We started moving again, with more purpose now, any pain forgotten, bruises, cuts, grazes, scars, all fading to nothing. The terrain beneath us continued to drop, a steep slope forming, the trees as thick as ever but the sounds fading back in: we could suddenly hear birds again, a breeze, the far-off murmur of water lapping on a shore.

‘What’s the first thing you’re going to do when you get home?’ Jo asked with a smile on her face, looking at me, then down at her boots. ‘I’ll be getting a foot bath.’

I laughed, moving even faster, the road maybe a mile away, maybe even less. The sound of our footsteps, the scuff of our soles on the forest floor, became quicker; I listened for cars but couldn’t hear any, couldn’t see any either, but it didn’t dampen my excitement. We were a mile from the road; a mile from this hell coming to an end.

And then it all changed.

As I turned, Jo was already falling: she’d lost her footing, a tired leg catching the knot of a root, and she tumbled forward, hitting the ground about seven feet away from me, too far for me to stop her. She kept falling, propelled by the natural incline of the hill, her head hitting the ground, then her ribs, then her head for a second time. I lurched in her direction, sliding against the camber of the ridge, desperately trying to get to her before she passed me – but it was too late. She had built up way too much speed and all I could do was watch as she went beyond me.

She hit a tree about twenty feet down.

The impact was so hard, it seemed to send a tremor through the earth. Worse, the moment she made contact with the trunk, she was still: no sound, no movement.

‘Jo?’ I said, my voice frenzied, terrified. ‘Jo.’

She didn’t even react.

I almost slipped as I ran down the slope, shoulder-barging a tree and spinning out from it in a desperate attempt to get to her faster. She was wrapped around the trunk, stomach facing in, her coat torn badly, her hair matted to her face with blood.

‘Jo?’

I placed two fingers under her jaw.

There was a pulse.

Sliding my arms under her, I hauled her up and staggered into a clearing a little distance away. She moaned, her eyelids fluttering, and then I shuffled the backpack off her, tossed it aside and took off my coat, using it as a pillow. Without my jacket on, I could instantly feel how cold it was, the air like ice, so I took off my own backpack, unzipped it and removed both blankets I’d been carrying.

She moaned again.

‘David?’

I heaved a sigh. ‘Yeah, I’m here, Jo. It’s okay.’

‘I think I blacked out,’ she said groggily.