Page 40 of Run of Ruin

Thorne picked up Dominic’s pack and slung it over his shoulder. It felt wrong, taking from the dead, but if it meant keeping my brother alive, I’d carry the guilt.

“Come on,” I said softly. “We’ve got a lot of ground to cover.”

I gave one last look at the form beneath the chute, then turned and started walking toward Praxis.

The first night was brutal.

We found water in a winding river that was carving through the forest like a silver scar. For a while, we followed it, Thorne insisting we stick close. “Rivers always lead to civilization,” he’d said. But after hours of hiking, it started curving south and looping back.

We’d reach Praxis eventually if we stayed on that path, but it would take forever. Time we didn’t have.

We filled our canteens, even the one we found in Dominic’s pack. Then Thorne finally did what we’d been putting off and consolidated all the useful supplies into his own bag and ditched the extra pack.

Leaving it behind felt like leaving Dominic all over again. God forgive me.

We fought over it, loud, bitter words in the silence of the forest. But eventually, he agreed to veer from the river and cut directly through The Wilds. It was a risk, but it would get us to Praxis faster. And if anyone was equipped to make the journey, it was us.

Darkbranch was built on terrain like this, with thick forests, jagged cliffs, restless wildlife. Thorne and I had been hunting since we were old enough to hold a bow. But this time, we were unarmed. No weapons, no traps. Just instincts and desperation.

We needed food, and soon.

Thorne, idiot that he is, ate his entire jerky stick the moment he found it. Like it was a snack, not survival rations.

Now we only had half of mine and whatever Dominic had in his pack. Not nearly enough to get us through the Wilds.

“We’ll have to hunt,” I said, scanning the undergrowth.

“You even seen anything out here?” Thorne asked, a little too casually, but I could hear the edge of hunger in his voice.

“Not the animals themselves. But there’s signs.” I crouched, brushing the dirt aside with my fingers. “Look.”

A paw print. Broad, deep. Still fresh.

“Bobcat,” I muttered.

Thorne whistled low. “Big one?”

“Big enough to feed us for a couple days, if we’re careful.”

He looked down at the print, then up at me. “So we track it?”

I nodded. “We track it.”

We slipped into old rhythms, falling into step like we were back in Darkbranch woods back before Pa died when he taught us how to track. Thorne was a pattern-reader, he could look at broken twigs and displaced moss and tell you which way something turned, how fast it was moving. I was tuned into the terrain itself, listening to the rhythm of the forest, feeling the shift in energy when something nearby moved.

We followed the trail, paw prints, broken branches, scraped bark. Silent. Focused.

Then we heard it.

A scream. High-pitched. Terrified. Feminine. It was cut off by a snarl, low, guttural, and unmistakably feline.

For a split second, Thorne and I locked eyes. Then we were moving, sprinting through the trees, leaping over roots and ducking under branches.

We didn’t say a word. We didn’t have to.

Someone was in trouble, and this time I was going to get there before it was too late.

The cat had someone pinned, its claws digging in as the figure beneath it thrashed and screamed, fighting like hell. Whoever it was, they weren’t giving up easily.

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