Thin Lines (The Child Thief #3)(42)

“Can’t see,” Jace whispered back. “I can barely see the tail of the last wolf at this point. More climbing, less talking! We can’t lose them now!”

He pushed me more quickly up the path, and the leaves of the trees around us started brushing against us, growing around the rock as they did. For just a moment it was almost easy to forget that we were hundreds of feet in the air, just a step away from falling to our deaths. Instead we were in a world of greenery and noise, and cool, soft wind that was refreshing against my cheeks. It was breathtaking.

Then we broke through the canopy and into the air above it, and we could see where we were.

“Holy crow,” Nelson gasped, staring past Jace and me and into the distance.

I nodded, entranced by the view. Wilderness for miles and miles in that direction, with nothing but trees and mountains on the horizon. It was wild and unbroken, and right now, in the dying light of the day, utterly peaceful. No men with guns. No jails. No political wars that you didn’t understand.

Then, just as suddenly, the path swung sharply to the right, and I was faced with an immediate step downward. I took it, then stumbled at the landing and jolted forward several steps, through a tunnel of red rock that came very close to my sides, and then out again, into open space.

I moved forward a bit to give the others room to get out of the tunnel, and looked around, both terrified and amazed. We’d made it to the top of the rock, where the view was even more phenomenal, and were standing on a large, flat spot, with plenty of room for all of us to gather. Jace turned and put a hand out to help Nelson out of the small chute that led up from the trail, hauling her up to stand next to me.

Then I noticed that up ahead of us, the wolves were already disappearing into another gulley in the rocks, their tails moving in tandem as they filed into the darkness, and I realized that we were just at the start of our journey. We might have come up the face of a rock, but the wolves weren’t home yet.

“At least it looks flat that way,” Jace said.

I took the lead on my own this time, leaving Jace to help Ant and Abe with the bags and boxes, and the others to continue following. My gut was telling me that the wolves would lead us to safety, and we couldn’t afford to lose them. I couldn’t hear the Authority agents anymore, and once I entered the new culvert, the only thing I really heard was the echoes of our footsteps, but I knew they were back there.

I hurried along the smooth ground, wondering whether this path was some sort of stream during the winter, and glanced up at the sky to notice that late afternoon was starting to fall above us. We needed to hurry. Darkness would be helpful when it came to hiding from the Authority, but not so helpful when it came to keeping track of the wolves.

I strained my eyes on the path ahead of me, trying to figure out where the wolves had gone—or how far ahead they were—and had all but given up, positive that we’d lost them, when we ended up in a wide clearing, with trees surrounding us once again. I stuttered to a stop, too surprised at the sudden change of scenery to process it at first, and looked around, confused.

This forest looked exactly like the one we’d just left. What was this, a second, elevated version of the forest? Was it possible that there was just some big elevation shift here that I’d never even known about?

And where were the wolves?

Then I realized that we weren’t in a forest, but rather a large basin surrounded by more mountains. There were trees growing here, yes, but it was, in essence, just a valley. A valley in the sky.

“Oh my God,” Jace said, coming to a stop next to me. “We were right. They led us to safety.”

We rushed through the forest toward the nearest side of the valley, no longer needing to look for the wolves, and reached the wall of the basin about twenty minutes later.

By that time everyone was walking, too tired to continue with the run. I noticed that no one was talking at all, either. We’d been through more than our fair share of action in one day, and even with the food we’d shoved down our throats at my cabin, we needed calories and water and a chance to recover from the adrenaline that had been powering us for too long.

The adrenaline rush that had started last night, I realized, with those first explosions outside the Authority complex, and had continued all the way to right now, with barely a pause.

When we came to a stumbling stop in front of the first cave we saw, I was almost too relieved, and too tired, to appreciate it properly. Then I glanced at the others, and my logic kicked back in. We needed shelter, immediately. Especially if the Authority managed to find their way up that rock and through the gulley to this forested valley.

I didn’t think they would, at least not tonight. But if they did, I didn’t want to be caught standing around, just staring at an opening in the side of a cliff. We needed a defensible position.

“What now?” Abe asked, staring at the yawning mouth of the cave.

I pulled my phone out of my pocket and turned on the flashlight against the impending gloom. It was almost dusk at this point, the shadows long and taking over the ground in the forest. It was going to be pitch black soon, and the cave we were about to enter was even darker than the forest around it.

Hopefully there wasn’t a bear or cougar sleeping in there.

“Think there’s anything else in that cave?” I asked Jace quietly.

“Doubt it,” he replied with confidence. “I’m guessing this valley is the territory of the wolves, and nothing else would sleep this close to them… I don’t know where they’ve disappeared to, but they evidently don’t have a problem with us being here. We need shelter. There’s a cave right in front of us. Seems like an obvious decision.”