Protecting the Flame Read online

  She saw the roll of his throat as he swallowed. “Yeah. He did.”

  A sparkle of hope. “Do you remember the last time you saw it? Did he have it on him?” Actually, she was positive Burke had not. What she remembered was walking up with Will to where Burke and the others waited and the pilot, his cell in hand, saying, I was gonna give you people two minutes. He’d slipped his cell into a breast pocket, but there had been no satellite phone. She’d probably remember that because a sat phone was so big.

  They were breaking open that safe if it was the last thing they did.

  “Be back in a jiffy.” She turned to go. “I’ll bring some hot water so you can wash and brew up some tea.”

  “Well, great,” he said. “What a pisser.”

  Chapter 6

  Will’s walkie-talkie burped as she was melting a potful of snow, and then Mattie’s voice sounded, “Emma, are you there? Over?”

  “Hey, Mattie. How’s your mom?” she said, dropping to a sit next to her grandfather. “Over?”

  “Still out, but Will said her color’s better so that’s good and she…you know, she went to the bathroom.” Pause. “So we made her another diaper. Over.”

  “Too much information,” Earl grumbled.

  She grinned. “You want to talk to your grandfather? Over?”

  “Oh, can I? Over?”

  “Sure, hang on.” She showed the old man how to work the handset then scooped up Burke’s rifle and moved away from the fire to give them some privacy.

  Something weird is going on. The glow from the fire at her back was a muddy orange on the snow but only reached a few feet before darkness shrouded the world beyond. The stars were out again, though, and this time, when she tilted her head to peer up, she spied the moon, now more like a thumbnail, midway up the sky to her left. With the crackle of the fire and the low drone of the old man’s voice, it was almost peaceful. Of course, if this were a novel or horror movie, right about now she’d snap on her headlamp and the green coins of a million eyes would leap from the blackness.

  Don’t do it. Her hand strayed to her headlamp. In movies, a person had about a split second before the animals leapt. But this is reality, Greg. She flicked on her headlamp. A silver lance pierced the night.

  No eyes. No slavering wild animals.

  Idiot. Switching off her headlamp, she let out a soft snort. Freak yourself out, why don’t you?

  But she was troubled. Her reporter’s instincts niggled. There was a disconnect she wasn’t seeing. Hunter said his dad, confused and disoriented, had gone off to meet “some guys.” She was pretty certain these were not friends. She stared into the darkness so hard her eyes ached with the strain. They were guys. And that whole thing about upgrading the plane, going into debt but expecting the investment to pay off? What had Hunter said? That their business would come back to bite them if they stayed in too long. What did that mean? Why would ferrying rich people around to expensive and distant locations be a problem?

  “Hey.” She turned to see the old man holding up the walkie-talkie. “She wants to talk to you.”

  “Sure,” she said, though she also felt the tiniest squirt of disappointment. Will had to be listening. He didn’t have anything to say? Of course, Scott would also be listening. So, maybe just as well. She wasn’t going to discuss anything Hunter had said within Scott’s hearing. Hunter had told her to watch out for Scott, which was not news. But had Hunter meant something else or more? “Hey, Mattie, what do you need? Over.”

  There was a mild background fizz and then Mattie said, “It’s the fourth night. Over.”

  “Ah. Sure thing.” Yippee. “You and Will got the candles ready?”

  “We do,” Will said. “You say when.”

  The sound of his voice made her heart leap. She wished they could talk things over. Instead she said, “When. Tell me when you’re ready.”

  “Hang on…Okay, go for it.”

  “Yehi ’or.” She could feel the actual blessings jostle for space on her tongue. What would it really cost her to say them? Nothing. They were only empty words that would dissipate into an even greater void. “Over.”

  “Let there be light,” said Mattie.

  “That’s right.” Emma cleared her throat. “Okay, talk to you guys in the morning. Over and out.”

  As she clicked off, Earl said, “You going to share…what that was about?” He listened as she rattled off a thumbnail version detailing the holiday. “I heard…of that one. But there’s got…to be more to it. More words. Especially…” He drew in a long, rattling breath. “If we’re talking a miracle.”

  “Yeah, well.” She gave a tight smile. She had heard that kind of rattle before and didn’t like it now any more than when it had issued from her grandmother and she had discovered that the sound was not a metaphor. “If we are.”

  Chapter 7

  She snapped upright from her slouch, pulling her head up from where it had come to rest on her knees. Feel asleep. She smeared drool from a cheek. She wasn’t aware she’d dropped off. She aimed an anxious look at the fire, which had not dwindled much at all. She wasn’t toasty by any means, but she wasn’t freezing either.

  So what had awakened her? Not the cold. Something else. Earl was still, his features arranged in what looked like sleep. She laid a palm on his chest then felt her shoulders relax a smidge at the rise and—

  Something, somewhere, made a very faint but very audible sound.

  She froze. The hairs rose on her arms. What was that? She listened hard over the snap of the fire, the pop of a log. The sound had been so fleeting, it might even have been her imagination. She willed herself to hold still. That had sounded like…

  Something growled.

  Oh hell. Her heart kicked. She inched her head over a shoulder to peer into the darkness to the east. The noise came again, a soft growl followed by a scuffling, a hissing noise that could be ice against ice or stone. The sounds were coming from the direction where she’d found those faint impressions of boot prints and fresher, deeper animal prints. But there hadn’t been anything to find, no body, no bits of clothing, nothing.

  But I didn’t think about digging beneath the new snow to check now, did I?

  It had been snowing when Burke wandered off. He could have fallen fifty feet from the wreck or five hundred, and she and Will had been too preoccupied with doing what they could for the survivors.

  Rifle in hand, she slowly made her feet. What could she possibly do here? Bringing a body into camp would be inviting the wolves in for a buffet. And there’s a mountain lion out there, too, don’t forget. Killing the animals wouldn’t be right. They were only doing what animals did. Would a single shot over their heads scare them away? Or, wait…she felt for the flare in a parka pocket…she could touch that off and accomplish the same thing or simply use a log from the fire. No matter what she did, the solution would be only temporary. The wolves would be back and pick up where they’d left off—or that mountain lion might take their place.

  She crept around the cockpit, wincing every time snow squeaked and squealed. She knew the animals must hear her coming, too, because at every misstep, the sounds ceased, the air quivered, and she could imagine them all pricking their ears and pausing in their feeding to look, as one, in her direction. When she’d drawn even with the cockpit’s ruined nose, she could make out the animals’ shadows as they fed. Her ears caught the dry tearing of cloth and the deeper, meatier, wetter sound of ripping flesh. Heart booming, she flipped on her headlamp and socked the rifle’s butt into her shoulder.

  Four wolves, three a mottled gray and one larger wolf who was the color of jet, leapt from the darkness. In the light of her headlamp, their eyes were green cinders. Muzzle dark with blood, the jet-black wolf’s lips peeled back revealing orange teeth and the dangle of something pink and stringy. The snow, chunked and churned, was red. The rest was a fractured kaleidoscope of torn clothing, tangled guts, a cage of rib bones partially stripped of flesh. Burke’s body lay at an angle, h
is head cranked impossibly far back on the stalk of his neck because they’d torn out his throat and eaten the flesh down to bone.

  She should use the rifle. That had the best chance of really spooking them. But it was stupid to shoot. This wasn’t their fault. But wasn’t it also true that once an animal had the taste of a human in its mouth, it wouldn’t stop but would hunt down what was, in the end, very easy prey? She wished she knew what to do. Should she call Will? No, that was stupid, too. She was supposed to have this.

  She took aim for a spot over the animals’ heads and fired. The rifle cracked; a bright yellow flare of muzzle flash leapt from the barrel. Yipping, the wolves jumped and backed off but didn’t leave.

  “Go away!” She let go of another shot and then another. This time, two of the wolves wheeled about; a third jumped in a high, frightened hop. At the fourth shot, even the black wolf finally broke and ran off into the darkness beyond the range of her headlamp.

  Her pulse thundered. Sweat trickled down her neck, and she shivered. She was panting, though she couldn’t hear much over the ringing in her ears. Her grandmother had always warned her to wear ear protection.

  She felt a vibration at her hip. Pulling the walkie-talkie from her pocket, she depressed the send button. “Yeah?”

  “Emma? Are you all right?” The words, barely intelligible over the roar in her head, spilled from the speaker in a hash of static. “I heard shots. What’s going on?”

  So, it was true. Sounds really did carry at night in the wilderness. “W-wolves,” she managed. Her mouth didn’t seem to want to work. The smell of spent gunpowder was sharp and turned her stomach. Swallowing, she pressed a hand to her mouth then said, with a weird little laugh, “I found Burke. Well, the wolves did. He was buried under the snow and they…they…he’s all torn up and…”

  “Oh Jesus.” Maybe he heard that slight hysteria, maybe not. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry, Emma. I wish I could make it better for you. Are you all right?”

  “N-no. I mean…” She forced a swallow. Now that the adrenaline was tailing off, fear gnawed her neck. She didn’t dare fall asleep again. She wasn’t supposed to have drifted off at all. Some great helper bee she was. One little thing, and she couldn’t get it right. “I didn’t shoot them, Will. Was I supposed to? It didn’t seem right. It’s not their fault we’re here and Burke’s dead and…”

  “Hush, honey, hush. You didn’t do a thing wrong. They were doing what wolves do.”

  “Will they come back?’

  “Doubt it, but I don’t know. I’m not an expert on wolves. You did the right thing. I’ve heard that in some places, they shoot the wolves so they don’t get used to being around people.”

  “I didn’t shoot them,” she said again.

  “You did fine.”

  “I fell asleep.”

  “You’re human. We’re all exhausted and scared and half-starved. It’s okay. You’re safe. Earl and Hunter are safe.”

  A sob balled in her throat. “I think Earl is really dying.”

  “You’re doing what you can do.” A static-filled pause. “I can come be with you. Rachel will be okay, and Mattie will have the radio. I can be there in an hour, maybe less.”

  “No. It’s not safe. I’ll be all right.” She added in another burst of illogic, “I’m sorry I woke you. Go back to sleep. Both of us can’t stay up all night. Only one of us is allowed to be a wreck.” And tag, she was it. She hoped she hadn’t awakened Mattie. Scott, she couldn’t care less about.

  “Sleep?” He let out a soft chuckle. “With you out there blasting away at errant wolves? Who could sleep through racket like that?”

  She gave a watery laugh. “I’m sorry.”

  “Save that for when you’ve got something to be sorry about. Where are you now?”

  “Looking at Be…” She caught herself before Ben slipped out. Odd, that. There really was no comparison. Burke was in pieces, cuts of meat and gnawed bone. Ben had been totally different. As she considered this, an image from memory flashed of Bubbe Sarah, kneeling by a buck she’d shot, hunting knife in hand. This is how you do it so you don’t spoil the meat. And then, with a barely suppressed smirk: Of course, it won’t be strictly kosher because I’m not a shochet, but nu? What can you do? I’m sure God can take a joke. For a woman who’d not spent a single year of her life in New York, Sarah could really lay on the schmaltz when she wanted.

  “Looking at Burke,” she said.

  “Well, stop looking. You can’t stand there all night. Earl and Hunter need you. You’ve done what you can. Now, go on. Walk. Get back to the fire. Get warm.”

  She started back to the fire on legs that felt like pegs. As she drew closer, she heard Hunter shouting and called back to let him know she was all right and would be in to check on him in a second. She told him not to worry, as if squeezing off a couple two, three rounds was par for the course, normal, no big deal. Once she was within sight of the fire, she brought the walkie-talkie back to her mouth. “Okay, I’m back. Please, Will, go to sleep.”

  “You’re sure? We’ve got extra batteries. I can stay on. We can talk. I can read The Times.”

  That made her laugh. “That’ll put me right to sleep. Really, I’m positive. You get some rest. See you in the morning.”

  “All right.” Another crackling silence. “Please stay safe, Emma.”

  “On my to-do,” she managed around a sudden lump in her throat. “Will, I…I’m…” She wanted to say…what? For a split second, she saw the two of them in that one sleeping bag, with nothing between them but air, could almost feel the glide of his hand over her hip, the warmth of his palms cupping her breasts, and…

  “Yes?” He waited a moment, and when his voice came back again, only a fool could miss that gentle note. “I know. Me, too.” Another pause. “We’re all scared.”

  And she was insane. He was married. His wife would be waiting when they stepped off that rescue chopper. She was nothing but baggage and unfinished business.

  “Yeah,” she said, her voice shaky. “Out.”

  Chapter 8

  As she slid another thick split of pine into the flames, Earl said, “You did…the right thing.”

  “Don’t talk.” At the sudden introduction of colder wood, the flames retreated before flaring back to lick at the wood with greedy golden tongues. After a few seconds, the resin heated enough to pop and sputter.

  “Nothing else to do.” Pause. “I’m afraid to go…to sleep. Might not…wake up.”

  She didn’t know what to say to that. “I’m sorry, Earl.”

  His head moved in a weak nod. “Would’ve liked…to see Joshua.”

  “I’m sorry,” she said again.

  “Way it goes.” At that moment, Hunter let out another plaintive call, and Earl said, “You gonna tell him? About his dad? That’s what…what the wolves were…about, right?”

  “Yeah.” Why was this her responsibility? “Should I?”

  “Best not to lie.”

  “Right.” She gave Earl’s shoulder a squeeze. “Be right back.”

  She’d expected tears, and there were a few, but Hunter didn’t cry much. Maybe when your plane has crashed, your legs are trapped, there’s blood in the cockpit, and your dad’s disappeared, you expect miracles to be few and far between.

  “Thanks for chasing them off.” Hunter’s eyes shimmered from a cocoon of space blankets and parka. “But what now? You can’t leave him there. I mean, I know you can’t do anything tonight, but…”

  Well, she could, but from her story on Thule, she knew the Inuit left their dead to the elements all the time. Without a backhoe, digging a grave in frozen ground was a non-starter. “I don’t know.” Interesting question, though. So far, they’d not had to deal with dead people. “What do you want us to do?”

  “Maybe rewind the last four days?” A weird, croaky laugh floated on a breath cloud that Hunter choked off. “I know you can’t bury him. Ground’s frozen. Maybe rocks?” Averting his face, Hunter burrowed deeper i
nto his blankets and parka. “I need to think about it.”

  “Sure. I’m sorry, but with everything that’s happened, I forgot to bring your broth and some hot water for your face. Would you like me to do that now?” They were running low on broth; pooling what was left from Burke’s MREs and Will’s two remaining ramen packs, they had about six watery servings left between the two camps. But it was the only humane thing to do.

  “No.” Pause. “I mean, maybe later. It’s nice of you, but I kind of need some time. Weird, huh? Been nothing but alone pretty much.”

  “It’s okay. I’ll come back in a little while.”

  “I’m not going anywhere.” As she started to back out, he said, “I’m not going to make it out of here.”

  It had not been a question. “We don’t know that.”

  “Don’t bullshit a bullshitter. Blind man could see it with a cane. That Will, he’s all right. He said he’d bring tools, and I know he’ll try his damnedest. I can tell he’s that kind of guy. I was a real prick to him, too.”

  “I think Will lets a lot of things roll off.”

  “I can’t feel my feet anymore, can’t wiggle my toes. I’ve never had frostbite, but even I know not feeling nothing’s bad.”

  “People come back from frostbite.” She’d seen pictures and knew the basics. “If we can get you out, get your feet and legs into warm water, get some circulation back…”

  “You don’t know me real well. I’m not a nice guy, okay? I’ve done a bunch of things, and I bullshit a lot. So, I’m telling you, don’t bullshit a bullshitter.”

  “No bullshit.” She really did know of a few cases where soldiers developed frostbitten toes, fingers, ears. A nose. “It doesn’t all have to end bad, if we can get you out and warm you up.” It would also be nice if a rescue plane found them already.