Page 31 of Swept for Forever
Her gaze flicked to the incline we’d originally planned to take. She sighed.
Wordlessly, she stepped toward me, wrapping her arms around my shoulders as I lifted her onto my back.
“Hold tight,” I said, securing my grip on her legs. “I’m not dealing with you falling again.”
“You act like I’m a flight risk.”
“Autumn, you tumbled off a steep slope. Hell, let’s just call it a cliff if that wasn’t clear enough.”
She muttered something under her breath, but then settled against me as I started moving.
Sunlight pressed in now, its heat finally biting through theleftover chill. We kept moving through the brush. Lulu trotted ahead, occasionally getting distracted by sniffing something useless.
After half a mile, I let Autumn walk with support, keeping her weight off her bad leg. Just short bursts of movement with rest breaks in between. I could feel her frustration, the way she wanted to push harder and move faster. Every time she stumbled, I caught her, and she leaned in just a little more.
I checked the map. Less than a mile to go.
“You wait here, okay? I’ll grab my pack.”
She glanced around before nodding. “Okay.” Lowering herself onto a mound, she patted Lulu’s side. “Stay.”
I ran back to retrieve my pack. Everything was intact. Hauling it over my shoulders, I hurried back. But the second I saw Autumn, my stomach clenched.
She was struggling to stay upright.
Her fever was creeping back, her breaths shallow and uneven. Maybe the hike, short as it was, had taken more out of her than I’d realized.
I crouched beside her, rubbing her back. Her fingers weakly gripped my sleeve.
I didn’t like this. She was slower to respond and fading, leaning heavier into me. All signs that the infection had taken a turn.
Four hundred yards to the village.
I could do this.
I lifted her into my arms, adjusting her carefully onto my back. She let out a weak protest, but I didn’t care.
“Hang on. But easy on that left shoulder.”
I shifted my pack to the front, tightening the straps. The weight hit, yanking my center of gravity forward. My knees locked for half a second before instinct kicked in and my muscles caught up, straining under the load.
Jeepers, that was heavier than I’d accounted for.
I bent, adjusted my stance, and took a step. Fire licked up my calves. My ribs pressed in, and my breathing became shallow fast.
Barely a hundred yards in, and my legs were already shot. My pack chewed into one shoulder while Autumn clung to the other. Every uphill step ground my teeth tighter. How much longer could I keep this up?
Then his voice echoed in my head, “Weakness wears a face.Yours.”
Always right when I was a hair from buckling.
I huffed.Not today, old man!
Because weakness didn’t stay behind in a storm. Weakness didn’t carry someone else when they could barely carry themself. And whatever face I wore now, it wasn’t his.
Funny thing was, I’d struggled harder yesterday and climbed like hell. But that voice? It hadn’t shown up once.
Because my mind had been full of her. Autumn.
