“Buck’s co-counselor, yeah, we know,” interrupted the other girl. She was a tiny thing, so pale that if not for her startling mismatched eyes—one bright blue, the other an equally vivid green—Honey would have wondered if she was an albino. “Which means you’reourcounselor. I’m Estelle, and that’s Beth. Finley and Rufus told us about you.”
“Good things,” Finley clarified hastily. Rufus confirmed this with a slight nod, looking up at her sidelong through his thick hair.
“I’m glad to hear it,” Honey said. “It’s nice to meet you, girls. I’m looking forward to getting to know you all, but right now, I really need to find Buck. Did you see which way he went?”
“Yeah, that way,” Estelle said, pointing away from the camp, where the flat green fields gave way to the rising, forested slopes of Thunder Mountain. “He was really sprinting, too. What did you do?”
“Estelle!” Beth hissed.
“What?” the other girl replied. “She must have donesomething. Buck looked ready to rip a tree in half. Even more than normal, I mean.”
Finley interposed himself between Estelle and Beth with the ease of someone used to being a human peace-keeping buffer. “We were just debating whether we should go tell someone, since it looked like he was heading straight out of camp. Did something happen?”
“Nothing you need to worry about,” Honey said, hoping that was true. “He just needed some space to clear his head. I’ll go find him.”
Beth perked up, like a dog that had just heard the wordwalkies.“Do you want me to come too? I’m good at finding people.”
“No, that’s all right.” The last thing any of the kids needed was to see one of their counselors having a sudden, inexplicable breakdown. “The first counselor training session is nearly done, so I expect Leonie will call you in for lunch soon. You kids get back to what you were doing, okay?”
Finley, Beth, and Estelle all nodded, though Beth looked distinctly disappointed. Rufus, however, didn’t. His gaze slid past Honey, fixing on the woods beyond. He swallowed, mouth working soundlessly, then—
“Hurry.”
Honey jumped at the unexpected whisper. All three other kids whipped round to stare at Rufus as though he’d burst into song. He flinched but held his ground.
“Hurry,” he said again, in that dry, barely audible whisper. She could see his throat working, struggling to shape his thoughts into words. “He needs… you need… need to see…”
He fell silent, mouth contorting in frustration. Finley touched Rufus’s arm, like a question. Rufus pulled away, shaking his head. He looked at Honey, not quite meeting her gaze. She was struck once again by the strange bright gold of his eyes; like a lion, or a hawk.
“I’ll find him,” Honey said to him, and saw his tense shoulders drop a little in relief. “I promise.”
* * *
This did not turn out to be easy.
“Buck?” Honey called again, cupping her hands in front of her mouth. “Oh, for crying out loud, you aggravating man.Buck!”
Her call bounced off tree trunks, falling flat into the undergrowth. She couldn’t have been that far past the camp boundaries, yet it felt like she was the only human being for miles.
“This is ridiculous,” Honey muttered to herself, dropping her hands to her hips. “What does Leonie expect me to do, track the man through the wilderness?”
Maybe the head counselor would indeed have been able to follow a trail of bent leaves and scuffed dirt straight to Buck, but Honey’s ability to find people began and ended with typing their names into Google. For all she knew, Buck could be clear on the other side of the mountain by now. Or hiding behind the nearest rock, refusing to answer her increasingly hoarse calls out of sheer cussedness.
If it hadn’t been for her promise to Rufus, she would have l given up and turned around half an hour ago. Only the memory of those intense, pleading eyes kept her struggling onward, wading through the tangled undergrowth.
“Buck!” she shouted. “If you can hear me, come here right now! We need to get back to camp!”
Not even a blue jay called in response. Apart from the occasional leaf fluttering to the ground, nothing moved. Closer to the camp, the woods had been alive with chirping birds and buzzing insects, but now she couldn’t spot so much as a squirrel. A dense, oppressive silence had settled over the forest, as though every living thing had simultaneously decided it would be a good idea to stay very, very still.
Honey was trying hard not to feel unnerved by this.
She moistened her dry lips, wishing she’d thought to bring a bottle of water. Some camp counselor she was turning out to be, charging into strange woods without an ounce of preparation. She didn’t even have her phone. Not that she would have been able to get any signal out here, but she could at least have used the inbuilt compass.
“Buck?” she tried again, without much hope.
A flash of black fabric caught her eye, just visible through a gap between two young conifers. Heart rising, Honey pushed her way through the thick, prickly branches—but it wasn’t Buck. Just an old camp t-shirt, snagged on a branch.
Except it wasn’t old. The printing on the front was fresh and unweathered,CAMP THUNDERBIRDstanding out in crisp white letters. When she tugged the t-shirt down, the fabric felt soft and dry, untouched by rain or dew. She checked the label: no name, but size men’s XXL.
