She scrabbles backward, over the log that tripped her. Finds a broken tree branch and lifts it and swings wildly at the bear, and the branch is rotted through and splits in half as she swings it, and she’s crying now and screaming her throat raw.

“Help!” she says. “Damn it, somebody help me!”

The bear looms above her. From this angle, it’s huge; it’s all Dawn can see. Its harsh breathing is all Dawn can hear. And it suddenly seems stupid that this is how she’s going to die, eaten by a bear—a black bear—in the middle of nowhere, screaming for her life and probably peeing her pants.

And then a gunshot cracks behind her.

It’s loud.

The bear goes stiff, and seems to forget about Dawn. Looks past her into the trees as another shot fires. As Amber races into the clearing and drags Dawn to her feet. As Christian and Lucas and maybe some other people burst in beside her, yelling loudly at the bear and waving their arms.

A third shot goes off, and Dawn momentarily goes deaf.

The bear looks around. Looks back at its cub, which is now racing away, terrified, out of the other side of the clearing. The bear opens its mouth and makes some kind of noise that Dawn can’t really hear because her ears are still ringing from the shots.

Then it turns and lopes off across the clearing, following its cub.

It stops once, and looks back, and its eyes fall on Dawn again. And it stares at Dawn for a long moment, like it’s staring right into her soul.

And then it turns around and disappears into the trees.

Chapter 26

“I DON’T UNDERSTAND,” Dawn says, when Amber and Lucas have helped her back to the campfire, and after she’s unsuccessfully petitioned the counselors to abandon the hike, bring the group out of bear country and back to civilization.

“If Christian shot the bear, why wasn’t it injured?”

Christian laughs. He looks utterly unfazed by the whole experience. “I didn’t shoot the bear,” he tells her. “You think they’d let you kids anywhere near a gun?”

Dawn stares at him. “No, what the hell,” she says. “I heard the shots.”

Christian and Amber swap looks. And then Christian reaches into his pocket. He pulls out something the size and shape of a pen. “Bear banger,” Amber explains. “It sounds like a gun. Most of the time it’s enough to scare a bear away.”

Christian grins at her. “Most of the time,” he says.

“And if that doesn’t work, there’s bear spray,” Lucas adds quickly. “Right? You guys are at least carrying bear spray, aren’t you?”

“Sure,” Christian says, and he seems to meet Dawn’s eyes the same way as the bear did. “And most of the time that works pretty well, too.”