The rain continued to come down in sheets for hours, drenching them completely, save their waterproof backpacks. After the road Crit had pointed out to them became more dirt and grass than asphalt, splatters of mud from the impact of missile-like raindrops sent splashes of mud up their legs so that despite being drenched, Rain found herself coated in muck and mire.Uneven terrain also had them sliding down patches of earth, practically rolling down some of the steeper hills. How she could be caught in a torrential downpour and end up caked in dirt was a notion Rain couldn’t quite conceive of, but by the time it finally stopped raining, as the sun was disappearing behind the tops of the trees, all of them were filthy and exhausted.“How much further do you think it is to the river?” Walt asked. It was the first question anyone had asked that wasn’t a necessity in hours.Mist slowed slightly to ga

Rain stayed buried in the water up to her neck, her mind wandering back to the night before as she went over every word that had come out of her mouth and still had no idea what it was that she’d said to make Adam react the way that he had. She’d been trying to be nice, to pay him a compliment, to let him know how much she cared about his happiness, but he had seemed to think her words were rude or meant to hurt him, and she had no idea why.“All right. Ready to get out of this glacial fjord?” Adam asked with a soft chuckle, bringing Rain out of her thoughts.“Huh? Oh, yeah. Definitely.”“Cool. You wanna go first, or do you want me to?”Thinking it would take her forever to get her feet moving on the slippery rocks when they were so cold, she muttered, “You can go ahead.”“All right. But no peeking. I mean it, Rain. If

The eruption of briskly moving water cut through her raspy breaths as Rain realized they were nearing what had to be a large river in front of them. She imagined it had to be the River Red, but there was no capacity left in her lungs for words. Running at full speed for hours had taken away all conscious thought, all ability to speak or think or pray. The only thing she was capable of at the moment was putting one foot in front of the other as rapidly as humanly possible. And judging by the pain in her muscles and the spasming in her feet, that possibility was about to dry up.They were back in the forest now and had been for several hours. Behind them, the sound of explosions had faded away as they’d put more distance between themselves and Dafo, but every once in a while a light would reflect off of the shiny rifle slung over Mist’s shoulder, and Rain would get the notion that it was another bomb being hurled at their friends in Dafo. She h

Being on a boat for the first time would’ve been an adventure Adam could really sink his teeth into, if he’d been able to pull his eyes away from Rain. She was out now, unconscious from either the pain or the exertion of being moved to the unfamiliar vehicle while she was wounded, he wasn’t sure, but either way, he was concerned.“Let’s lay her down,” the woman who owned the boat said quietly. “It’s better if she rests now.”“Is she okay?” Mist asked from next to Rain’s knee. Adam didn’t pull his eyes off of the beautiful redhead to read the concern in her face, but he could hear it in the quiver in Mist’s voice.“She will be,” the woman assured them. “I’ve seen many a wound worse than this. With less medicine to fix it.” She moved Rain so that her head was resting on her backpack. “I’m Esther G

Waking up and not realizing where she was or how she’d come to be there was something Rain was getting used to. As unsettling as that could be for someone who’d woken up in the same bed in the same room for almost twenty years, she wasn’t alarmed when she opened her eyes to find herself in a bed she didn’t recognize in a room she was fairly certain she’d never been in before.Trying to move was her first reminder of what had happened. Her shoulder was sore. It didn’t hurt at the moment, though she was suddenly aware that it had. The pain was a fresh memory, and as she pushed up to sitting, she could almost feel it radiating through her limb again.But it didn’t hurt, not like that. It was more of a dull throb in the center of her upper chest muscle. She was wearing a white nightgown and paused to question the origin and how it came to be on her body. Had Mist changed her clothes? Surely, Adam ha