Page 15 of Every Little Thing She Orcs

By the time we hit the trailhead, he’s showing her photos on his screen. He doesn’t realize he’s being escorted off the premises.

At the gate, I rest one hand flat on the bars, under the red CLOSED sign, and look back up the hill. Wren stops beside me, still talking. Behind us, James lifts his camera and points it back up the trail. The shutter clicks twice. Taking pictures of the trail, just like I told him.

Then he turns to us and lowers the camera. “Seriously, though. Thank you. If that hill had come down while I was standing there…” He shakes his head. “I owe you both.”

“Stay on the marked trails,” I tell him.

“I will. Promise.” He shakes Wren’s hand, then mine. His grip is damp. “You two make a great team.”

He climbs into his car and drives off. I watch the dust settle behind him, a gnawing feeling in my gut. He was polite and grateful, saying all the right things. But I didn’t miss the way he looked back up that trail before he got in his car. I’ll call Prue tonight and get the deer-track closure logged and taped.

I look down at my hands. They’re shaking, but not from fear. It’s adrenaline with nowhere to go.

A spruce that fell last winter lies across the trailhead path. I’ve been meaning to clear it. I grab the trunk with both hands and heave it off the path. It crashes into the ferns, shaking the ground.

Wren raises her eyebrows. “Feel better?”

“Not yet.”

She walks over and stands right in front of me. “You know what you do when you’re not telling me the truth? Your left ear goes flat. Just the left one. It did it at the lookout, and it did it up there when James said the word ‘interior.’” She tilts her head. “It’s doing it now.”

I didn’t know that. She’s the first person to watch me closely enough to notice.

“He was close to it, wasn’t he?” she says. “Whatever you’re hiding.”

“The closure signs are only on the north side,” she says. “Three ‘Boundary marker repaired’ entries in the log. All in your handwriting.”

“Then there’s the blank on the old survey. The consultant puts his gold star right in it. James heads straight for it, and your left ear goes flat. Every time we get close, same ear.”

She looks up at me. “Whatever’s there is alive. Small enough to miss unless you know where to look. And you’ve been protecting it alone.”

My mouth opens, but nothing comes out. She’s worked all that out from signs and paperwork. My left ear flattens again. God help me.

I want to tell her. The words are right there. But this secret isn’t only mine. It belongs to creatures that can’t speak for themselves, and if I get this wrong, there’s no taking it back.

She lays her palm flat against my chest, right over my heart, and leaves it there. She has to feel it slamming.

“I’m not your enemy, Holt,” she says. “I know you think I’m here to take your forest away, but I’m not. I’m just trying to do my job. And I need your help to do it.”