“How are you feeling?”
His eyebrows, golden and thick even in the dimly lit loft, furrowed together as he winced, sinking back under the quilts. “The ankle hurts, I’m not going to lie. But it’ll be all right. I don’t think anything is broken.”
After Samuel had eaten last night, Mama had pried him away from Rebecca and helped him up the stairs. She’d snuck him a shot of Papa’s whiskey to help him sleep, and he’d been gone to the world before the Elders had arrived. Rebecca had stood peering up at the loft, chewing on the inside of her cheek, until Papa had gently suggested she return home. Her eyes had met mine, wet and miserable, until I’d offered a small smile. She’d returned it with a tentative one of her own, and for a moment, all had felt right between us.
“What happened?” I asked, pushing aside the memory of my friend’s worry.
“We found Samson’s trail easy enough. There was so much blood. Swathed all along the brambles and the trunks…It was even up real high.” He paused to gesture with his fingers. “Dripping down from the pine needles….How’d it get way up there? Then we…we got separated. It gets dark early in the forest, you know?” Samuel continued. “One minute Papa was right behind me, trying to pull down some of those…branches to burn…and the next, I couldn’t see him anywhere. It was just me and the fires and all that blood. I shouted for him but never heard a reply. I tried…I tried following the flames—he’d have to be at the end of them, right? But he wasn’t. It was just…those things.”
“The wolves?” My nightmare lingered uneasily.
He shook his head slowly. “Those weren’t like any kind of wolf I’ve seen before. They were big, Ellerie, so big. Bigger than a bear, bigger than the hive boxes, big enough to swallow the world whole.”
A patch of icy unease formed at the back of my neck, and grew large enough to plummet down my spine like raindrops on a windowpane. Growing up, I’d assumed that the legends of monsters in the woods were nothing more than elaborate fairy tales, stories told to keep foolish children from getting lost in the pines.
Were the stories true?
Were the monsters real?
“Whatever they were, they went after me, but it wasn’t like a chase. They were too fast for that. I could have never outrun them. I twisted my ankle, trying to get away. But it was…it was almost like a game to them. They were playing with me, laughing at my fear.”
“You heard them laugh?” The words fluttered from my mouth, as insubstantial as autumn leaves caught in a brusque wind.
Samuel scrunched his eyes shut. “I hear them laughing even now.”
Sweat beaded across his brow, and I dabbed it away with a corner of my blanket. His skin was flushed hot. A fever and nothing more.
“Don’t think about that now, Sam. You’re at home and you’re safe and those things can’t get you here.”
I glanced out the window, pleased to see soft gray light filtering through. Mama would be up soon. She’d know what to do, what medicines Samuel ought to have.
Medicines.
Jeb and all those men had been on their way out of the mountains to secure supplies for the Falls. Runs usually took place twice a year—as soon as the ice melted away, ensuring the pass out of God’s Grasp was clear, and again at the end of summer, before early snows could set in, making travel impossible. We hadn’t had a group head out since April. How low were Dr. Ambrose’s supplies?
Another group would have to be sent out, and soon. It was as simple as that. Medicine wasn’t the only thing brought back. We relied on those runs to get supplies that couldn’t be procured in town.
Guns and bullets. Cloth and thread. Books. Sugar. Tea. Coffee.
They simply couldn’t be produced in a town so small.
Selfishly I’d hoped for fabric for a new dress. I’d shot up two inches since spring. Mama thought it must be my final growth spurt, and I prayed she was right. No clothing hung properly on my frame. Bodices stretched uncomfortably as I went about my chores, and my wool stockings could be seen, peeking above the leather of my black boots. I was already taller than Mama, and the only cloth at McCleary’s were two bolts of floral batiste. They were beautiful, to be sure, but would do nothing to keep me warm once leaves began to fall.
“Ellerie?” Samuel whispered.
His lips were chapped, and I fished a tin of salve from the rickety table near his bed. Mama made balms and lotions with the abandoned beeswax after harvest.
“You believe me, about the monsters, don’t you?” His gray eyes were glassy, but I couldn’t tell if it was from the fever or if he was about to cry.
“It must have been terrifying,” I answered carefully.
He grabbed my hand. “I thought I’d never see you again.”
I squeezed his fingers. It was only his fevered imagination, but my heart thunked out of rhythm as I envisioned a world without my twin.
“You’ll keep me safe, won’t you? You’ve always kept me safe. Ever since we were little.”
He sounded little now, younger than even Sadie. A sad, small, lost boy, desperately in need of protection.
“Of course.”
“I couldn’t…I couldn’t stand the thought of being without you. We’ve never not been together. It just…” He broke off into a sob.
“Don’t think like that, Sam. We’re a team, right? You and I. You know I’d never let anything happen to you.”
His eyelids fluttered shut as he slipped back into the uneasy embrace of exhaustion.
I could count on one hand the number of times I’d seen Samuel cry. Though I was sorry he’d hurt himself, and had such a frightening experience in the woods, I wondered if this moment would be a turning point for us. All summer we’d been growing further apart, me remaining at home while he snuck off on adventures unknown. But now…perhaps everything could go back to what it had been like before.
I watched his chest rise and fall, a satisfied peace settling over me as I counted to one hundred before deciding it was finally late enough to wake Mama.
But when I tried slipping my hand from Samuel’s grip, he tightened his hold.
I flexed and twisted my fingers but couldn’t squirm free. Though his face was slack, his grasp was as tight as a bear trap. I tried prying loose, to no avail.
Samuel’s lips were moving. Just barely.
I leaned in close, pressing my ear to hear the refrain he whispered over and over, like a prayer, an entreaty.
“They’re coming for you. She’s coming for you.”