The Prisoner's Apprentice by Cheyenne Richards

Author:Cheyenne Richards [Richards, Cheyenne]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781737302209
Publisher: Your BETTEREST, LLC

25

I heard my scream—as shrill and terrifying as if it had come from someone standing beside me. I squinted up at Pa, unbelieving, until I saw his silhouette behind the window glass reloading the rifle. The palomino yanked at the lead, and as soon as I leapt into the saddle, took off at full gallop across the field of new snow.

Another shot kicked up a cloud of snow to my right, and the horse broke left for the trees without any guidance from me.

She took us into the forest, where skeleton branches flew past my face as I tried like mad to think. We were out of rifle range now, but it wouldn’t take Pa more than a few minutes to get to the barn, throw a saddle on Horse, and be after me. Maybe less if he skipped the saddle. Still trying to hold on to the palomino, I had to find a way to work through the impossibility of what was happening if I was going to survive.

Where could I go? Hide out at the Snyders’?

Even if I could avoid Pa, word would get around in a flash that I was the one who’d let Rulloff free, and then even Mrs. Snyder would want to see me strung up. The whole town would want me dead—Eph and everyone with the torches, coming for me with that noose. I’d be swinging from the poplar by nightfall.

A branch caught my cheek and sliced it open to my ear.

Ithaca was all I knew.

What else was there? Flee to Canada? To the territories? The snow was too deep this time of year.

I struggled to breathe in the fear and the cold. The palomino had nearly exhausted herself already. I cried out loud, wishing I’d convinced Rulloff to take me with him.

I could still hear shouting, too far away to recognize words but close enough to know Pa wasn’t giving up. It was time to make a choice, and it had to be the right one.

What would Pa expect me to do?

He knew me as the namby-pamby son of a jail-keep who ain’t got the sense God gave a toad. He’d expect to find me easily in a nearby barn, or if I was slightly bolder, hiding out in a wagon or boat headed out of town. He would never think I had it in me to set out alone for a place I’d never been.

Of all the directions I could flee, the least traveled was south. I remembered the map in the telegraph office. There was a rail line from Binghamton to Manhattan, so that could be useful—if I could get to Binghamton. The distance was only around fifty miles, and trappers sometimes spoke of a summer trail, but this time of year the snow was deep, the terrain hilly, and to my knowledge, even the Mohawks never dared the trip in winter.

I had a musket, a coat, a hat, gloves, and a horse. No food or water or flint. And if I was going to shake Pa off my trail, my best chance was by getting rid of my horse.

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