"Imagine how much easier it is to pilot something that can listen and think," he said hopefully. "I mean, I'm a natural flyer. Chimeras are. But I also don't normally fly over mountains, or at—how high is that?"
Jo drew in a deep breath of cold air and tilted her head up, examining the peak and those around it. "Three, four thousand feet? Almost a foothill." Hope surged in her belly. "Maybe we just came down in a valley between the foothills and the big mountains, which would still mean we're probably not that far from the road system."
"Well, whether it's three or six, I don't usually fly anything like that high, so I'm not kidding when I say having an experienced pilot on board will make me feel a lot better."
"I bet you don't usually fly with a passenger, either," Jo said, finally realizing just that. She turned toward Colton, whose expression became slightly guilty. "Can you even get up that high with somebody on your back?"
"I'm not sure," he admitted. "I wasn't reallyflyingwhen we jumped out of the airplane."
"No, I noticed. Controlled descent, but basically a long glide, not a flight."
To her surprise, Colton's eyes lit up. "See? That's why having a pilot with me is a good thing. You've got at least as much sense of what it'll take to get out of here as I do. Maybe more."
Jo rubbed her forehead. "Well, all right, look. We should probably start with just finding out if you can get off the ground with me on your back, because otherwise we need a completely different plan anyway. Wait!" She held up a hand before Colton shifted and he went as still as a startled cat, eyes wide, before relaxing. Jo snickered, feeling like she could see the chimera in the man. "Assuming youcanget off the ground, I need to know a few things. Like, even aside from the fact that a steep ascentwould probably make me slide off your back, can you even do one? How much…runway…do you need?"
"Oh. Jeez." Colton glanced up at the mountains, then at where they stood in relation to its abrupt rise. "I'd probably have to circle some to get enough height."
"Assuming you can go that high at all."
"No, I…" Colton tipped his head to one side, cat-like again, and Jo was certain he was consulting with his chimera. After a moment he said, "We can go as high as we need to. It's the distance we need to worry about."
"And I don't know how far we'll need to go." Jo turned again, studying mountains she wasn't used to seeing from this side, or this angle. "Well, wewon'tknow until we're higher up, I guess. If it turns out we're in the middle of the damn range, we'll come back down and figure it out, but if we're as close to the edge as we should be, we ought to be able to make it to the other side of the big stuff, anyway. Or." She turned north, glaring impotently at the magnificent, untouched, gorgeous scenery and the huge problem it caused. "Going over might be stupid. Going north toward where weknowa pass lies might be smarter. Less risky. And maybe even less distance."
Colton turned to look north, too, and after a hesitant moment said, "That doesn'tlookany better…"
"No, I know, but it is. I mean, let's say—" Jo reached for her phone, planning to show him where she thought they were in relation to the pass, then groaned as she remembered there was no signal, and not much battery. "It's incredible how much I rely on that stupid thing. How did people survive before they had cell phones?"
"Like savages, I guess," Colton said with a brief smile that melted most of Jo's irritation.
"I guess so. Okay, but, so, listen. We were about halfway through the flight when we went down. I know where wewere,just not where we ended up. If thisisthe north end of the Hacksaws, then heading a little farther north will get us back to the road system."
"And if we got blown north, or just deeper west?"
That was the problem, all right. Jo looked up at the mountains again, wishing she knew them from ground level as well as she knew them from their distant profiles. "Go up without me," she said slowly. "Go look."
"No! I'm not leaving you here alone!"
"Colton." Jo exhaled heavily and actually found herself reaching for his hand. "You can fly higher and faster without me, can't you?"
"Yes, but?—"
"And we need to get our bearings."
"But you're the one who knows where we are! Or what the landscape looks like, at least!"
"Yeah, but listen. If we're in the Hacksaws, when you get up high enough you'll be able to tell. They're a huge curved ridge of mountains that stretches south from the pass. And the pass will be obvious, okay?" Jo let go of his hand so she could draw in the snow: the Hacksaws, curving north and south in three or four obvious ridges; the wide, almost y-shaped mouth of the summit pass, and then, speaking as she drew, she said, "To the north of the pass is the Butte Range. It's a south-southeast range, itlookslike it's sitting in a different direction from the Hacksaws, okay?" She finished drawing it out and stood, shaking snow off her gloves.
Colton looked at her snow-sketch unhappily. "I don't like the idea of leaving you here, Jo. What if I can't findthisplace again, when I come back down?"
"You'll be able to," she said with confidence, but then smiled. "Look, why don't you break a huge X Marks The Spot in the snow, and I'll line it with branches while you're gone. That'll helpit stand out. And it'll keep me warm,and," she promised, "if I finish before you're back, I'll go back into the tent to stay safe and warm, okay?"
He glanced from her to the sketch to the mountains and back again before finally giving a reluctant sigh. "I don't have much choice, do I?"
"Not really," Jo said quietly. "The odds of us getting out of here safely are a lot higher if you do a scouting mission first. I'm not thrilled, either, but the sooner it's done, the sooner we'll be safe." She pulled together a smile., even though the next words she said felt like stabbing herself in the chest. "And the sooner you'll be back in New York, helping those kids win their court case."
CHAPTER NINE
Colton hadn't thought about his court case in at least eighteen hours, which was probably a personal record. Now, hearing Jo mention it and realizing that one way or another he was going to have to leave her for a little while, he was suddenly breathless with pain. He wanted to gather her in his arms and promise he'd be back. To tell her he couldn't live without her anymore. To guarantee forever, when in fact he couldn't even guarantee they'd get out of the damn mountains alive.
