Ashen Winter (Ashfall)

I would have liked, but at least we were out of sight of the barge.
    Darla started to fall, and I caught her again. I looked down and saw I’d stepped outside of Bikezilla’s track. We were leaving a clear trail despite our efforts to stay in the path.
    Darla fell once more before we made it to the top of the ridge. The woods were silent and still. On the mostly level ground at the top of the hill, Darla stretched out her pace, and we made better time. Maybe the jogging was warming her up, though she was still shivering. I rubbed my wet arm as we ran. I still couldn’t feel it.
    I stopped when we got to the massive, spreading oak in the clearing. “We can get off the path without leaving a trail here.”
    “How?” Darla asked.
    “That branch.” I pointed above our heads. “I’ll boost you up. We’ll crawl along it to the trunk, climb around, and crawl out another branch on the far side.”
    “G-g-good idea.”
    I wasn’t so sure it was a good idea. If Darla fell and hurt herself, it would be a disastrously bad idea. And I’d never been much of a tree climber—I don’t like heights. “Can you do it?”
    Darla just nodded, shivering.
    I squatted and grabbed Darla by her thighs. Water squished out of her coveralls onto my coat. I lifted her high enough that all she had to do was flop her arms over the branch to hang by her armpits. She kicked out—I had to duck to save my head—and got one leg up over the branch. Then she swung herself up on top of it and started dragging herself toward the trunk, inchworm-style.
    I jumped and grabbed the branch in both hands, facing away from Darla. I swung my legs back and forth a few times, working up momentum, and threw them up and around the branch. Then I just had to roll over, pulling myself to the top of the tree limb. Darla was already about halfway to the trunk. I dragged myself along behind her.
    “There’s a great view from back here,” I said.
    “Q-quit looking!” Darla snapped, but I could hear a hint of a smile in her voice. Maybe my stupid joke had worked. I needed something, anything, to distract from the desperation building in my gut.
    Darla stopped at the oak’s huge trunk. “There’s no way to climb around.”
    “What about up to that fork in the tree?” I asked.
    “Maybe. I might need a boost.”
    Darla wasn’t stuttering or shivering as much. I hoped that was a good sign. I let my legs dangle over either side of the icy branch and scooched over to help. She sat up and threw one knee up on the branch and reached to try to get a handhold in the fork of the tree. I held her waist, trying to keep her steady. Darla stood up on the branch so she could reach farther into the fork. “Push me up.”
    I put my palms under her butt and shoved. She pulled herself upward until her chest was wedged into the split in the tree. She rested there for a moment and then pulled herself the rest of the way up.
    “There’s a branch here that goes the right way,” Darla said. “We can get at least another thirty feet from the path.”
    “Okay, good. I’m coming up.” I pulled my knees onto the branch. Standing was tricky. I got one foot flat on the ice-coated branch, but I felt wobbly. I stood, trying to keep the unsteadiness in my knees under control and clinging to the trunk. I wasn’t that far off the ground—maybe ten or twelve feet. There was no real reason to be scared. I focused on the tree trunk and tried to get my breathing under control. In through the nose, out through the mouth—like I’d use for a sparring match in taekwondo.
    I reached and got a grip on the fork in the tree. I bent my knees to jump and give myself a head start on pulling myself up, but I slipped—and suddenly I was dangling, my feet clawing futilely at the air.

Chapter 20
    I kicked out, bashing my toes against the tree trunk. Feet scrabbling against the trunk, I tried to pull myself onto the branch. I didn’t have a solid grip on the fork in the tree; my fingers were slipping on the icy bark. Darla’s hands wrapped around my left wrist and hauled upward. I strained, pulling myself up until my chest was wedged in the fork. Darla was sitting on a slightly higher branch, reaching down to help me.
    “Thanks,” I grunted.
    Darla turned and started inching away from the trunk on the new branch, saying, “I think this branch will work best.” I scrambled to follow her.
    The end of the new branch looked none too safe. It was more than fifteen feet above the ground,