Can’t stay here. Can’t leave without Dorran. Where is he? Why did he go?
Then she saw him. He’d run ahead of her, along the dirt track leading to the impossible fence. He leaned against the gate, his muscles straining as it ground open. Others were running towards him, though. They had weapons and would be upon him in a moment, but Clare wasn’t even sure he had seen them. His head was down as he forced the gate open with painstaking effort.
She pushed onto the accelerator, dragging energy out of the sluggish bus. One of the men leapt out of the way.
What do I do? Her reflexes felt blunted, her mind full of cotton. She didn’t know if she should slow down or go faster. She needed to get Dorran onto the bus, but if she slowed down, the others would catch up to her.
The gate was just barely wide enough for the vehicle to fit through. But Dorran continued to strain against it, and he was in her path. In a burst of blind panic, Clare hit the brakes. The momentum was immense. The bus wouldn’t slow in time. She was aimed right for Dorran’s back.
He moved at the last second, darting to the side. The bus rocketed through the open gate. She felt something snag on its side and bit her lip as she leaned forward to see into the mirrors. Dorran had caught onto the plyboard nailed to the windows. He had his feet pressed against the bus’s side, shoulders hunched as he held on to the vehicle. Clare hit the button to open the doors. They were slowing, the brakes finally stopping their mad rush downhill, and Dorran leaned into the momentum as he slipped forward, neatly stepping through the open door. He was breathing heavily, his eyes full of fire as he looked behind them.
“Faster,” he said.
She put pressure on the accelerator. The open door nearly clipped a tree as the bus picked up speed. Dorran wrenched it closed then stood beside her, legs braced to balance against the rocking motion.
The road ahead was blurry. Clare tried to navigate, but she wasn’t reacting with enough dexterity. The bus’s other side scraped a tree, wrenching a branch loose in an explosion of splinters.
“I can’t—” Even her words felt faltering.
Dorran came up beside her, a gentle hand on her arm. “I can drive.”
The changeover was faster than Clare had thought possible. She slid out of the seat while Dorran held the wheel, and in a second, he had taken her place. The engine rumbled as he pushed it to move faster. Clare caught herself on the passenger seat and dropped into it, then looked in the side mirror.
Three of the gaunt youths were running in the bus’s wake, but they were already disappearing into the distance. As she watched, they slowed to a staggering halt, lips peeled back in angry, fearful grimaces.
Dorran braked suddenly as the bus burst out of the forested area and back onto the main road. He wrenched the wheel, coaxing the minibus around to face the setting sun. But before they had travelled more than a dozen meters, he braked again.
Clare opened her mouth to ask what he was doing, but the sudden direction changes left her dizzy and sick. She clung to her seat, one hand braced on the window, as Dorran put the bus into reverse. He adjusted their angle using the side mirrors and backed into the hand-painted wooden sign. Mother Gum’s Nest, Weary travellers welcome bowed under the pressure from their bus’s rear then cracked and collapsed into the mud.
“I know they’ll just put it back up,” he grumbled. “But at least this way, I feel better.”
Clare cracked a smile. Dorran ran the bus’s rear wheels over the sign before turning back to the road. The path was mostly straight, and he allowed the bus to creep up to an aggressive pace as they sped away from the compound. For a moment, Clare’s head was full of the roar of motion and Dorran’s ragged breaths. They seemed too loud. Deafening. The palm she pressed to the window was slick with sweat.
Then Dorran spoke. “I should have known better than to stop. I am sorry for putting you in so much danger.”
She wanted to tell him it was all right, that she’d been lured in just as much as he had, but the words wouldn’t come. She shook her head instead. The air was too hot; it choked in her throat before it could reach her lungs.
Dorran glanced at her, and his expression drew tight. “Clare? Are you hurt?”
“No. Uh—no—I—”
The bus began to slow. Real alarm was growing in Dorran’s eyes. “You’re white. What happened? Did one of those people hurt you?”
“I can’t breathe.” Her stomach was burning. Her lungs ached. She shook her head as a drip of perspiration ran down her cheek. “Pull over… Need air…”
The bus was already coasting to a halt on the road’s shoulder. Dorran put it in park but didn’t turn off the engine as he opened the door for her. Clare rose and tried to climb out. The cold air felt good on her face. She leaned into it and realised a second too late that she was falling.
Dorran barked her name as he caught her before she could hit the ground. His voice sounded as though it had echoed down a long tunnel. He carefully lowered her to sit on the bus’s step, then his hand moved across her forehead and her neck. He took a sharp breath. “The tea. She drugged it—”
Oh, she is such a monster. Clare tilted her head back, begging the swimming nausea to subside. Thank goodness Dorran didn’t drink it. He still had his wits and his reflexes when they attacked us.
“What was it?” Dorran muttered the words, not directed at her, but a question to the universe. “A sedative? Poison?”
“I’m fine,” Clare mumbled, vaguely aware that the words were slurred. “Just got to catch my breath…”
Dorran darted away from her, disappearing into the bus, and returned a second later with the water bottle he kept near the driver’s seat. He unscrewed the lid and held it to her lips. “Drink.”
She shook her head. “Feel sick…”
“Please.” Desperation bled into his voice. “You have to drink.”
Reluctantly, she swallowed the water. It tasted off, and her body wanted to reject the liquid. She managed to swallow three mouthfuls before she keeled over, violently sick.
“Good. Good.” Dorran held her with one arm across her chest, the other rubbing her back. “Get it out.”
Clare hung off him, gasping, sweat sticking her clothes to her skin. She tried to straighten, but her stomach muscles contracted again, forcing her back down. The sickness didn’t stop until bile burned her throat and her body had no more energy to move. Dorran gave her the last few spoonfuls of water from the bottle to help wash her mouth out, then he half guided, half carried her back into the bus.
“Bed or chair?” His voice was beautifully soft compared to the roaring noise in Clare’s ears.
She squinted, trying to think. The back of the bus was dark, almost unpleasantly so. Lights danced across her eyes. To her disoriented mind, they looked like ghosts. “Chair.”
Her throat burned, her stomach muscles ached, and her legs were uncoordinated. Dorran lowered her into the chair and adjusted its back so that Clare was half reclined in it. He buckled her seatbelt, fetched a blanket from the bed, and draped it over her.
Her mouth still tasted foul. But her nausea had finally passed, and a deep thirst had risen. “Water?”
Dorran’s hand ran over her shoulders, a comforting caress. He didn’t move to fetch her a drink, though. He only stood beside her, facing the bus’s insides, a horrible grimness haunting his features.