The air around her changes. Maeve reels. The smell of the animal is overpowering, musk and rot cutting through the cold air. The bear’s rough grunt, below her now. She looks down to see it raise its head, its eyes black and dull. Black claws gripping the ice. It barks, jaws open: the smell of it choking her.

Her own breath coming in thrusts. She jams her boot hard into a crevice, kicking and kicking to get purchase. Then she pulls a hand away and goes for her pocket.

When she brings it out again, she’s got Anna’s claw tight in her fist. Her arm swings at the shoulder and she hammers the claw like an ice pick into the sheet above.

It sticks.

Maeve torques her shoulder again to pull herself up over the lip, but something goes wrong—it doesn’t work. She grasps the claw tighter and heaves to keep from falling back, pushing up with her legs from below—but only one leg swings free.

The toe of her right boot is trapped in its hold. Stuck fast where she slammed it in so hard. She tugs again, then tries bearing down through her heel and kicking up, but it’s no good: the boot is locked in place.

The bear huffs at her, pawing low down against the snow, before it stands up for the first time.

The problem is you can’t control it.

The jolt of the first swipe knocks her sideways. The bear’s paw hits the rubber heel of the stuck boot; her ankle spirals as Maeve hits the rock wall, shoulder on, her bloody fingers shearing across the ice, the other hand tight on the sunken claw. The bear drops down and then comes at her again.

Her ankle is suddenly useless and numb with pain, her foot loose and scraping at the tongue of her boot. The bear comes up again and she swings to the side, propelling herself with her good leg and then kicking down, trying to loosen a chunk of rock or ice to deter it. Her ankle somehow floating as it twists this time, light and detached. A claw sinks into the wall just beside her, but the animal’s weight is too much: the ice breaks away and it falls back. The bear drops to all fours again, raises its snout and makes a few throaty barks.

Maeve keeps it in sight and gives a last jolt to free herself. The action of pulling up against the trapped boot makes her head swim. She reaches down with her bad arm to release the foot, wrenching up on her own thigh as though it were made of scrap wood.

The foot slides free just as the bear rears up again, and a searing pain tears through her calf.