She could see the break in the trees ahead of them. It was so close, but somehow completely out of reach. But by some miracle, or perhaps just Alex’s efforts, they were there.
A few more steps and they would be free.
“One last push.” Alex urged, his voice hoarse and raw.
Her legs were wobbly and weak. Her throat bloody as she gasped in the icy air, but she gathered herself for one final effort. But wanting doesn’t automatically will something into being. Too long spent stumbling in the freezing forest meant her feet were heavy and cumbersome, and she tripped over a well-placed root – a final effort to prevent their escape.
As she fell forward she saw a branch dip low, its lethal edge catching the light, ready to cut her in two. She waited for it, imagined the searing pain of the blade biting into her flesh, the silence as Death led her away.
But it never came; instead she was shoved forward, hard enough to send her flying through the air, towards safety. She landed hard and the air exploded out her lungs as Alex landed on top of her. Her vision dimmed in the stillness that followed. The last thing she saw before allowing the darkness to take her was blood soaking into the ground around her.
*
Like a diver surfacing from the depths, through water as thick as syrup, Allyra fought her way back to consciousness. It was dark and it took a few bleary-eyed blinks before she could make anything out.
For one desperate heartbeat, in the magic between sleep and wakefulness, she believed she was back home. Back in the darkness of her bedroom – if she turned over she would be able to tuck herself into Jamie and without waking up; he would instinctively pull her closer. She would be safe…
As hard as she fought against it, reality reasserted itself. Instead of a soft mattress, she was on hard rock and instead of Jamie’s warmth; all she had to wrap around her was the cool air.
She appeared to be in some kind of cave. The air was dark and still around her; whatever light there was, was pale and insignificant, filtered though from the outside.
So – they had somehow survived the horror of the Walking Forest.
Allyra closed her eyes and took a deep breath, mustering all her courage to perform a tentative assessment of her health. She wriggled her toes. Yes – legs were still present and accounted for. She brought her hands onto her abdomen and felt around gingerly for cuts, gashes or gouges, the memory of the swinging branch blade was still clear in her mind. But her searching fingers found nothing untoward. Beyond general exhaustion and the aching of every single muscle in her body, she seemed to be largely intact.
And yet she remembered the blood – hot and thick, soaking into the dry, parched ground.
Alex. Alex must’ve saved her.
But where was he now?
She tried to get a better view of her surroundings and started the painful process of trying to sit up. As she rolled onto her left side, a sharp pain ran up her arm. Wincing, she rolled up her sleeve to take a closer look and found a rough bandage tied around her arm, with a thin line of blood seeping though. She might not remember it, but she had been injured after all, though it didn’t look nearly serious enough to explain her last memory.
She pushed herself up, ignoring the complaints of various muscles until she was sitting up against the cave wall. She paused for a moment as the blood rushed out her head, making her vision erupt in black spots. Eventually her equilibrium reasserted itself and she looked around the cave.
There wasn’t much to see, so her eyes landed immediately on Alex. He was sitting closer to the cave entrance, his long legs stretched in front of him. In the darkness, she didn’t notice the blood straightaway, but when she did; it was all she could see – the dark red stain on his shirt playing into the shadows.
Icy tendrils wrapped around her heart, leaving her hollow and afraid. Her feelings about him were paradoxical at best. She blamed him for her current predicament; perhaps she even hated him a little. But he’d saved her when he didn’t need to and for that she was grudgingly grateful.
His actions were contradictory and his motives more murky than a muddy waterhole, but he was crucial to her survival here.
Wherever or whatever here turned out to be.
“Alex?” She whispered softly, unsure whether it was safe to make a noise. Her levels of paranoia had escalated to new and incredible heights.
He didn’t respond.
His skin was so pale and he was so completely still and all she could think of was blood – so much blood.
A flash of utterly irrational anger rushed through her. He had time to bandage her arm, but didn’t bother to do something about his own wound? It was a wound that should have been hers to bear. One that he surely only suffered due to her clumsiness.
Allyra could feel herself unraveling and she gritted her teeth and forced herself back from the ledge.
Hydrogen, helium, lithium, beryllium, boron, carbon…
She wrenched herself back. Cool, practical and levelheaded – that was what she usually was and what she needed to be now. She scanned the cave again to check that it was truly empty, before struggling slowly to her feet. She suffered through another lightheaded moment, and clutched at the cave wall to steady herself.
“Alex?” She whispered again as she made her way to him.
He remained still and silent.
The roof of the cave was low – not quite high enough for her to stand upright, forcing her to hunch over uncomfortably. This, combined with her still wobbly legs meant it was
