Page 3 of Finding Peace
I go toward the sight of light flashing through the trees, blindly hoping Kat’s following me.
But when I turn around to check, I see her running in the opposite direction.
Shouting erupts near the ATV, and I know I don’t have time to call after her.
“Hey!”
“Fuck—stop!”
Footsteps pound through the snow behind me as I trudge through the thick powder as best as my short frame will allow.
“We can’t lose this one!” one of them yells. “Boss doesn’t care about the other one!”
Branches whip my face as I run blindly through the dark, my lungs already burning, the cold air stabbing deep and sharp with every breath.
That’s when I hear it.
Hooves.
Distant.
Thunderous.
Real.
My chest tightens painfully as hope surges so hard it almost knocks me off my feet.
Come find me.
I push harder, legs screaming, boots punching through snow that feels too deep, too heavy. Then, the trees thin without warning, and I burst out into open space.
The snow is untouched here, drifting high and soft like waves in the sea, swallowing my calves. Every step is a fight as I move toward them.
Willow trees loom ahead, their long, skeletal branches hanging low and whispering in the wind as the light of the full moon shines down on the river.
Another engine sounds behind me.
I veer right, toward the low branches of the willows, hoping they’ll hide me from the two men still running at me and the ATV that’s not far behind. But before I know it, my foot slips as the ground slopes sharply downward.
And then I’m falling.
The world tilts violently and cold slams into me like a living thing.
The river steals the breath in one brutal rush. Icy water swallowing me up to the waist, then higher… and higher. Soaking my clothes and dragging me down.
I scream, but it comes out broken. Stolen by the shock of the frigid water.
It takes a minute, but the cold morphs from shock to pain. My muscles seize. My limbs feel thick, unresponsive, like they don’t belong to me anymore. Water wraps around my legs, then my hips. Tugging me down hard. Insistent.
I claw at the embankment, fingers scraping uselessly against mud and frozen roots.
My teeth chatter so violently my jaw aches.
I hear shouting.
They’re closer now.
Then—hooves again.
