reminding. We took slow, careful steps through the short brush. New growth shot up between the ashy roots, tall grass and ferns, hopeful signs of resilience.
As we reached the edge of the tree line, Arden turned to me. Her gaze softened. Her mouth curled slightly, a sort-of smile perceptible only to me. This may be good-bye, she seemed to say, her eyes reflecting the starlight. I’m sorry if it is.
We stepped once, twice, and three times into the woods. I glanced off to the right. I could see two trees, but nothing beyond. Then Arden said it, so low I could barely hear her: “Now.”
I took off, my body weightless as it darted over downed tree limbs, through prickly brush, moving deeper into the charred wood. I kept my arms outstretched in the dark, feeling my way through it.
“You little—” Fletcher called out behind us, his heavy boots clomping down in the clearing. “I’ll cut your throats!”
Lark and Arden ran across the woods, splitting up somewhere in the blackness. Then the first gunshot rocked the air, quieting the birds and insects. I fell to the ground, scared Arden would cry out, but there was only the sound of footsteps, twigs snapping, and Fletcher’s loud, raspy breaths behind me. I kept moving, crawling over the tangled brush, but Fletcher was getting closer. His shadow weaved in and out of the trees, moving steadily forward.
I struggled to my feet, my ankle twisting. There, beyond the charred forest, a light in the window of a house winked at me. I could just decipher the front porch, the tar roof a solid block against the shaded landscape.
“Get back here,” he growled.
My pulse throbbed in my fingers and my toes. I ran toward the light, my chest heaving now, my legs tiring. Keep going, I told myself. Just keep going.
Soon the trees ended and the land folded out before me, a thick expanse of wildflowers. The light was much farther off than I thought—a hundred yards away, set beneath the towering sand sculptures.