Cover Of Night

By now Mellor had probably made his demand. If what he wanted wasn’t forthcoming, he would have no reason to be patient. He could start shooting incendiary rounds into the houses and burn them out. Mellor could do this. Mellor could do that. Cate was astonished that Cal had such an encyclopedia of violence and destruction in his head. The bottom line was that he thought there was little time left before the situation exploded and even more of their friends were killed.

She couldn’t reach him. He had pulled inside some fortified mental position; his focus was on what he needed to do. Finally she sat in despairing silence, watching as he fashioned some rough snowshoes, which would allow them to move faster over the snow and keep their shoes dry.

Her sneakers hadn’t completely dried, and the leather was stiff from being so close to the fire, but he’d kept the empty plastic bags their rations of muesli had been in and had her put her feet inside them before putting on her shoes. The bags fit awkwardly, and he’d had to cut out the zipper because they kept rubbing her heels, but the plastic would keep the dampness from soaking through her socks. The snowshoes would keep her from sinking into the snow over the tops of her shoes, which would promptly have gotten her feet wet again.

He sat on the pad with his legs crossed, his expression intent as he worked. He’d cut some saplings about the width of his thumb, trimming them with his big multipurpose utility knife. He’d also cut some smaller lengths and notched each end. as well as a two-foot section from one end of his rope. He had then unbraided the rope fibers, separating them into individual cords.

Next he bent the saplings into a U shape, pulling the ends together and securely tying them with a piece of cord. The notched sticks were fitted inside the U to form bracing crosspieces and tied on each end to the sapling. The resulting snowshoe was crude but durable. He cut more rope, then laced the snowshoe to her right foot. In a matter of minutes he constructed the left snowshoe and had her walking around experimentally.

She had never worn snowshoes before, and she quickly found a normal gait wasn’t possible. You didn’t walk in snowshoes, you sort of waddled and shuffled, because you had to either kept, your legs straight like cross-country skiers or lift your knees high to keep the front end of the snowshoe from digging in.

Nevertheless, the improvised shoes worked. She staved on top of the snow instead of sinking into it.

Awkwardly, she crawled back into their shelter where Cal sat working on his own set of shoes. Eyes narrowed, he surveyed her shoes to make certain the bindings and laces were holding. "When you get out of the snow," he instructed, "just cut the bindings. You have a knife, don’t you?"

"In my pocket."

"Work your way back to the Richardsons’ exactly the way we came. You’ll have a protected route the entire way. Tell Creed right away what we’ve figured out; he’ll need to know because the situation could change at the drop of a hat.’

"I will." She was chilled, as much from fear as from the weather, and she carefully placed another stick on their little fire. She wasn’t afraid for herself, even though she was going back alone, rappelling down a rock face alone. A hundred things could happen to her, but all of those possible calamities were accidents. Cal was deliberately going into a situation where people would actively be trying to kill him. She had never been so terrified in her life, and she couldn’t protect him any more than she’d been able to protect Derek from the bacteria that ravaged his body.

If anything happened to Cal, she would be emotionally destroyed. She couldn’t go through that again, couldn’t lose the man she loved and emerge in any way whole. Part of her would be dead, her capacity for love permanently stunted. No new? people would be taken into her heart. She knew that, but she didn’t say it, didn’t lay that guilt trip on him. He was a hero, she thought painfully, a true hero, risking his life to save the world. Well, not the entire world, but people he cared about. Wasn’t that just her luck? Why couldn’t she have fallen for a math teacher or something?

"Hey," he said softly, and when she looked up, startled, she found he was watching her with an expression of such tenderness she almost burst into tears. "I know what I’m doing, and they don’t. They’re good shots, maybe good hunters, hut I’m better. Ask Creed. I’ll be fine. I promise you – I promise-that we’re going to have that wedding, that new little kid we talked about, and a lot of years together. Have the same faith in me that I have in you."

She managed to glare at him through the tears that blurred her vision. "I can’t believe you’re so underhanded when you argue, pulling that line on me."

"I don’t argue," he said.

"Right."

Too soon, all too soon, he put out their fire by dumping snow on it, then scattered the ashes. She almost cried again, seeing the coals die. He was leaving most of his climbing gear behind so lie could travel faster. He took his rope and trenching tool, and that was it as far as equipment went. She was slightly comforted by the big automatic weapon and holster that he slid onto his belt, and the knife in its scabbard. He put some food in his pockets and took one bottle of water. Then he used the knife, to cut a hole in the middle of the blanket, which he then dropped over his head.

He cut. strips from the bottom of the blanket and motioned her over. Gently he held her hands and tied the strips around them to form makeshift gloves. Then he cut two sturdy limbs for her to use as walking sticks, to keep her balance on the snowshoes. Until she gripped the sticks, she hadn’t realized how much she needed the protection for her hands.

"I love you," he said, leaning to kiss her. His lips were cold and soft, his bristly cheeks were rough. "Now go."