Page 109

Thomas is completely comatose; his limbs are limp—strong, but limp.

I close my eyes as Micah kneels in front of him. I don’t need this visual haunting my dreams. Thomas’s entire body convulses, and he screams out in pain—it’s then I know Micah has started.

“Hold on to him, London, don’t let him go.”

Keeping my eyes closed, and using every ounce of my strength to hold him down, I press on his convulsing body.

Thomas screams—a gut-wrenching scream that nearly deafens me—and his body flails, his arms smacking me straight in the arm. Micah kneels on his chest, and the noise I hear next I can assume is the crunch of the bone, a grinding noise as metal meets flesh. A warm liquid splatters against my face. I just hold on and breathe.

My eyes open when Thomas’s body eases, and his breathing regulates. Sweat pours down his forehead as Micah wraps Thomas’s arm. He hoods his eyes and sets his jaw as he focuses on finishing his task.

I wipe my face—my fingers are blood-red.

I swallow and lean back, wiping my hands on the dirt and my sweats, then take those same hands and gently run them over Thomas’s forehead.

Thomas has passed out again, completely unconscious, and I don’t even know if he’s alive. I want him to know we’re here and doing our best to save him. My eyes flick to Micah when I hear him shuffle. He’s crouched down, watching me at the entrance, his expression pained. Beyond anything I’ve ever seen in him.

“We have to take turns keeping watch on him,” he tells me.

I nod. “Is he going to be okay?”

He looks away and shakes his head. “I don’t think he’ll last the fucking night.” Micah jumps up and leaves the shelter, stalking off into the forest.

I’m alone with Thomas now, so I continue rubbing his head while listening to Jade’s sobs. I focus on the wind and the trees and the crackling fire outside. A few minutes later, from the nearby woods, Micah’s scream pierces through the air. The anguish in that cry rips me apart. I barely make it outside before I throw up what little I have in my stomach and dry heave the rest of the morning.

I don’t know how long I was in with Thomas, it could have been one hour or several. My mind is woozy, so I focus on my breath. I’m not even sure when Jade’s cries ceased. Eventually, I stopped hearing anything at all, as if Thomas and I were the only people left in the world.

My fingers steadily check his pulse, just to make sure his heart is still beating. The fire just outside had long burned down to ash. My fingers freeze, and only Thomas’s burning body beneath my fingertips provided a warmth to my otherwise entirely numb body. I’m also immune to the stark temperature drop and freezing air around me because my numbness has nothing to do with the frozen air.

My head whips up when Jade crawls through the shelter to sit next to me and moves Thomas’s head from my lap to hers. Just as I’ve done for the past couple of hours, she immediately checks his neck for his pulse. Her eyes are distant and dead inside, just as I assume mine must be, but she lets out a sigh of relief when that small pulsing sensation hits her fingers. A stain of blood pools on the ground next to me, smearing across their bed—a visual reminder of the heroism that happened here today, and the savagery that caused it.

I avoid it and sit cross-legged near the entrance. Moving him away from the stench requires Micah’s help, and he is still missing.

Jade’s puffy eyes rise to meet mine. “Is Thomas going to live?”

I swallow, keeping my focus on the blood-soaked bed next to Jade. I’m not sure what to say, Micah wouldn’t even confirm it. So I force a smile. “He’s okay for now, Jade. That’s what we have to hold on to.” My voice is raspy and raw from puking my guts out earlier, my body still shaking.

“How could they let this happen?” She looks at me, noticing the mud, blood, and sweat on my body from the past twenty-four hours with Micah.

I meet her stare. “I can’t even make sense of what is going on right now, Jade.” The layers of complexity even she doesn’t realize the depths of. At this moment, I just want to shelter her from it. She doesn’t need the burden of what’s happening between Micah and me, or between Micah and his brother, or between the twins and the rest of the group. Secrets and lies will destroy us.

She sucks in a breath, her hand trembling as she caresses the forehead of a comatose Thomas. “You can go to him if you want,” she tells me. “I’ll be fine with him for a few minutes. Go clean yourself up.”

Jesus, I must look that bad.

I give her a tight smile. “I’ll be back soon. We’ll clean up this mess, I promise.”

Secretly, I’m eager to find Micah. He’s been gone for hours, but I know he didn’t go far. Not when things are this bad, and when the others are pissed we stole from them. I have no idea what I will say to him. We broke up a mere minute before he had to cut off his best friend’s hand. If breaking up is even what you want to call it, I’m not even sure we were really together.

When I step outside, the mid-afternoon sun momentarily blinds me, and a northern wind seems to blow right through my clothes. I walk across the meadow to my shelter and grab some extra clothes and my pack, where I keep a small bottle of shampoo and some soap. The sun hits my face, and it’s truly the first warmth I’ve felt in days, so I revel in it.

Once I’m at the stream, I bend down and place my hand in its shallow waters and wipe the blood from my fingers and face. I slowly peel off my clothes and dip them into the water, ringing out the blood the best I can, then I place them on the bank to dry. The smell of rotting flesh still lingers in my nose. I’m not sure I’ll ever get that scent off me, and I’ll certainly never forget it. I pick up my tank top and see dried bits of blood on the back side of it. That blood is all mine, so I wash it in the river, too.

I ignore the goosebumps rising from my flesh and fully submerge myself into the stream, letting the cold water completely engulf me, enjoying the stinging sensation on the scrapes on my back. It gives me a moment of utter blissful relief as the stream washes away the dirt and grime all over me. I unbraid my hair and fully immerse myself, bathing for the first time in days, and I can’t scrub my skin hard enough.

My stomach still hurts, so I place my hand on my flat tummy, then move my fingers to my hipbone and ribs protruding from my skin, feeling what little meat I have left on my bones. I’ve probably lost at least ten pounds since I’ve been here. I slide my fingers down between my legs, where that aches too, and wash myself the best I can, letting my hair now fall over my chest. I lean back, letting the sun dry the top part of me. I’m not sure if Micah’s watching me right now, but I hope he is. I want him to stare. To see what he can’t have while simultaneously giving him a show.

Torture and tease.