Page 45 of Creed
“Don’t worry. I’ve said the same thing many times before and it’s never happened.”
Creed’s eyes narrowed as he continued to stare at me, like he thought I would suddenly start losing weight right in front of him.
“Good,” he eventually declared, then turned around to take Mavis back from Robyn so we could continue our escape.
I just shook my head, picked up the backpack, and followed him.
Navigating our way through the forest in the dark was nothing like the hike Creed had taken me on earlier. I’d thought the previous hike was hard, but it was practically a stroll through the park compared to this. We had a flashlight, but Creed claimed that waving a light around in the middle of the night would make us easier to find, so we stumbled our way through the dark. There wasn’t a path, not even a natural deer trail that we could follow, so we were forced to stomp our way directly through the underbrush while trying to leave as little evidence of our passing as possible.
I had no idea how Creed did it. The man must secretly be part cat, because despite his size, he barely left any footprints, and easily navigated between the trees as if it were broad daylight. He did all this while also carrying a mostly unconscious child and didn’t even look like he was breaking a sweat.
In contrast, I nearly smacked my face directly into a tree trunk three times in the first hour.
“Do you even know where we’re going, or are we just wandering around blindly?” I asked when we stopped to catch our breath for a moment.
I had no illusion that the break was mostly for Robyn’s sake. If it had just been the two of us, Creed would have insisted we keep going. In bed, I enjoyed that kind of confident control, but in this case, it was just annoying.
I couldn’t even get mad at him for it. Creed’s unrelenting spirit was the thing most likely to help us survive.
“I know where we’re going,” he assured me as he handed me one of the water bottles from the bag that Robyn had supplied.
The boy had been smart enough to pack plenty of essentials. We had enough food and water for a few days so long as we used it sparingly.
I only took a brief sip of water, saving as much of it as I could.
“How can you possibly know where we’re going? We’re out in the middle of nowhere.”
Rather than answer me with words, Creed merely pointed toward the sky.
I looked up, seeing the cloudless night sky above us dotted with thousands of stars.
Of course, the man could navigate purely by the sight of the stars.
Why was I even surprised?
That kind of competency was hot, don’t get me wrong, but still...
What the hell?
Why would he even know that kind of stuff?
Surely the military had more sophisticated navigational technology.
“We escaped on the north side of the village,” Creed explained. “We’ll head east for a bit to ensure we give the area a wide berth, and then we’ll head south. If we are where I think we are, there should be a town just a few days hike from here.”
He was already starting to pack up again, ready to continue our journey.
I groaned but hoisted myself off of the tree I was leaning against.
“Isn’t there a road or something we can follow? We were brought there in a van. That means there is some way to travel to and from the village.”
Creed handed me the bag before picking up Mavis again and carefully positioning her on his back.
“The road is the first place they’ll look for us. If we want to avoid getting caught, we have to stay as far from the road as possible.”
The bag may not have been as heavy as the one I was carrying when we started our little hiking trip, but it still weighed on me as I hoisted it onto my shoulder. I groaned as the straps settled into place and prepared myself to continue the difficult journey.
“I can take that,” Robyn offered, reaching for the bag.
