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It was hard, and painful, to keep her and myself in the saddle at the same time. My muscles were screaming at me after a couple of hours, but I didn’t care. We didn’t have any other choice.

It was midsummer now, and the day was overcast. The air was hot and humid. Claire was wearing a clean Delta soldier’s uniform—the only clothes available—and shouldn’t have been cold. Still, she shivered every now and then against me, and I hated that she was here, out in the open, in the middle of fucking nowhere instead of at home, where we could take care of her properly.

Worse, we didn’t make anywhere near as much headway on the first day of travel as I’d hoped. We had to ride incredibly slowly to avoid jostling Claire too much. Speed-wise, it wasn’t much better than walking; the only advantage was that Ghost could carry her for a lot longer than I could.

“It’s alright, baby,” I kept murmuring against Claire’s hair. “We’re alright.”

Maybe if I said it enough times, it’d actually become true.

We made camp after dark, slept for a few hours, and set out again at dawn. The same slow, agonizing pace—for hours and hours. I was losing my mind.

Towards the end of the afternoon, a lightning bolt split the sky just ahead, and a crash of thunder followed.

“Fuck,” I muttered, and Kimmy looked over her shoulder at me, her expression worried.

“We need to stop,” she said.

“We can’t,” I replied, frustrated. “We’ve barely moved today. At this rate, it’ll take us over a week to get home.”

Kimmy clearly heard the words I didn’t say: Claire won’t last that long, because she bit her lip.

“But being cold and wet won’t do her any good,” she said. “It might make matters worse.”

She had a point.

“My rain jacket’s in my pack,” I said. “Help me get it out, and we can put it over her.”

She directed Bella to pull up beside me, and between the two of us, we managed to get the jacket out. I tented it over Claire, covering her head and torso, and she stirred.

“What’s happening?” she mumbled, disoriented, and I kissed her hair.

“It’s okay, baby,” I soothed for the hundredth time. “Just covering you up to keep you dry.”

She shivered. “It’s so cold.”

It was August, which meant the days were generally still warm. Today had been milder than usual, but not enough to cause shivering. I gritted my teeth, right as Kimmy shot me a look filled with concern.

“We’ll keep going for a little while longer,” she said hesitantly. “But we have to stop soon. I need to look her over again.”

I nodded, my chest tight. I wanted to scream with frustration. I wanted to urge Ghost into an all-out sprint, all the way back to the Valley. I wanted to do something, anything, useful. But all I could do was quietly sit in the saddle, calmly direct Ghost, and hope my wife wasn’t going to die in my arms.

Not long after, the skies opened up, and after only a couple of minutes, Kimmy and I were soaked to the skin. Claire was mostly protected under the jacket, but she kept shivering anyway, and I knew it was time to admit defeat and make camp for the night. God fucking damn it.

We found a big maple tree that gave us enough shelter to pitch the tent. Luckily, the rain slowed to a drizzle. As I shifted to free Claire and myself from the rope tying us together, I realized she was hot to the touch. When I swiped a hand across her brow, she was slick with sweat. Fuck.

“Kim, she’s burning up,” I said, trying to keep calm.

Kimmy cursed. “Get her down. Set up the tent. I’ll look at her in the meantime.”

Between the two of us, we managed to dismount Ghost and lay Claire out on a blanket on the ground. We made a makeshift tent out of mine and Kimmy’s rain jackets over the blanket to give Kimmy a spot to examine Claire. The horses grazed as I tried to set up the tent at record speed.

I made myself focus on the task at hand because it was all I could do. I put my entire being into constructing that goddamn tent, like it was my life’s work. At least, that was the best explanation I had for why I didn’t hear a big guy walk up, ten feet away, and point his rifle at us.

“Fuck,” I muttered, instinctively reaching for my gun. Too slow, because the next thing I knew, the loud bang of a gunshot rang out, and I just about jumped out of my skin.

Ghost didn’t panic, but Bella did, rearing back and whinnying frantically. I thanked my lucky stars that I’d tied them up, because she would’ve bolted if she could.

I looked down and realized he’d deliberately fired at the ground a few feet in front of me. A warning shot.