Ren Frost's Arc

Chapter 3 of 13

Ren told Jason she'd call back. She hung up before he could answer. A low groan came from the shed roof above her head. Snow hissed down the seams. She looked up and saw the center beam bow like a tired spine. She had minutes. Maybe less. The fawn pressed against her boot, ears flat. Ren grabbed the first kennel and ran. The old stone cave sat at the pasture edge, half buried in drift. Hunters had used it once. The rock overhang held the snow off. She kicked the entrance clear and shoved kennels deep against the back wall, two and three high. She sprinted back. Six trips. Eight. Her lungs burned. Behind her the shed roof folded inward with a wet crack, beams snapping, ice sheets sliding off the bent metal into the snow. The doors hung open on a ruin. The loose animals had nowhere to stand. Ren dragged fence panels from the trailer wreck and wired them to the cave mouth, lashing scrap board across the gaps. A crooked wall, but a wall. The fawn went in last. Ren counted sixty noses in the dark. Headlights swept the drive. Jason's truck. He climbed out, looked at the caved shed, then at her makeshift pen. He said one word. "Okay." Then he started unloading lumber from his bed.