Sunless by Sloane J.T. & Kraus Mike

Author:Sloane, J.T. & Kraus, Mike
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Muonic Press Inc
Published: 2022-12-30T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER NINETEEN

Anayeli Alfaro. North of Darby, Montana

The voices snapped Anayeli out of the hazy silence she’d been walking in and back into the night, into the moment.

She’d been clutching Fortune’s lead rope for so long she no longer felt it in her hand, focusing only on the slanted hillside in front of her, one foot in front of the other as she navigated the loose, pine-needle-covered ground. Slipping would be a disaster. It was a long way down if she lost her footing. But moving was good. It dulled her gnawing hunger and parched throat and aching arm and relegated the heat and her exhaustion to background noise.

But the voices were decidedly not good.

She glanced up toward the highway, but the steepness of the hill, the hazy air, and the darkness of the night-day—that’s what Bailey Rae had called it back at the evacuation center—meant she couldn’t tell where the voices were coming from.

A queasiness that spelled “adrenaline dump” oozed through her. Someone was on the road, and moving a lot faster than they could down on the rough hillside.

She inched closer to Andrew, who was scrambling along the slope just ahead of her, leading Manteca, the horse Anayeli had caught in the stampede. He was the color of butter, and butter made everything better—hence the meaning of the Spanish name she’d given him. Mama slouched on Manteca’s broad back, her chin dropped to her chest. Anayeli had always thought sleep-riding was some cowboy movie myth, but then again, she’d never understood the real, deep, physical and mental exhaustion that came from working so hard just to survive from one moment to the next. She kept her voice low so as not to wake Mama. “Do you hear that?”

The horses’ ears swiveled forward, then back. They were listening too.

Andrew nodded, the movement barely visible in the darkness. “They’re farther away than it sounds—the wind carries.”

It made sense. There’d been a steady, light breeze at their backs almost since they’d started walking, however long ago that was. She’d lost track. It could be morning or night. She had no idea—the blackness of the smoke-filled sky was unrelenting no matter the time of day.

She laid her scarred palm on Andrew’s arm, drawing his attention from surveying the road and back to her. “You doing okay?”

“I’m fine.” Andrew was so quiet all the time, so stoic, she had no sense of how he really was. Maybe it was his military training, though she didn’t think that was the whole of it. But if he said he was fine, she was going to take it at face value. She had enough to worry about.

Just behind her, atop Fortune, Ernesto’s breathing was not quite normal, but his thin, high wheeze hadn’t gotten any worse. Cricket had stopped whining and was draped across Ernesto’s lap. Ernesto’s arms caged the dog, his fingers clutching Fortune’s mane to keep his balance as the horse struggled with the uneven ground.

“Any bleeding?” She only spoke in whispers, afraid her voice

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