“That’s a relief,” Beaudine said.
“More likely a bear,” Quinn said. “We’re camped right on a bear trail. I saw all kinds of tracks last night.”
Beaudine’s eyes narrowed. “And you didn’t think to tell me this before I wandered off into the forest by myself?”
Quinn chuckled. “Did you want me to come with you?”
She thrust the plastic bag with the toilet paper roll back at him without answering. “I only used four squares, in case you’re a counter.”
Quinn arched his back, introducing his old injuries to the new ones he’d gotten from the crash, before looping the headlamp around his neck and starting for the river.
Beaudine looked up at him from where she warmed her hands by the fire. “Where are you going?”
Quinn sighed. In the bush, the harsh practicality often chased away the niceties of life. “I’m going to keep the ravens from eating my friend.”
Chapter 34
The northern lights cascaded across the sky in dancing curtains of green and purple, incredibly bright now that Quinn had the fire behind him. He crunched the thirty feet down the gravel slope to the water, hardly looking up.
The mangled wreck of the airplane was a silver shadow in the black water. The Aurora and crescent moon reflected off the snowy landscape, giving plenty of light.
A night of snow and heavy rain upriver had caused the little creek to swell and jump its banks, changing the terrain just enough to throw off Quinn’s bearings. It took him a moment to find the white lump of snow that was Lovita’s body, and he was horrified to find that the stream had flooded enough to cover her legs and now lapped at her waist. It was a foolish notion, but Quinn couldn’t help but worry about how cold she must feel in the icy water and moved quickly to drag her body to higher ground.
“Don’t worry, kiddo,” he whispered, gently brushing the snow from her face. Her body was stiff, but she looked like she was asleep. “I’ll get you to your airplane until I can come back and do things right.”
Quinn swallowed hard, patting his young friend on the shoulder as if to comfort her. He looked out at the water that just hours before had come to his knees. Now, it would easily reach his waist.
Shaking the snow off a nearby willow bush, he removed his shirt, and then peeled off his woolies, draping them on the bare branches to stand naked along the bank.
The frigid water pushed the wind from his lungs as surely as if he’d been hit in the chest with a sledgehammer. If there was an upside, it was that the cold numbed his feet so the stones didn’t hurt quite as much. His teeth chattered, his muscles ached, but the overwhelming need to find Volodin drove him forward.
It took him five agonizing minutes standing in the rising stream to pry open the wing locker where Lovita kept the survival gear and medical kit. He grabbed the second sleeping bag as well, and his Aunt Abbey’s AR-10 rifle. Frigid water shoved at his hips as a stiff current rolled loose stones under his bare feet, threatening to push him down with every step.
He had little feeling left in his legs by the time he’d carried all the gear back to shore and picked up Lovita’s body for the return trip. She was light, barely a hundred pounds, but cold and circumstance had weakened him to the point of collapse. He fell twice, floundering in the icy water and nearly letting her get away from him. Shivering uncontrollably by the time he reached the door, he could just fit Lovita’s body into the airplane. She was still stiff, so he had to slide her in at an angle on the roof of her airplane, between the inverted seatbacks. His brain fogged with anger and cold, he stood at the door, at a loss for what to do next. His mother would have said some kind of prayer. Instead, Quinn clenched his jaw to silence his chattering teeth and leaned inside the plane on his belly. He put a hand on his friend’s cold forehead and told her good-bye.
It took another full minute to get the door bent back shut and bend the latches into the locked position with a multi-tool he’d carried out for that purpose. It wouldn’t be enough to slow down a hungry bear — but he hoped it would keep her safe from wolves and ravens for a while — and it was the best he could do.
Quinn took a step toward the bank, then turned, overwhelmed with the sudden need to know what had happened to cause the crash. The aircraft had overturned on impact so he had to stoop and use the multi-tool to open the engine compartment, playing the beam of the headlamp around the charred mess. Burned oil made it almost impossible to tell one piece of the engine from any other, but the tool marks were clearly visible. Quinn had worked on enough motorcycles over the years that it didn’t take him long to find the problem.
Khaki Beaudine was up and dressed by the time Quinn walked into camp wearing his long underwear and unlaced boots. He was deathly pale, and she couldn’t tell if he dropped the load of gear because he wanted to put it in front of the tent, or if his shivering arms simply gave out at that particular spot. He shot a wild look at her, but didn’t speak, moving immediately to squat in front of the fire, arms outstretched, as close as physically possible without bursting into flames himself. Clouds of steam escaped the fabric of the black long johns.
He’d been gone the better part of an hour, and Beaudine had spent the time watching Quinn’s shadow moving back and forth in the darkness, and punctuating her worry with the few useful chores she could think to do. She’d nearly collapsed with relief when he finally switched on his headlamp. The tent was still up but she’d stuffed the sleeping bag in its stuff sack along with the folded Mylar bivy blanket. Trails of her boot prints crisscrossed the snow along the gravel bar, disappearing into the darkness where she’d braved wolves and bears and creepy little gnome people to search for firewood. It seemed silly now, but she was inordinately proud of the large pile of deadfall she’d been able to find.
Quinn looked at the wood and gave an approving nod. He opened his mouth wide, going through a series of grimaces to get the blood flowing in his cheeks, wincing as cold and numbness surely gave way to warmth and revitalizing pain.
“Give it to me straight, Jericho Quinn,” Beaudine said. Her Texas accent twanged as strongly as her mama’s when she was nervous. “Just how bad are we screwed?”
“Pretty bad.” Quinn stood, stepping into the pants he’d left warming on the boulder, and then shrugged on the fleece jacket. Warm now, he looked at ease, as to begin going through their meager pile of gear. Beaudine watched as he opened an empty plastic bag and scooped it full of snow before setting it aside. Using the headlamp, he searched through the first-aid pack, taking out a bottle of water and what looked like a small multi-tool, and setting them on top of the rifle drag bag to keep them off the ground. “I’m pretty sure the Russians disabled the Emergency Beacon. But even if anyone is looking for us, they won’t be looking for us here because Lovita had to leave her original flight path to Needle Village in order to find a suitable place to set down.”
Beaudine took a deep breath, letting the reality of their situation sink in. “And we can’t build a signal fire because that would just bring this Worst of the Moon guy right down on top of us.”
She dabbed at the wound on her face with the cuff of her woolies, pulled down over the heel of her hand. She’d managed to get the crusted eye open but she could feel the angry flap of skin on her forehead, just above her left eyebrow. It wept blood constantly, blurring her vision and forcing her to keep wiping it away.
Quinn found what he was looking for and stood, turning to her, firelight flickering off his face.
“I think I’ve stopped shivering long enough to get you stitched up,” Quinn said. “Then we need to pack the rest of our gear and get on the trail.”