Gingerly, I slithered across the ice and grabbed it. The sun was almost down, now, the water beneath the ice inky black. I started to pull myself along the rope but even that small movement was enough to start the ice cracking again, and I froze. I was going to have to just lie there, a dead weight, and let Erin pull me in.

She hauled on the rope and I began to slide. The ice snapped and sagged under me and I held my breath…but it held, as long as I stayed still.

Erin was walking backwards from the tree, moving along the edge of the lake as she pulled me in. The ice gradually stopped cracking and started to feel more solid. And then I was at the edge. I let out a long, shaky sigh and crawled onto the shore. Safe!

Erin had walked so far backwards, as she pulled me in, that she’d actually drifted onto the ice, but only the thick stuff close to the edge. She grinned at me and started walking back towards me, coiling the rope as she went.

But her next step took her onto one of the floating ice islands and her weight was too close to the edge. The slab of ice tipped almost vertical. She had time to cry out…and then she plunged into the black water and was gone.

41. Erin

41

ERIN

I hit the water face first and it was so cold that it didn’t even feel like liquid, more like falling through a tank of knives. Then I choked on water and that was even more painful, like my chest was filling with razor-sharp shards of ice. I flailed frantically, kicking and grabbing. The cold made me forget how to swim, how to think, everything except the pain.

The water was pitch black. My hand scraped something solid. Was I upside down? Had I gotten turned around and I was clawing at the bottom of the lake?

I squinted…and saw a faint orange glow. The sunset. I was at the surface, but between me and the sun was—

I was under the ice! The ice island that had tipped me off had righted itself, filling the hole I’d fallen through.

I was trapped.

42. Danny

42

DANNY

I’d run to where I saw her go under and was on my knees, staring down through the ice. I saw her hand press against the underside of the ice island. Erin!

I scrambled to the edge of the island. Maybe I could guide her over to the gap between islands. But they were too closely packed: there was barely an inch gap between them and I couldn’t even stick my hand through.

I crawled back to where I saw her hand. It had disappeared, and I felt my heart stop. Then I saw a flash of skin: she was scrabbling at the ice, running out of air….