She knows her only hope is to come for Warden first.

To use her own body as a weapon.

And she knows she has no time to spare.

Just standing up is the most challenging thing Dawn has ever done in her life. Her arms feel like jelly and her legs don’t exist, but somehow she manages to pull herself up and lean against that hundred-year-old tree that nearly killed her, and she stays there for a half second to catch her breath and blink the tears from her eyes.

She listens to Warden coming up the slope and knows that he must be only a few feet down from the other side of the tree.

She knows it’s time.

She forces her mind to forget about the exhaustion. Pushes off from the tree and steps out from around it, nearly collapsing when she puts her whole weight on her legs.

In fact, she does collapse.

Falls back to the ground and hits so hard she thinks she might die.

But it’s not a big deal, Dawn collapsing.

Because when she falls, she takes Warden with her.

Chapter 123

WITH THE LAST OF HER STRENGTH, Dawn throws herself down the slope toward Warden. He’s off guard, off-balance; he doesn’t see her coming. Not until she’s in the air, until she’s nearly on top of him.

Then his eyes go wide and he puts up his hands to defend himself.

But it’s too late. Dawn’s coming down, and Warden can’t swat her away. She wraps her arms around him and carries him with her, stealing his balance and sending him tumbling backward.

She holds on to him as best as she can as they roll down the slope. But the slope is too steep and they’re falling too fast. Sooner or later, they disengage. Uncouple. They tumble down the hillside together, but apart.

Dawn catches a glimpse of something orange on her way down. A glimpse of a face, bloody, eyes open and unseeing.

She knows it must be the bystander and that the bystander is dead.

Then she collides into something and the pain is all-encompassing, and Dawn blacks out again.

Chapter 124

SHE WAKES UP ON THE TRAIL. Somehow, they’ve come to rest on one of the switchbacks.

Dawn can see the dead bystander in his orange jacket fifteen or twenty feet off the trail, upslope. She can see an Out of the Wild logo on his baseball cap. And when she looks closer, she can see it’s Steve.

Steve, the guy who picked her up from the airport.

Who brought her into this mess.

Dawn feels no satisfaction at seeing him dead. But she doesn’t feel anything else, either. She’s just numb.

She lifts her head a little bit and looks around and sees Warden. He lies a few feet from her, on his back, his neck skewed at a crazy angle. He’s bleeding.