From the other room came the sound of a TV rapidly flipping through the channels. The younger boys—Adam, Michael, Jeff—hated Wheel of Fortune and always changed the channel when Mom and Dad were out of the room. They must have come home from school while Mollie was at the hospital. Rural bus routes sometimes got them home an hour or more after school let out.

Mom said, “You all almost done out there? Whatever stupid scheme you got going now, it’s taking your father and the older boys away from their chores. You come and go as you please, dropping in when it’s convenient, or when you’re hungry, or when you have laundry you don’t feel like doing yourself, but you forget this is a farm with work to be done.”

Who would do the work now? How long would they be in the hospital? Even after they’re discharged, even if they eventually heal, it’ll take a long time before …

“Mollie!” Mom snapped her fingers at Mollie. Drying her hands on the dish towel, she said, “I asked you a question. How much longer are you gonna be wasting everyone’s time in the barn?”

“There’s been … Mom, something happened. Something bad.”

She started to explain but realized she couldn’t. That she didn’t know how to explain what happened because she didn’t understand it. Didn’t even want to think about it. She managed to say, “They’re in the hospital.”

Mom dropped the towel. “Who?”

“All of them.”

“I didn’t know what else to do,” Marcus said, for about the hundredth time. “I just didn’t know…” He carried Olena’s unconscious body pressed to his chest. Face flushed and sweaty, his breathing came hard. His arms quivered with fatigue, but he kept moving. His one goal the only thing driving him.

The hours since he broke through the barricade had been one long misery of motion and worry. He dodged soldiers and troop transports heading toward Talas, and refugees fleeing the city in vehicles and on foot. He darted for cover as helicopters flew in low, thrumming their way toward Talas, and squirmed even faster when fighter jets appeared, always instantly there, announcing themselves with an earsplitting roar.

All the while he kept checking Olena. For a time she had been feverish. She had bouts of trembling, and would occasionally mumble something. Later she went deathly still and got cooler to the touch. Her breathing became so faint Marcus feared time and again that she’d died. That he’d killed her. If that turned out to be true, he wouldn’t be able to live with himself. He’d go to Talas and give in to the madness. Part of him wanted to do that even now. First, though, he had to try the one thing he thought might save her.