The Forest of Vanishing Stars(52)

It was time to go.

It took her only five minutes more to put everything she owned into her knapsack. She turned to Aleksander, who was still behind her, still talking, saying things that didn’t matter. She put a finger to her lips, and finally, he stopped, his eyes shining with desperation in the darkness. “Yona?” he asked, his voice high, pleading. “It is the woods. The rules are not the same. We are all just trying to survive.”

“I shouldn’t have stayed so long,” she said softly, and when his eyes widened and he began to protest, she held up her hand and waited until he went silent again. “It was my mistake. When Zus and Chaim return with the mercury, gather several eggs from nests nearby. Use just the whites. Mix them with the mercury, and dip strips of fabric into the solution for everyone to wear across their chests for a day, then across their backs for a day. It should rid you of the lice. You know how to hunt now, how to trap, how to fish, how to stay on the move. Zus and Chaim are with you now, and they know the woods better than you do, so don’t let your pride get in the way, or you’ll die out here. Listen to them. And never let your guard down, for the Germans will find you. May God watch over you all.”

She turned to go, and when he grabbed her wrist to stop her, her pain bubbled to the surface as a white-hot streak of anger. Twisting away, she dug her nails into his forearm, squeezing until he yelped in pain and let go. “You will never touch me again,” she said.

“But the woods—”

“Are where we learn who we really are.” And then, extinguishing her pine light in a puff of breath, she hoisted her pack onto her back and slipped into the dark night.

Across the clearing, Sulia stood outside her shelter, her dress askew, a small smile on her face, as if she believed she’d finally triumphed by driving Yona out. But it hadn’t been Sulia to make her go. Yona should have been gone months ago, but she had foolishly opened her heart to the wrong person, which made her ignore all the things she knew to be true. Now she was wiser. Now she would return to the world she knew, the world in which she flew alone, a dove in the wilderness, untethered. Her wrist throbbed with purpose as she turned and strode toward the trees.

Later, when her anger had faded and the heartbreak crept in, the thing that would hurt most was the fact that when she left, Aleksander didn’t follow, nor did he try to stop her. She didn’t turn to look back, but she imagined him standing beside Sulia as they watched her go, the woman who had helped them to survive already no more than a footnote in their story.





CHAPTER FIFTEEN




Yona had walked for only thirty minutes—tears streaming down her face, no sense of direction in the thick forest, where the moonlight was nearly lost—when she heard footsteps approaching. Her grief was pushed immediately aside by fear, and she slid quickly behind a tree, holding her breath. She could tell by the footfalls that there were only two people trudging through the darkness, both men, judging from the sound, and her mind spun. If they were Germans, there might well be others not far behind. She had a chance to stop these two, for she had the element of surprise, but what about a whole German unit? Would it be too late to protect the group?

But as the men drew closer, she heard their voices, and she recognized them immediately with a great swell of relief. It was Chaim and Zus, returning from their mission. She closed her eyes and put her hand on the tree to brace herself, weak with gratitude that they were safe. For a few seconds, she considered letting them pass. After all, she was embarrassed by the pain she knew was written across her face. But she needed to know whether they’d been successful, because if they had the mercury, she would sleep better knowing that the group would be able to eliminate the imminent threat of typhus. If not, she would have to go back, wouldn’t she?

Taking a deep breath, she stepped from behind the tree when they were just a few feet away, and she was encouraged to see that their reaction was instant; their guns were on her immediately, even though their guard had been down just seconds before. With instincts like that, they’d have a fighting chance.

“It’s only me,” she said softly, and they both blinked at her, alarm still firing in their eyes as they lowered their guns.

“Yona?” Zus asked, stepping forward. He reached out as if to touch her face and then seemed to think better of it, pulling his hand quickly back. “What is it? What’s wrong? Has something happened?”

She shook her head. “The group is fine. I just— I couldn’t stay any longer.”

In the silence between them, the words seemed to unfold without a sound, and after a pause, Zus blinked in understanding. “Aleksander. What did he do?” When she didn’t answer, his jaw clenched. “He was with Sulia?”

“You knew?” Another wave of despair threatened to wash over her.

“No, Yona, I didn’t. It was just—it was a guess. I’m sorry.”

Yona was embarrassed to feel tears in her eyes again. “Yes, well, he said I didn’t understand because I am not like him. That things were easy with her.” She delivered the words in a monotone, embarrassed by how deeply they had wounded her.

“Those are not the words of a man with a backbone,” Zus said instantly, and Yona could hear the fury in his voice. “And they speak entirely of his character, not yours.”

She looked at the ground. “Is it supposed to hurt this much?”