At the far end of the platform theres a tunnel, so low Julian and I have to stoop to enter. After ten feet, we reach a narrow metal ladder, which takes us down into a broader tunnel, this one studded with old train tracks but free, thankfully, of running water. Every few feet Julian pauses, listening for the Scavengers.
Then we hear it, unmistakably, and closer now: a voice grunting, This way. Those two words knock the breath out of me, exactly as if Id been punched. Its Albino. I mentally curse myself for putting the handgun in the backpackstupid, stupid, and no way of getting it now, in the dark, while Julian and I are pushing forward. I squeeze the handle of the knife, taking some reassurance from the smooth grain of its wood, from its weight. But Im still weak, dizzy, and hungry, too; I know I wont do well in a fight. I say a silent prayer that we can lose them in the darkness.
Down here!
But the voices grow louder, closer. We hear feet ringing against the metal ladder, a sound that makes my blood sing with terror. Just then I see it: light zigzagging against the walls, flashing yellow tentacles. Theyre using flashlights, of course. No wonder theyre coming so fast. They dont have to worry about being seen or heard. They are the predators.
And we are the prey.
Hide. Its our only hope. We need to hide.
Theres an archway on our righta cutout of even blacker darknessand I squeeze Julians hand, pulling him back, directing him through it, into another tunnel, a foot or so lower than the one weve been traveling, and this one dotted with puddles of stagnant, stinking water. We grope our way through the dark. The walls on both sides of us are smoothno alcoves, no piled wooden crates, nothing to conceal usand the panic is building. Julian must be feeling it too, because he loses his footing, stumbles, and splashes heavily into one of the narrow beds of still water.
Both of us freeze.
The Scavengers, too, freeze. Their footsteps stop; their voices fall silent.
And then the light seeps through the archway: a creeping, sniffing animal, roving the ground, ravenous. Julian and I dont move. He pulses my hand, once, then releases it. I hear him shift the backpack from his shoulder and know that he must be fumbling for a weapon. Theres no longer any point in running. Theres no point in fighting, eithernot reallybut at least we can take a Scavenger or two down with us.
My vision goes suddenly blurry and Im startled. Tears sting my eyes, and I have to wipe them away with the inside of my wrist. All I can think isNot here, not like this, not underground, not with the rats.
The light widens and expands; a second beam joins it. The Scavengers are moving silently now, but I can feel them taking their time, and enjoying it, the way a hunter draws his bow back the last few inches before releasing an arrowthose final moments of quiet and stillness before the kill. I can feel the albino. Even in the dark, I know he is smiling. My palms are wet on the knife. Next to me, Julian is breathing heavily.
Not like this. Not like this. My head is full of echoes now, fragments and distortions: the heady smell of honeysuckle in the summer; fat, droning bees; trees bowed low under the weight of heavy snowfall; Hana running ahead of me, laughing, her blond hair swinging in an arc.
And strangely, what strikes me thenin that exact second, as I know with solid certainty that I am going to dieis that all the kisses I have ever had are behind me. The deliria, the pain, all the trouble it has caused, everything we have been fighting for: for me it is done, washed away on the tide of my life.
And then, just as the beams of light grow to headlightshuge, blinding, bearing down on us, and the shadows behind them unfold and become peopleI am filled with desperate rage. I cant see; the light has dazzled me, and the darkness has melted into explosions of color, spots of floating brightness, and dimly, as I leap forward, thrusting blindly with my knife, I hear shouting and roaring and a scream that bursts through my chest, whines through my teeth like the reverberation of a metal blade.
Everything is chaos: hot bodies and panting. Theres an elbow in my chest and thick arms encircling me, choking out my breath. I get a mouthful of greasy hair, a blade of pain in my side; foul breath in my face, and guttural shouts. I cant tell how many Scavengers there arethree? four?and dont know where Julian is. I am striking without looking, struggling to breathe, and everything is bodieshardness and enclosure, no way to run, no way to break freeand the slashing of my knife. I hit flesh, and flesh, and then the knife gets wrenched from my hand, wrist twisted until I cry out.
Enormous hands find my neck and squeeze, and the air goes out of the tunnel, and shrivels to the point of a pen in my lungs. I open my mouth to gasp and find that I cant. In the darkness above me I see a tiny bubble of light, of air, floating high above meI am reaching for it, fighting my way out of a thick, consuming murkbut there is nothing but mud in my lungs and I am drowning.
Drowning. Dying.
Faintly I hear a tiny drumming, a constant pitter-patter, and think that it must once again be raining. Then there are lights blazing again on either side of me: dancing, mobile light, twisting and live. Fire.
Suddenly the circle around my neck breaks. The air is like cold water washing into me, making me gasp and splutter. I sink to my hands and knees, and for one confused second I think I must be dreamingI fall into a stream of fur, a blur of tiny bodies.
Then my head begins to clear and the world returns from the fog and I realize the tunnel is filled with rats. Hundreds and hundreds of them: rats leaping over one another, wriggling and writhing, colliding with my wrists and nipping at my knees. Two gunshots explode; someone cries out in pain. Above me there are shapes, people, grappling with the Scavengers; they have enormous, smoldering torches, stinking like dirty oil, and they scythe through the air with their fire like farmers cutting through fields of wheat. Various images are frozen, briefly illuminated: Julian doubled over, one hand on the tunnel wall; one of the Scavengers, face contorted, screaming, her hair lit up with fire like one of the torches.
This is a new kind of terror. Im frozen on my knees as the rats rush around me, drumming me with their bodies, squeaking and slithering and whipping my skin with their tails. Im sickened and paralyzed with fear.
This is a nightmare. It must be.
A rat crawls up onto my lap. I shout and swat it away, nausea rising in my throat. It hits the wall with a sickening thud, squeaking; then it scrabbles back to its feet and joins the stream again, blurring past me. Im so disgusted I cant even move. A whimper works its way out of my throat. Maybe Ive died and gone to hell, to be punished for deliria and all the terrible things Ive doneto live in squalor and chaos, just like The Book of Shhh predicts for the disobedient.
Stand up.
I raise my head. Two monsters stand above me, holding torches. Thats what they look like: beasts from the underground, only half-human. One of them is enormous, practically a giant. One of his eyes is milky white, blinded; the other is as darkly glittering as an animals.
The other figure is hunched over, back as crookedly swollen as the warped hull of a boat. I cant tell if its a man or a woman. Long, greasy hair mostly conceals the persons face. Sheor hehas twisted Julians hands behind his back and bound them with a cord. The Scavengers are gone.
I stand. The bandage on my neck has come loose, and my skin feels slick and wet.
Walk. The rat-man gestures with his torch toward the darkness behind me. I see that he is slightly doubled over and is clutching his right side with the hand not holding the torch. I think of the gunshots and hearing someone shout. I wonder if he was hit.
Listen. My voice is shaking. I hold up both hands, a gesture of peace. I dont know who you are, or what you want, but were just trying to get out of here. We dont have much, but you can take whatever you want. Justjust let us go. Please, okay? My voice breaks a little. Please let us go.
Walk, the rat-man repeats, and this time jabs so close to me with his torch I can feel the heat from the flames.
I look at Julian. He gives a minute shake of his head. The expression in his eyes is clear. What can we do?
I turn, and walk. The rat-man goes behind me with his torch, and in front of us, hundreds of rats disappear into the darkness.
then
No one knows what to expect at the third encampment, or whether there will even be a third encampment. Since Tack and Hunter never made it home, we cant know whether they successfully buried supplies just outside of Hartford, Connecticut, roughly 180 miles south of Rochester, or whether something happened to them along the way. The cold has buried its claws in the landscape now: It is relentless, and will not let go until spring. We are tired, hungry, and defeated. Even Raven cant maintain the appearance of strength. She walks slowly, head bowed, not speaking.
I dont know what well do if there is no food at the third encampment. I know Raven is worried too, although she wont talk about it. None of us talk about it. We just push blindly, obstinately forward.
But the fear is there. As we approach Hartfordthreading through the ruins of old towns, bombed-out shells of houses, like dry insect husksthere is no sense of celebration. Instead there is anxiety: a hum of it, running through all of us, making the woods feel ominous. The dusk is full of malice; the shadows are long, pointed fingers, a forest of dark hands. Tomorrow we will reach the third encampment, if it is there. If not, some of us will starve before we make it farther south.
And if it is not there, we can stop wondering about Tack and Hunter: It will mean that in all probability they are dead.
The morning dawns weakly and is full of strange electricity, like the waiting feeling that usually precedes a storm. Other than the crunching of our shoes in the snow, we move in silence.
Finally we reach it: the place where the third encampment should be. There is no sign that Tack and Hunter have been here: no gouges in the trees, no tattered pieces of fabric looped over tree branches, none of the symbols weve been using to communicate, and no indication that any goods or supplies have been buried here. This is what weve all feared, but still the disappointment is almost physical.
Raven lets out a short exclamation of pain, as though shes been slapped; Sarah collapses, right there in the snow, and says, No-no-no-no-no! until Lu tells her to shut up. I feel as though my chest has caved in.
There must be a mistake, I say. My voice sounds too loud in the clearing. We must be in the wrong place.
Theres no mistake, Bram says in a low voice. This is it.
No, I insist. We took a wrong turn somewhere. Or Tack found a better place for the supplies.
Be quiet, Lena, Raven says. Shes rubbing her temples, hard. Her fingernails are ringed with purple. I need to think.
We need to find Tack. I know Im not helping; I know Im half-hysterical. But the cold and the hunger have turned my thoughts dull too, and this is the only one that stands out. Tack has our food. We need to find him. We need to