Twisted Heart (17 page)

Using the binoculars, I scanned the far shore for signs of life.

‘See anything?’ Ava asked.

I shook my head and handed her the field glasses, tried to tell myself that Kaylee’s theory was correct. If they had any sense, the four Explorers and Holly had given up the attempt to climb Carlsbad and were roughly at the same altitude as us, at this very moment building a new shelter for their second night in the wilderness.

Meanwhile, we had work to do, constructing our own shelter by bending and binding together the tips of young aspen saplings to form a rough tipi then weaving horizontal branches stripped from nearby pines between the uprights. Then Jarrold showed us how to cover the wooden framework with plastic tarp, strapping it in place and leaving only a small flap for the entrance.

‘Good enough?’ Kaylee checked after an hour’s teamwork.

Jarrold nodded and glanced up at the sky, which was growing dark. ‘We’re good unless the wind gets up. In case it does, we ought to weight down the tarp with extra stones.’

‘But first we eat,’ Kaylee suggested, digging into her backpack to produce bars of high-energy cereal and dried fruit plus packs of juice. ‘It’s not much but it’s all we have – unless you want to go out and trap rabbits, break the ice and catch a fish, shoot a deer …’

Gratefully Ava and I took the bars, sat cross-legged on some spare tarp and chewed in silence.

By now the light had almost faded and the snow clouds had cleared. A pale moon rose above the ridge.

‘Do you hear the wind?’ Jarrold said.

I hadn’t until that moment, but now I listened and sure enough the branches of the nearby trees were rustling, the aspens were beginning to bend.

‘We need more stones.’ Ava sprang to her feet and began the task of weighting down the bottom rim of our shelter. Kaylee too found heavy rocks and lowered them into position but now Jarrold didn’t seem interested. Instead, he stared at the moon and slowly wandered off through the aspens. Something made me follow him. I kept him in sight until the trees opened out on to a clear view of Carlsbad in the distance. Moonlight made the snow shimmer with a silver glow. Over our heads there were a zillion stars.

In the valley there is a large band of men marching in single file under the moon. They chant, they cry, they howl as they leave their land for the last time and walk into the mountains. It is a trail of tears
.

‘I wouldn’t have left,’ Jarrold said quietly, as if he shared my vision of the defeated tribe. ‘I would have stayed to fight.’

‘What with? Bows and arrows against guns?’

‘I would still fight.’

I believed him. Nothing on this earth would have made Jarrold walk away from a battle. ‘How can it be so peaceful up here?’ I wondered.

‘With all the blood that was spilled?’ He shrugged. ‘You think you’d feel the anger, the loss.’

‘But you don’t.’ Maybe it was the eternal moon, the mountains rolling on for ever. I relaxed, breathed deeply and felt my worst fears slip away as I stood at ten thousand feet with snow on the ground and with Jarrold beside me.

F
or me, having a night without dreams is heaven.

I had no dreams, either bad or good, and without even my dreamcatcher to filter them. I slept like a baby inside our tarp shelter, glad of the body warmth generated by Ava, Kaylee and Jarrold as we lay nose to toe in our silver sleeping bags like a can of cosy sardines.

I woke at dawn and slid out through the canvas flap to greet the rising sun. And wow, what beauty, what a spectacular, pink-tinged, cloud-banked sky, and pure white snow everywhere – on the mountains, in the valleys and across the frozen surface of Turner Lake.

I breathed in the cold purity and vastness, felt my anxious heart lift. Jarrold followed me out of the shelter, camera in hand. He filmed the sparkling scene then closed in on my smiling, serene face.

‘Give me the camera,’ I said.

He handed it over without a word then zipped up his jacket and pulled his hat low over his forehead. I kept the camera on him as he walked away.

‘Where did Jarrold go?’ Kaylee asked, emerging sleepily but glancing at me and injecting a tinge of jealousy into her voice.

I pointed to the figure heading up the mountain, leaving a trail of fresh prints in the snow.

‘It’s his day to be alone, I guess.’ She looked anxious. ‘Let’s hope he doesn’t do anything stupid.’

‘Like what?’

‘Like decide this is all too hard – again.’

‘And then what – get the hell out of here?’

Kaylee nodded. ‘Jarrold wouldn’t be the first. He won’t be the last.’

‘Really? You guys go on the run? Tell me more.’

Maybe she would have talked if she wasn’t suspicious about me and Jarrold and if I hadn’t had the camera, but as it was she grunted, turned and crawled back into the shelter. Half an hour later, my new buddy Ava surfaced.

‘Did you sleep well?’ I asked.

There were dark shadows under her eyes as she pulled up the fur-edged hood of her jacket. ‘I had bad dreams.’

So it was her turn, not mine. ‘What about?’ Her confession drew a sympathetic smile.

‘About Conner,’ she replied, going tight-lipped and retreating into the shelter when I waited for more.

So I quit filming and sat listening to the wind in the trees.

My mind cleared as I absorbed the silence, the space. I internalized what I saw – the neat pawprints of a coyote between the aspen trunks, a blue jay huddled on a snow-laden branch (but no mourning dove, no Zenaida), the diamond glitter of snowflakes.

After an hour I felt totally calm until Jarrold came back down the mountain. I watched him closely, admiring his combination of strength and long-legged litheness as he skirted around icy boulders and waded through soft drifts. In the clear, early morning light he raised clouds of snow that seemed to form a sparkling halo around him. I held the camera steady, captured every move.

‘Is that what you do, Tania – sit here and chill while your buddy is in deep trouble?’ he demanded.

His voice was a gunshot shattering my peace. I let the camera drop to my side.

‘Come and look,’ Jarrold invited, grabbing my elbow and leading me out of the stand of aspens, giving me a clear view of the lake.

I saw another lone figure toiling up towards us – unrecognizable from this distance but it could only be an Explorer from the Hawk Above Our Heads band.

‘What makes you think … ?’

‘It’s Regan.’ Jarrold handed me his field glasses. ‘The only reason he’s on his way up here is because his band needs our help.’

‘So let’s go!’ I set off out of control down the mountain, half running, tripping, skidding and clutching at snow-covered bushes.

Behind me, Jarrold had raised the alarm with Kaylee, and Ava and all three were now following.

‘Tania, take it easy!’ Kaylee bawled. ‘You want to break a leg?’

I didn’t care. I only wanted to reach Regan and get the facts.

The thin, geeky Explorer saw us coming and slumped forward, hands on his knees, arms braced while he caught his breath.

‘What is it? What happened?’ I yelled as soon as I thought he could hear me.

‘Holly fell through the ice!’ His hoarse voice barely made it up the slope but it stunned me to the core.

My friend is down with the corpses – the skulls and coffins. She doesn’t resist as she drifts through the church door. The minister is the dark monster with snake head and lion body, his wings outstretched. Double-headed water snakes make up the hissing congregation
.

‘Thank God, she made it to the island in the middle of the lake,’ Regan said.

‘But now she’s stranded. She can’t get back?’ I stumbled and slid the final few metres, grateful when Regan put out an arm to halt me. We were both caked in snow, our faces blue with cold. Regan was like Ava – not cut out for these conditions.

‘Exactly,’ he confirmed, repeating the situation for the benefit of the rest of my band.

‘Crap!’ Kaylee muttered. ‘How come she was on the ice to start with?’

Regan shook his head. ‘Channing’s our leader – you’ll have to check with him.’

‘What does Channing want us to do?’ Jarrold asked.

‘He says two of you should inform Ziegler, and two of you should head back with me.’

‘I’m coming with you!’ I cut in before anyone could speak.

‘Me too,’ Jarrold decided. ‘Kaylee, you and Ava report back.’

There was a short argument – Kaylee said she was stronger than me and would be more use, and anyway she was keen to film the rescue. But no way was I going to leave Holly stranded on the island. Before anyone could stop me, I set off in the direction of the lake.

‘How long has she been there?’ I asked Regan when he and Jarrold caught up with me.

‘A couple of hours. There’s a zip-line between the lake shore and the island. Marta thinks Holly tried to use it to get across but the wire snapped and she went straight through the ice.

‘Awesome!’ Jarrold gave a heartless smile. ‘Your buddy acts like we’re in a theme park and almost gets herself killed.’

‘Channing blames himself,’ Regan told us. ‘This is his third wilderness walk. He should’ve warned Holly to stay away from the ice.’

‘God, she must be so cold!’ The more I tried to run, the worse I stumbled in the snow drifts, so I was the last to arrive at the Hawks’ temporary lakeside shelter and it was Blake who had to come and dig me out of the last hole I fell into.

‘Give me your hand,’ she grunted, her red hair flaming in the early sunlight.

She held on to a tree trunk and leaned out towards me.

‘How’s Holly?’ I gasped.

Blake shrugged. ‘We tried to fix the zip-wire, but no luck. Right now she’s lying under the trees – see?’

As we reached the pebble beach and I squinted across the ice at the small island, I saw Holly in her orange jacket slumped against a trunk. ‘Is she conscious?’ I gasped.

‘She was, but now we’re not sure.’ The answer came from tall Marta, helping to brush caked snow from my jacket.

‘If anyone can survive this, it’s Holly,’ I tried to assure them as Jarrold discussed with Channing our next move. Who was I kidding? It didn’t matter how tough you were – anyone who fell through the ice in these sub-zero temperatures was in serious trouble from hypothermia.

‘What we can’t do is walk on the stuff,’ Channing explained, testing the surface with one foot. The second he put any weight on the newly formed ice, it splintered and his foot went through.

‘We need a boat,’ Jarrold said.

‘What we need is a miracle,’ Blake countered. ‘The girl is dying out there!’

‘Yeah, so no boat,’ Channing disregarded his band member’s gloomy prognosis. ‘What we do have is the top of a picnic table we scavenged from the Grey Goose camp ground a couple of hundred metres south of here, plus some planks from a bench.’

‘To make a raft and paddles?’ Jarrold quickly got the picture. ‘You think we can break through the ice as we go?’

‘Let’s find out.’

The two guys were already heaving the makeshift raft into the lake when I stepped up to join them. ‘I’m coming,’ I insisted above the sound of cracking ice. ‘Holly doesn’t know you – she knows me and the sound of my voice.’

‘That could work if she’s already losing consciousness,’ Jarrold agreed as he made room for me between him and Channing.

I squatted down, eyes fixed on the island. We had to cross a gap of about a hundred metres. ‘Holly, hang on. We’re coming to get you!’ I yelled at the dark shape huddled under the tree. No response. I felt my guts tighten and my heart thump against my ribs. So typical! I thought. Trust Holly to try something like this.

The two guys made slow progress through ice that was around a centimetre thick. Their planks cracked and crunched into the surface to open up an area that was big enough for them to paddle through. Then they had to stop and begin the procedure all over again, a couple of metres at a time.

I stared down into the water, watched the loose shards of white ice swirl around the raft. I held at bay all images of slimy monsters deep under the black surface, of skulls trapped inside houses, stripped of flesh, grinning up at us as we rowed.

It took maybe thirty minutes for us to reach the island. When we did, I was the first to leap from the raft with stiff, shaking legs and run towards Holly.

She was propped against the tree without her hat, her head slumped forward, eyes closed. Her lips were blue, I noticed, and the weirdest thing was that the zipper of the new orange jacket was broken and her T-shirt was ripped from the neck band almost to the waist.

‘Holly, wake up!’ I cried. I’d seen a TV programme about an expedition to Antartica where victims of hypothermia were tempted to drift slowly into what seemed like comfortable, warm sleep, but what was in fact their final moments of consciousness. ‘Holly, wake up. It’s me – Tania!’

I was shaking her, pulling her jacket closed and pushing frozen locks of fair hair from her face, still trying to rouse her when Channing crouched down beside me.

‘Holly, we’re here,’ he said in a low, intimate voice, stooping so that his lips were against her cheek. Then he slid his arms under her and effortlessly lifted her.

‘Wake up!’ I pleaded. Her head fell back, her arms hung limp but her eyelids began to flicker.

Thank God – she’s alive!

‘We’re here for you,’ Channing murmured. His broad shoulders protected her from the cold wind; his body heat seemed to revive her.

Holly’s eyes slowly opened. She was dazed, weak as a kitten in Channing’s arms. And as she opened her eyes and tried to raise her arms to put them around his neck, her whole body convulsed and she shook from head to toe. Channing carried her down to the shore and on to the raft. He held her close as Jarrold and I rowed her to safety.

Back on shore we swaddled Holly in sleeping bags and lay her in the overnight shelter. We took our orders from Channing. ‘Marta and Blake, make a fire. Regan, go back on to Shaman Overlook, watch out for Ziegler’s Jeep and direct them here. Jarrold and Tania, build a windbreak.’

Everyone got busy while Channing stayed in the shelter next to Holly.