Claire Summers's Arc

Chapter 4 of 7

The shape didn't move. Claire crept closer, heart pounding, and her boot splashed into shallow water. She froze. A river ran through the cave floor, narrow and bright, winding past the still figure into the dark. She knelt by him. He was breathing — shallow, but breathing. Alive. She didn't know his face, but the badge on his collar matched the jacket above. One-four-five. He'd come for her, and he'd fallen. She pressed her palm to his forehead. Hot. Too hot. She needed clean hands, a clear head, something other than forty days of grime between her and helping him. The river slid past, cold and clear. She made herself a deal. Five minutes. Just enough to think. Claire pulled off her boots and set them on a flat rock. The leather was cracked, the soles worn paper-thin. They had walked her through everything. She folded her ripped shirt and shorts on top, a sad little pile of who she used to be. Her pack leaned against the stone beside them. The water bit when she stepped in. She gasped, then sank to her shoulders. Dirt lifted off her skin in dark ribbons. She scrubbed her arms, her face, her tangled hair. For one strange second, she felt human again. She watched the tracker's chest rise and fall across the stones. She wouldn't leave him. She couldn't carry him up that rope alone, either. But she could keep him alive until someone came. She could be the one who stayed. Claire climbed out, shivering, and reached for her clothes. Then the coin of light above the hole flickered again. A shadow. A voice — far away, muffled by stone — calling down. Someone was up there. And she was naked, dripping, with a wounded man at her feet.