By the light of their headlamps, following the sketchy trail through the mud and the snow that their feet trampled into existence that afternoon. Up toward the barrier trench and the Raven’s Claw and the trail toward help.

There’s nothing to do but start running, and they do.

Run, and hope nobody follows.

Behind them, the forest is silent. The trail is steep and slippery and Dawn almost bails a couple of times, and when she stops to catch her balance and regain her breath she listens, and she can’t hear Warden behind them or anyone else, just the rain and Lucas beside her, trying to catch his own breath.

There’s no time to be scared anymore. They pause for a second and then they run again, certain that they’re dead if they’re caught. They run and gain altitude and the rain turns to snow and it soaks through Dawn’s pants and her boots and she’s sweating through her undershirt, and her hands and her knees are covered in mud and wet from slipping and crawling and trying to pull herself up.

Around them, the night grows imperceptibly lighter. Morning is coming, but that doesn’t matter.

All that matters is getting away.

Chapter 76

AFTER A TIME, THEY REACH the barrier trench, sweaty and out of breath and exhausted. It’s darker in the trench but steadily getting lighter, night turning inexorably to day.

Briefly, they stop to sip water out of one of Dawn’s canteens, and Dawn transfers as much food as she can into Lucas’s pockets.

There’s blood on his jacket. A tear in the lining. “Warden’s knife,” Lucas tells her. He pulls the jacket tighter; he won’t let her see. “It’s just a scratch,” he says. “I’ll be fine.”

Dawn studies his face. He stares back at her, earnest, and Dawn knows he’s probably lying, that he’s hurt worse than he’s ready to admit. But there’s no point in pushing him right now.

(She didn’t steal the first-aid kit from the Pack.)

“What were you even doing out there, anyway?” she asks Lucas. “Shouldn’t you have been, like, asleep?”

“I had to pee,” he says, sheepishly. “I saw you and Warden in the light of the fire. I thought—” He looks away. “I just had to know for sure that you like him.”

Dawn makes a face. “I don’t like him,” she says. “He’s a freaking murderer, Lucas.” She explains to him what she knows about Warden. About Christian and Alex.

“You didn’t tell me?” Lucas says. “You knew Alex was murdered and you didn’t want to tell me?”

“I just thought it was safer if no one knew that I knew,” Dawn tells him. “I didn’t want to tip off the killer.”