Emma lifted herself out of the hay on her elbows and rolled toward them, and I got closer too, to listen.
“Don’t be insane,” said Emma. “If we throw the eggs now, they’ll shoot us to ribbons.”
“So what, then?” said Hugh. “We should just lie here until they find us?”
We clustered around the trunk, speaking in whispers.
“Wait until they unlock the door,” said Enoch. “Then I’ll throw an egg through the bars behind us. That’ll distract the wights long enough for Bronwyn to crack the skull of whichever one comes into the cage first, which should give the rest of us time to run. Scatter to the outer edges of camp, then turn and throw your eggs back at the middle-most campfire. Everyone in a thirty-meter radius will be a memory.”
“I’ll be damned,” said Hugh. “That just might work.”
“But there are children in the camp!” said Bronwyn.
Enoch rolled his eyes. “Or we can worry about collateral damage, run into the woods, and leave the wights and their dogs to hunt us down one by one. But if we plan on reaching London—or living beyond tonight—I don’t recommend it.”
Hugh patted Bronwyn’s hand, which was covering the trunk latch. “Open it,” he said. “Give them out.”
Bronwyn hesitated. “I can’t. I can’t kill children who’ve done nothing to harm us.”
“But we don’t have a choice!” whispered Hugh.
“You always have a choice,” said Bronwyn.
Then we heard a dog snarl very near the bottom rim of the cage, and went silent. A moment later a flashlight shone against the outside of the tarp. “Tear this sheet down!” someone said—the dog’s handler, I assumed.
The dog barked, its nose snuffling to get beneath the tarp and up through the cage bars. “Over here!” shouted the handler. “We’ve got something!”
We all looked to Bronwyn. “Please,” Hugh said. “At least let us defend ourselves.”
“It’s the only way,” said Enoch.
Bronwyn sighed and took her hand away from the latch. Hugh nodded gratefully and opened the trunk lid. We all reached in and took an egg from between the layered sweaters—everyone but Bronwyn. Then we stood and faced the cage door, eggs in hand, and prepared for the inevitable.
More boots marched toward us. I tried to prepare myself for what was coming.
But knowing that innocent people would die, could I really do it? Even to save my own life? What if I just dropped the egg in some grass and ran into the woods?
