She moves out from behind the cluster of broken trees, holds up the coffeepot, and lifts the lid. “For you! Two packages of freeze-dried! See? Twelve portions! A jar of matches! A pot to boil water! Come and get it!”

Deke screams, “I WANT IT ALL!”

Mia sets the pot down on the very edge of the river, within inches of moving water. “This won’t stay here for long! The river will steal it! Hurry if you want to eat today!”

Up top, Deke and Tony are conferring. Deke points down and Tony nods. Then they back away from the edge, out of our sight.

“Hurry!” Mia urges us.

Imani and I catch up as she jogs along the riverbank. We have our spears, but we also have no doubt they’ll be useless if the enemy makes it down from the top of the ravine before we’re gone. Deke has that part right. His stones will crush our spears, and our skulls, if his aim is true.

As soon as we get to a clear part of the riverbank, with no debris blocking our path, we start to run. None of us need to say a word. We know what the stakes are.

Life or death. Run or die.

22. The Queen of Not Giving Up

We run for miles. We run until we drop to our knees, until Imani cries from the pain under her ribs.

Mia scoops water from the river and lets the sand settle to the bottom of the pan. “We have to drink plenty of water. Slurping rainwater is fine, but we need to keep hydrated.”

“Do you think they took the bait?” I ask.

“It’s not bait, Daniel. That was sharing. But I hope so.”

Imani has recovered her breath enough to say, scornfully, “Are you serious? They’ll be stuffing their bellies by now. I bet they ate all twelve portions, like they did last time.”

Mia agrees. “Deke is cruel and greedy. But he understands we offered him a lifeline.”

“That doesn’t mean he’ll give up,” Imani insists. “We’re following the same river, heading for the same place. He’ll find us.”

Mia nods. “You’re right. We need to keep a watch. Don’t let them sneak up on us again.”

We agree to be vigilant, and to keep moving. We bump our spears, give a quiet cheer, and continue on, fast as we can walk.

The Crazy River bends so sharply that sometimes it almost reverses direction. We decide to climb up for a better view and find ourselves hiking along the very edge of the ravine, looking down at curls of white in the water below. A few miles back, the river was clotted with broken trees and boulders, but not here. Too far from where the dam broke? That’s Imani’s theory.