Page 234 of Crucible

I force myself to put one foot in front of the other as I make my way back up the slope. Khalil lingers behind, making sure the mercenaries are all really dead. He’s over by one of the larger slanted rocks, checking Sanders when I hear it.

The horrifying familiar crack like thunder and the sound of heavy rain pouring down…

Except the sky is clear and there is no rain.

The snow beneath our feet begins to crack and slide, slowly heading for the ledge where it spills over the side. I imagine the image from below where Finnegan lies dead is that of a waterfall except with snow.

The ground starts trembling, and it feels like a stampede heading straight for us.

Seth, who had stopped to pick a flower turns to face us with a confused frown. “What is that?” he calls out from fifty feet ahead.

The blood drains from my face as I gape at the horrifying image behind him. Mist crests the hill that leads home, and then a wall of white so thick and high it blocks out the sun follows as it heads straight for us.

The answer to Seth’s question spills from my lips in a horrified shudder. “Avalanche.”

Fuck, it’s cold.

I stopped feeling my fingers and toes hours ago, but if I complain again, I have a feeling I’ll perish from strangulation instead of exposure.

The storms have finally stopped, but the sun still hasn’t appeared as snow slowly falls, making visibility poor. Today, the wilds are cloaked in fog and mist that blanket the forest floor and wrap around my ankles.

“So I’m guessing you’ve realized life is too short to spend it guarding a soulless witch, and you’re planning to quit once we make it out of here, huh?”

I peek over at Tyler, who is currently trying to use the hands on his grandfather’s watch to determine our direction. Caught off guard, his head snaps toward me, and his brown eyes widen when he finds me watching him. Amusement breaks through his surprise, and then he snorts.

“Or I realized the soulless witch needs me more than I thought, and I’m asking for a raise once we make it out of here.”

“No need to wait. Done. Doubled.” Wrapping my arms around one of his, I rest my cheek on his strong shoulder. “I know I can be hard to deal with.”

Laughing, Tyler shakes his head. “What is it you told Joanna? Better hard to deal with than easy to play with?” Smiling, I nod. “Besides, how could I leave you? You’d be lost without me.”

“Literally.”

I’m rewarded with another snort, and then he says, “Come on. The beacon is this way.” He points to the other side of a ravine forty feet below us where the forest continues.

I immediately wrinkle my nose. “But how are we supposed to get down there?”Please don’t say climb. Please don’t say climb.

“We climb, princess.”

I groan. “Can’t we go around?”

“That could take hours and cost us another day to reach the tail. Another storm could hit, and we may not be lucky finding shelter again.”

“We could also fall to our death, Ty.”

Tyler’s jaw ticks, and I know he probably wants to take control and tell me we’re doing this, but he’s also remembering that he works for me, which means I’m in charge.

Technically.

After watching him struggle with indecision, I decide to cut the only person in the world who actually likes and gives a shit about me some slack.

“So how do we do this? We don’t have any rope.”

Tyler looks relieved that I’m not going to go Godzilla on him, and then he’s frowning again as he trudges over to the edge of the small cliff and peers over. “Slowly. I think I see a way down. I’ll go first, and then you follow. Step where I step. Hold what I hold. We should be fine.”

“Piece of cake,” I tease.We’re gonna die.

Pushing away from the tree I’m huddling under, I take one step toward the cliff’s edge when I hear something like a clap and a boom. Startled, I look around in confusion, but before I can ask Tyler what it could be, the ground under my feet begins to shake. It trembles so hard I have to hold onto the tree I abandoned for balance.

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