Page 142 of Forsaking All Others

And she’s right.

Holed up in a hastily built but sound cabin, they’d bolstered their diet with white rabbits, squirrels, and more importantly, raised their spirits with rest and laughter.

Neither seems to be aware that an enemy watches and waits, but I remind myself that Cat is always aware. Those knowing eyes miss very little.

‘Don’t let that slide now, Cat.’

“Ah, Viscount, are you sure you don’t want to comment? After all, it’s apparent that in the coming days the last two of your final three will be decided and, ah, it may not be the competitors you, or we, were expecting, if nature takes its course.”

‘I won’t let that happen.’

“I don’t have anything to say,” Mr Dott.

“Not even a word of concern for your favourite?”

I shake my head.

“She can look after herself.”

107

I truly don’t understand what’s happened and why there’s an awful sound in my ears, a pounding like that of a heart, and a liquid whoosh, whoosh, whoosh, accompanied by another sound a long way away.

It’s not until Thorun’s screams become so loud and high that they can’t be mistaken for anything else that I shake my aching head and try to get my bearings.

“Cat! Cat! I’m coming. I’m coming, just please, please be alive.”

Opening my eyes, my vision blurred, I realise I’m hanging upside down, high off the ground, by a rope securing one ankle. And when I say high, I mean sickeningly high.

“I, I can’t see,” I whimper, my body swinging wildly as I start to panic.

“Oh, thank God, thank God! Cat, you’re upside down. You trod in some kind of noose. It swung you up and I think you hit your head on the tree; there’s a big, bloody mark on the trunk. You have blood all over your face.”

“I can’t see,” I repeat, shaking my head and wiping my eyes, my hands coming away red and my gag reflex immediately kicking in.

“You hit your head,” she repeats, stepping out of the way of a stream of vomit. “You’re up very high. You’ve walked into a trap. I’ve been looking everywhere for you. The snow covered your tracks, and I got so worried. Thank God I’ve found you. Everything’s going to be OK now. You need to drop me down the tomahawk or the knife. I’ll try to climb up and cut you free somehow without causing you to fall.”

Wiping eyelashes frozen solid with blood, still more running into my eyes the moment I clear them, I manage to bend my head to look with blurred vision at my belt, and realise I don’t have either. I’d just come to collect some sticks for the fire. I hadn’t intended to walk this far, but I’d been following a porcupine I’d spotted running through the underbrush.

‘How long have I been hanging here? It’s cold. So cold. I’m so cold.’

“We’re bra-less,” I murmur as I shiver, this somehow coming to mind and making me want to laugh. “Bra-less, Thorun.”

I know even as I say this that something isn’t right. I shouldn’t be laughing as I’m bleeding and vomiting and swaying like a broken piñata. I’m not thinking straight. Bringing my hands up to my face again, I wipe away more blood and try to focus on where she stands staring up at me, but my vision, even without the blood, is blurry, and my head is pounding.

As I swing and try to refocus, my attention is caught by something, someone, running through the forest about fifty metres away.

‘Miranda.’

“Thorun!” I croak. “Run.”

“What? No, everything’s OK, I’m going to get you down.”

“Thorun,” I clear my throat. I can’t seem to recall how to say Miranda’s name, and things are starting to become fuzzier and kind of grey. But a warning comes to mind, and I shout as loud as I can, “Óvinur nálgast!”

Turning wildly, Thorun surveys the forest around us before looking back up at me, her expression terrified.

“FOKK! Cat, Cat. What do I do?”