Claire felt like crying. Soon, they’d be saved! It wouldn’t matter who the wild man had been or whether he’d known their parents, because they’d be safe and all of this—and all ofthat—would be the past.
“Dial,” Reyva ordered.
Hands shaking, Mariana punched 9-1-1.
It didn’t beep. It didn’t ring. Nothing happened.
“Try again,” Reyva said, her teeth gritted.
Mariana examined the phone, turning it over. “It’s cracked. Must have happened when Arthur was dragging him over the rocks. Or when he dropped him on the ground.”
Claire scooted closer to see. It wasn’t just cracked; it was crushed. And she felt all her elation crash down around her.I should have known it was too good to be true.
“Can you fix it?” Reyva asked.
“If it were a car, yes, but a phone?”
“You have to try.”
“Of course I’m going to try!” Mariana said. “It depends what’swrong with it. If the battery is just knocked out, then easy. But if it’s more serious... It’s not like I have any tools. So it might take a little time.” She dropped cross-legged onto the forest floor and scowled at the back of the case.
Claire didn’t know if Jack had time. Or the wild man. If he was only hurt and not dead, there might be a chance to save him, if help came soon enough. It was possible that they hadn’t killed him.I don’t want to be a murderer, she thought.
While Mariana tried to pry the back off the phone with her fingernails, Claire climbed back up the boulders to peer into the mouth of the cave. It was a darkness that felt thick. She couldn’t see any differentiation in the shadows. Just a blackness that seemed so complete that it looked solid.We should go down there, she thought.Just to check. He could be injured—
A hand reached out of the cave.
Bloody, with dirt clinging to it.
“Reyva! Mariana!” Kneeling by the hole, she called, “Arthur, are you okay?” And then she saw his face. She screamed. Scrambling away, she stumbled down the rocks.
“Claire?” Mariana rushed forward.
Shaking her head, Claire continued to retreat, unable to speak. She felt bile rise into her throat as the wild man clawed his way out of the cave.
Seeing him, Reyva swore, also backing away.
His head was bashed in. Half his skull, crushed. Blood oozed down his neck, and his neck was at an improbable angle.
He wasn’t alive. But he wasn’t dead either.
“Not possible,” Mariana breathed.
No one could survive wounds like that. His neck was broken, and his skull was crushed. Yet he crawled out of the ground as if out of a grave.
“What are you?” Mariana yelled at him. “What do you want?”
Blood oozed out of the wild man’s mouth as he spoke. “I want to live.”
They stared. Claire felt frozen.
He couldn’t be speaking. But he was, his words garbled by the blood in his throat. Red tears leaked from his eyes as he hauled his battered body out of the hole.
Reyva spoke. “Run.”
All three of them turned and ran, with Mariana clutching the broken phone to her chest. As they passed Jack, he pushed himself up to sitting. Groggily, he said, “What the—”
Claire shouted at him. “Run!”
