“Talk to me,” I said for the dozenth time under the drone of the engine. For a long moment he didn’t answer, and I shook his arm. “Ingo! Talk!”
“And say what, you harridan?” he mumbled.
“That’ll do. I just needed to know you’re still alive.”
“Please shut up and stop jostling me,” he said shortly, his voice tight with pain. “You don’t die of a broken rib, Amity.”
No, but you could die of blood poisoning from an infected wound, or if your rib pierced a lung. I managed not to say it…but as I lay there I listened to his breathing, and remembered with unease my promise to leave him behind if he couldn’t make it.
It seemed as if we’d spent days in this dark, cramped tyre compartment, though I knew it was only hours. How many now? Eight? Ten? At first I’d tried to guess how fast we were travelling and how far we’d come, but it was impossible to tell. At least a few hundred miles, I hoped. Far enough south that we were nearly out of the snow.
The truck stopped.
I gasped out loud at the shock of the sudden silence. The dark, tiny space felt claustrophobic suddenly. I strained to hear what was happening. To my relief, I could feel Ingo alert beside me.
“Maybe they’re changing the runners for tyres now,” he muttered in my ear.
“Hopefully not much further then,” I whispered back.
We both cringed as the snow-truck’s back doors clanged open. Ingo had said the tyres they used were stored on the truck’s side.
Footsteps echoed above. A long scraping noise, like a canister being moved. At the same time I heard a compartment door being opened on the side of the truck. It banged shut again. Another one opened.
An irritable voice called out, “This is stupid. We’re gonna get behind schedule.”
“Ours not to reason why, pal. Whole convoy’s in the same fix,” shouted back someone else. I flinched, my pulse battering; the speaker was right over our head.
“Can’t we just pretend we didn’t understand them on the talkie?”
“No. Keep searching. All compartments.”
Another slow scraping noise…this time directly above us.
Ingo shoved my arm vehemently. I didn’t need coaxing. I lunged wildly off the tyre, fumbling downwards for the trapdoor. I got it open – saw a patch of snow. I propelled myself out in a wild scramble.
The snow was deep, breaking my fall with hardly a sound. Ingo was right behind me. When he landed he surged upwards, scattering snow as he hastened to close the trapdoor again. I was feverishly thankful for the clangs and bangs happening all around.
A pair of snowshoe-clad feet appeared to one side, circling the truck. “Want me to check underneath?” their owner called.
Before he’d finished talking we were burrowing into the snow. A foot of soft powder lay over an icy crust; acting on panicked instinct, I wriggled deep under its surface. Ingo followed, kicking upwards to make it fall on top of us.
Neither of us moved. My cheeks went as prickly as if I’d burned them, then numb. I lay shivering, expecting hands to burst through at any moment and grab us.
There was only a grey, heavy silence.
As the minutes passed my shivering became convulsive. Beside me, Ingo was trembling just as badly. What if they’d already left and we didn’t know? We could be trapped here until we froze.
All at once, the ground shook. A distant thunder came. Our dim, snowy cave lightened: the snow-truck had moved away. I lay fighting against the primal urge to claw my way out. A convoy. How many more?
A low rumbling. Another shadow.
Abruptly, the snow crunched in on us. Hard, smothering. I tried to scream – snow choked me. I struggled, panicked; was dimly aware of Ingo clutching my arms. It went on and on, until the snow was packed so tightly I could hardly move.
After a long time, there was silence again.
I knew we should try to dig ourselves out. The idea seemed to come from very far away. I was starting to feel warm, almost comfortable. Sleep, I thought. Just for a little while.
An eruption came next to me – a violent churning. Ingo. Alarm filtered through my brain. Somehow I forced myself into action, kicking, flailing. My gloved hands became claws, tearing at the smothering whiteness.
With a strangely gentle sound, our roof crumbled. Suddenly I was blinking up at a grey sky, my chest heaving. Next to me, Ingo gave a ragged gasp, his head and shoulders covered with snow.
We crawled out and collapsed onto the ground. I couldn’t stop shaking. For long minutes neither of us spoke.
Finally I forced myself to sit up. I looked around us.
The ground was packed hard from the caterpillar tracks. They headed away into the distance, twin rutted roads in the snow. Faintly, I could still hear the snow-trucks’ rumble.
Apart from that, there was nothing. We were on a hill. In every direction there lay only snow, fir trees, more hills. Heavy-looking clouds hung above, with the afternoon sun just a faint lightening to the west.
As I took this in, the sound of the vehicles faded. The silence was immense.
Ingo sat up too. His face was greyish with cold, apart from the red, wrinkled mass of his scar. I saw him swallow.
We looked at each other.
“I have a little food,” he said.
I fervently agreed with his choice not to discuss this just yet. Our muscles still sluggish, we put what food we had together. It amounted to a few scraps of bread, a tiny morsel of meat. We each took a bite of bread – one bite – and then Ingo put the food away in his pocket.
I chewed the bread slowly, trying to make it last. We had no water. I looked at the snow, remembered it choking me, and shuddered at the idea of putting any in my mouth.
Finally Ingo grimaced. “We’re alive, at least,” he said. “No thanks to your informer.”
I felt a dull stab of hatred for Claudia. She’d told the Guns about our stolen uniforms, of course, or else they wouldn’t have searched the snow-trucks.
“We should have killed her,” I said tiredly.
“That thought’s crossed my mind, yes. Well, what now?”
“Any idea where we are?”
Ingo sighed. “Two, three hundred miles from Harmony Five, maybe? But in exactly what direction…” He shrugged.
I licked my lips, thinking of the maps I’d loved to study as a child – the thousands of square miles of wilderness surrounding us.
“We’ll have to follow their tracks,” I said.
“Yes. And if this is their regular route, they’ll probably see our footprints. They’re already looking for us.”
Far above, a hawk wheeled through the air. There was no other movement, not for as far as the eye could see. Even as large as the snow-trucks were, they had to be going at least forty miles an hour. It might be hours more before they reached their destination.
“Do we have a choice?” I said finally. It wasn’t a challenge. I was hoping beyond hope that he’d say yes, we did, and present me with some new, shiny idea.
Ingo wrapped his arms around his thin frame and studied the snow-swollen sky.
“No,” he said. “I don’t think we do.”
The treads’ deep ruts were spaced too awkwardly to walk on. We moved far to one side and quickly learned to tread lightly on this mix of old and new snow – or else break through into cold wetness up to our knees. Over and over, I misjudged and had to flounder my way out. Despite the long fleece-lined coat, my trousers were soon soaked. I couldn’t stop shivering. Ingo’s face was set and grim; he walked hunched over, not speaking.
Night came all too soon. There were no stars. Before it became too dark to see, we took refuge in a copse of fir trees.
We didn’t speak much. We fashioned a crude shelter out of branches and collapsed into it. I had never been more exhausted. I couldn’t imagine how Ingo felt.
We slept pressed together for warmth, our coats wrapped tightly around us. It didn’t help much. I closed my eyes fully expecting not to open th
em again…yet in the morning I awakened to a greyish dawn.
I looked over at Ingo. His gaunt face was as grimy as I knew mine must be. Black stubble coated his jaw, except for the barren wrinkles of his scar. But his eyes met mine.
“Still alive,” I said hoarsely.
He nodded. “Still alive.”
We each had a bite of bread and kept on. The wind picked up. Soon it was a knife that sliced through me. It skittered fresh snow over the trucks’ tracks, so that we had to move closer to keep them in sight. As the sun moved slowly across the sky we both began to fall through the snow more and more. My muscles quivered with cold, with fatigue.
I lost count of how many times I fell that day. Finally I went down and couldn’t make myself move again. Ingo battled over and grabbed my arm.
“Get up!” he yelled over the wind.
I was almost crying. “Ingo, please, just let me—”
“Up, you coward!”
Anger lashed through me. I gritted my teeth and managed to rise with his help, my legs churning against the snow. For a fierce, hot second I hated him for not letting me lie there.
But he was struggling too. Soon after, he stumbled over a half-exposed rock and just lay there, his face a sickly grey. As the wind howled, I put my arm around his shoulders; panting, I hauled him up.
“You have to keep on if I do, you bastard!” I shouted in his ear. “Move!”
Somehow we dragged each other on with curses, insults, long after it seemed there was no point. Overhead the sky was a smooth, ominous grey.
The first snowflakes were as gentle as kisses. More followed until they came thick and fast.
Before long the tracks had vanished. Earlier, we’d seen trees in the distance. Spurred by the thought of shelter, we trudged on, sinking to our knees with almost every step now.
Time slowed as the snow whined around us, measured footstep by flailing footstep. I wasn’t sure what direction we were heading in any more – was certain we’d gotten turned around.
Ingo staggered to a stop. “Look at the ground in front of us!” he called. He put his head close to mine, shouting in my ear: “Tell me what that looks like to you – think about flying over the base!”
The thought of flying was a sharp pain. I looked at the ground, trying to imagine it…and saw a faint ridge in the snow to the west. It continued on straight, for as far as I could see, and suddenly I recalled faint, ancient lines sketching the earth.
“A road!” I shouted.
“Yes, I think so!”
My pulse skipped. We battled our way up a hill, following the road, heads down. The snow was howling now, an attack of white bees.
When we finally reached the top, at first I could see only whiteness. Then shapes emerged: a dozen small mounds at regular intervals. The snow faltered momentarily and a piece of machinery appeared – a familiar, hulking mass.
“Ingo!” I grabbed his arm and pointed.
He was panting, clutching his side. “A rock crusher,” he breathed.
For a sickening moment I thought we’d travelled in a circle and arrived back at Harmony Five. But this crusher was rusting, falling to pieces.
An abandoned mine. Were the snowy mounds buildings? Please, please, I thought. We started down the hill. Snow hid the road now, its ridges evening out into a blinding whiteness.
The way down became steeper. Too steep. I knew we’d lost the road, but it was snowing too hard to go back. I could barely see where I was placing my feet. Struggling beside me, Ingo’s shoulders were thick with snow – his eyebrows beneath his hat looked half-frozen.
“We’ll lose each other in this!” I yelled, the wind whipping my words away.
“Keep hold of me!” Ingo held out his gloved hand.
I half-turned to take it; suddenly the world jerked sideways and I screamed. Snow and rocks seemed to explode around me. Sky and ground spun – I was tumbling, falling down the hill.
Abruptly, the world stilled. I lay motionless, panting. My head hurt. The snow kept falling, swirling towards me. Getting up seemed heartbreakingly difficult. I thought how nice it would be to just close my eyes and never bother to move again.
It’s the only thing worth being, Amity…I always knew that.
The pain spurred me. I still needed answers. I struggled up in a skitter of gravel and snow.
“Ingo!” I shouted, cupping my hands around my mouth – and then saw the grey mound of his coat a few feet away. I stumbled over. Before I reached him he’d managed to get up, but stood hunched, chest heaving. He gave me a grin that was more like a baring of teeth.
“That’s…that’s one way to get down the hill!” he shouted.
Our fall had carved a long, gravelly ribbon against the white slope. The wind shrieked, whipping us with snow.
The nearest mound was one of the largest. We fought our way to it. Beneath the snowy covering was a building of weathered grey wood.
The door was stiff with ice but opened inward when we tried it. We got inside and shut it behind us. I gasped in relief at the sudden lessening of sound. We were in an old office; there was a desk. My knees felt made of water. I sank onto the floor with my back against the desk, breathing hard.
I never wanted to move again.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
At last my numb fingers and feet started coming alive with painful prickling. Wearily, I roused myself, took off my gloves and swiped off the hat. I gazed around us.
Junk filled the small office. Newspapers were scattered everywhere, yellow with age. The smell of dust hung in the air.
Ingo was sitting on the floor with his bare head against the wall, eyes shut. The unscarred half of his face had more colour now; the burned side blazed a crinkled red. His hair was damp.
“What happened to leaving each other behind if we couldn’t make it?” I said.
He gave a tired shrug. “You’re obviously as idiotic as I am.”
“That’s pretty idiotic then.”
Ingo laughed without opening his eyes. “Did you just make a joke?”
“I do make jokes sometimes,” I said. “Or I used to.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“It’s true. It’s just that no one ever got them.”
“All right, that I believe…” Ingo sighed and opened his eyes. He had one hand pressed against his side. I glanced at his torso, wondering if his wound had opened up again.
“You know what I’m going to ask,” I said after a pause.
Ingo got to his feet. I had the impression he was standing upright through willpower alone.
“I’ll live,” he said. “What about you? Your head’s bleeding.”
I touched my forehead, suddenly aware as he said it of a warm stickiness. My hand came away bloody. “Look at that,” I said shakily. “I still work.”
Ingo came over. “Two jokes in two minutes…don’t wear yourself out.” He inspected my head briefly. “I think you’ll live too. It’s just a scratch. They bleed a lot, on the head.”
“I know,” I said. “My brother got a scratch on his forehead once…” I trailed off, not really wanting to think about Hal, hopefully still hidden in that tiny cell under the floorboards. I shook my head. “It’ll stop bleeding soon,” I said shortly.
The wind howled at the windows. Already, the cabin felt scarcely warmer than outside. Suddenly I recalled the matches in my flight jacket pocket. I groped hastily for them.
“Where’s the best place to build a fire?” I said in a rush. “Maybe if we crack open a window, so that we have ventilation—”
Ingo was scanning the shadowy walls. “No, here!”
He hurried to a dark, cluttered corner; a black pipe snaked up one wall. I helped him heft aside the trash: a rusted metal bed frame, old packing crates. Hidden behind them was an ancient pot-bellied stove, covered in cobwebs.
We crouched before it reverently. Ingo creaked open its slatted door. The ashy remnants of the last fire were still there.
“Do you think it
works?” I asked, almost in a whisper.
Ingo nodded tensely. “We’ve got one like it at home. It’ll work, if the matches still do.” He glanced at the small pack in my hand. It was the flimsy cardboard kind you find in bars.
“They look damp,” he said.
I winced, remembering all the times I’d fallen in the snow. I took off my gloves. “They feel a little damp,” I admitted.
There was a pause. “Well, fingers crossed,” said Ingo finally.
He quickly cleaned out the stove with a piece of board. We made kindling from breaking up old boxes; Ingo arranged them in a careful tepee inside the stove’s mouth and added some twisted-up scraps of newspaper.
We took turns trying. One after another, the matches failed. Finally, with only two left, one caught. Ingo hastily shielded the tiny blaze and touched it to a piece of newspaper. Neither of us breathed again until the wooden tepee was in flames.
Ingo’s shoulders slumped. “There,” he said softly.
We gathered up the firewood – bits of crates, a broken chair. Looking through the desk, we found an old timetable. “The manager’s name was Dave,” I said, reading it. “We’re in the New Hope Mine.”
“Last Hope, more like…” Ingo pulled open the bottom drawer and gave a bark of triumph. He held up a half-full whiskey bottle, its label grey with age. “Look, Dave forgot something. Lucky for us.”
We fed the fire and watched it grow. Faster than I would have believed, the little room lost its icy edge. I rubbed my fingers with relief.
Ingo nodded towards a bucket in a corner. “Look, we even have a chamber pot.”
Over six months in Harmony Five had made me immune to embarrassment. “Agreed,” I said. “I’m not going out there again.”
The wind whistled. All I could see through the window was a white blur, casting the cabin into a greyish gloom.
I took in Ingo, still too pale, and frowned. I went and got the bottle of whiskey. “Take your shirt off,” I said.
His normal eyebrow flew up. He gave a bitter laugh. “My scarred mug must be an improvement. Usually the alcohol is consumed before I hear that.”
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