Ashes, Ashes Read Online Free Page A

sharp grasses, running, like a panicked rabbit, in a crooked line, until she was pushing through dense and prickly bushes, ignoring the barbs that caught and tore her skin and snagged her clothes. She secreted herself behind the nearest tree—a pine, wind-battered and salt-poisoned, with rough, shaggy bark, and no branches low enough or strong enough to hoist herself up on. The rain drove into her eyes. She wiped a streaming hand across her face. Her water bottles tugged at her neck. She lifted the rope over her head and hurriedly stowed the bottles under a nearby shrub. Her grip on her knife was slippery, and she rubbed her hand uselessly on her wet pants to dry the moisture from it. She tightened her grasp and leaned her forehead against the tree, trying to catch her breath. She had a cramp in her side and she kneaded it with one bunched fist. Pressing her body against the coarse bark, she squinted her eyes against the drizzle to make out the shapes of the dogs.
    The throng broke apart, dozens of dogs fanning out and then coming back together as they caught a trace of her along the lakeshore. The moonlight made shadows everywhere. They had definitely found her trail. The rain might slow them down a little, the puddles she had sloshed through would mask her scent, but they were serious about tracking her and unlikely to give up. She could hear the heavy panting and excited bursts of barking as they called to one another, like the high-pitched yelps of puppies scuffling over a bone. They were so close.
    Lucy forced herself to leave the comforting solidity of the tree and move backward, as quietly as she could, sliding her feet through the mush of wet leaves. She took shallow breaths, darting quick glances over her shoulder, making for the place where the trees grew thickest. Black shapes wove back and forth, just beyond the pines in front of her, as the dogs tried to pick up her scent on the wet ground. She crept toward a cluster of pine, elm, willow, and leggy maples. The tall trees stood trembling; water cascaded down from their branches. She backed against the smooth trunk of an elm, the biggest tree in the glade. Too high overhead, wide branches spread out against the dark, fractured sky. The moon was directly above her. She hunkered down, listening to the sounds of the dogs coming ever closer. She held her knife in both hands, the blade pointing straight out in front of her. She’d kill at least one or two before they savaged her. The cramp was back again, jabbing into her side with a ferocity that made her wince; her lungs felt starved of oxygen; her heartbeat echoed in her ears. Then the crack of a branch snapping, loud as a gunshot, made her look up.

CHAPTER TWO
THE DOGS
    W hat are you waiting for? Come on, grab it!” hissed a low voice. A hand dangled a few feet above Lucy’s head. She blinked against the rain streaming into her eyes. Long fingers waggled. The rest of the person was shrouded in shadow. She stumbled backward, brandishing the knife. Behind her, at the perimeter of the small wood, the barks coalesced into a uniform baying and delighted howls, and she heard the sound of many bodies plowing through the undergrowth. They had found her.
    The person made an annoyed explosive sound halfway between a curse and a grunt. “Well?”
    She could tell it was a male voice. The hand gestured impatiently. “I can’t hold on much longer. Are you coming or what? Do you want to be dog food?” She took one last look over her shoulder and jumped for the hand. Her fingers grabbed and slipped. The branch bucked under their weight. For a brief moment before she dropped to the ground, she saw his eyes—light-colored, not the bloody red eyes of the S’ans.
    He grunted again. “And put that pig-sticker away before you cut off my nose. You’re going to have to help yourself get up here, you know. I’m barely hanging on.” Lucy hesitated; she didn’t think the branch would hold them both. He leaned farther forward.