“I think you missed one over there, Fiske. Is that beef or pork, do you think? Hard to tell when it’s all chewed up like that. Kinda looks like it came out the other end, if you know what I mean.” It was the first time Gabi had felt like laughing since Spruce.
Chapter EIGHTEEN
THE NEXT three days were composed of more hiking, more drills, and more pain. The terrain was getting rougher, the trails snow-packed or washed out and harder to navigate. The days were clear and cold, the sun hidden above the forest canopy, while a bright, milky scythe of moon kept the all-night watch rotations company. Team members alternated four-hour shifts throughout the night, standing lookout as the group trudged closer to the frosted peaks of the Cascades.
The advance Witness teams were supposed to have left caches of scouting information and situation updates in weather-tight canisters along the way, but each time Ames halted the group at one of the prearranged coordinates, there was nothing to be found. Occasionally they came across empty traps or snares and the subtle indents of snow-covered footprints, yet the Witnesses didn’t see so much as a wisp of smoke indicating a campfire or hear any sound at all besides birdsong and the whomp of snow surrendering its hold on the upper boughs. Moving through the quiet landscape felt like traveling backward in time. The few Tribal settlements they passed were either razed to the ground or looked as though their inhabitants had halted in the midst of their day-to-day activities, banked their fires, and walked away without a backward glance. Ames, who grew less communicative as the days wore on, had instructed the Witnesses to keep their guns in their thigh holsters rather than their packs. The friendly Tribal settlements Ames and Sykes expected to use as resupply stations along the way turned out to be nothing more than piles of debris, with no signs of life beyond a few stray dogs. Neither of the Apostles had to communicate that things were much worse than they’d expected.
As the Witnesses climbed up out of the valley, evidence of conflict grew more frequent. Buildings shot into sieves, congealed puddles of blood, and smoldering fires attested to struggle, though nothing like what they’d encountered in Spruce. There were no mangled bodies—just enough mayhem to make having a loaded firearm close at hand a very good idea. The new Witnesses had been given a quick tutorial on gun safety, and every drill session now incorporated target practice using empty food envelopes strung from trees as targets. Despite her exhaustion and the black menace radiating from her weapon, Gabi was a decent shot. She hit half of what she aimed for even when a breeze sent the envelope swinging, not that this impressed Ames one bit. His latest trick was to force Gabi to stand with gun aimed while everyone else took their shots, until lightning bolts of pain shot from her shoulders to her fingertips. Once the last echoes of gunshot had faded from the others’ practice, then Gabi was allowed to shoot, then collect the remnants of all of the food envelopes before catching up to the others on the trail.
As the vegetation grew more abundant, so did signs of game. The Witnesses were encouraged to shoot at whatever wildlife crossed their path, which included pheasant, rabbits, deer, and the occasional raccoon. Many of them had never seen a live pheasant or raccoon before, though rabbits were bred for meat in some of the branches. The excitement of the hunt and fresh food for their meals added badly needed variety to the monotony of each day. Though signs of human life were scarce, Ames warned them that they were surely being tracked by Tribal scouts. When a Junior Witness named Briana, a serious girl from Madrone, asked if the Lilim may be tracking them as well, Sykes assured her that if the Lilim knew where the Witnesses were, they would be dead already. Briana kept her questions to herself after that.
AS THEY moved along the trail, each preoccupied with their own thoughts of what lay ahead, Gabi took in the charged, crystalline quality of the day. The silence on this, their sixth day of the trek, was total, as if even the trees were holding their breath. Gabi had the distinct sensation that several pairs of eyes were on them as they passed. When she traded glances with Marnie and Jordan during their breaks, her two friends looked tense as if preparing for a blow from behind. Ames and Sykes led their teams in separate groupings, but that day Gabi noticed Mathew working his way closer to her as they hiked, allowing his teammates to pass him on the trail so he could keep her in view. She wondered if he sensed the change in the air too, or perhaps he was finally ready to forgive her.
“Girl Lowell!” Ames barked as the teams trudged into a clearing to make camp during the last hour of sunlight. He’d taken to calling Gabi and Mathew “Girl Lowell” and “Boy
