Ashen Winter (Ashfall)

my left relax for a moment. But I sagged into the road. The ice tore at my backpack, jerking it so hard that something ripped and my fingers were pulled from the strut. In less time than it took to blink, I twisted through a 180-degree turn. My right leg bent at an impossible angle, and the spike of pain forced a moan from my lips. My left boot dragged against the ground. I strained to raise it. I craned my neck as my back dragged, trying to keep my head off the road. The truck pulled me along by my right ankle, which was still jammed between the spare and the undercarriage. Something fell out of my backpack, and I snapped my head back just in time to see the twin rear wheels of the truck bump over my sleeping bag and rifle. Not good.
    I froze, despite the bone-jarring ride. The huge wheels that had just flattened my gear were less than a foot from my head.

Chapter 41
    I moaned, not knowing or caring if the Peckerwoods in the cab could hear. My right knee was twisted at a terrible angle. I strained to keep my leg bent—if I relaxed it, I was afraid my leg would be wrenched apart at the knee.
    The wheels crunched through the snow inches from my face. Pellets of ice peppered my neck. The engine’s roar was all-consuming, inevitable in its bass growl. I groped frantically, trying to grab something, anything.
    I got my fingers hooked around the other side of the spare tire and pulled. The instant my body was off the road, the bone-rattling shaking eased. I planted my left foot against the strut and tried to straighten my right leg. I was finally able to straighten my ankle, easing the pressure on my knee.
    I was still terrifyingly close to the deuce’s rear wheels, clinging to the spare tire like a spider. I had to move—if I slipped, I’d be crushed.
    I groped blindly to my right, toward the center of the truck. My glove touched a spinning shaft. It threw my hand down against the road, wrenching my arm. I snatched my arm back and flexed my fingers experimentally. My whole arm hurt, but everything seemed to work.
    When I reached out again, I moved more slowly, trying to see what I was grabbing. The underside of the truck was a chaotic mess of parts spinning furiously in the dimness. I reached up past a U-beam, my right hand inches from the whirling driveshaft, and grabbed some kind of strut. Slowly I inched sideways, sliding my left hand to join the right. That moved my head out from the path of the rear tires, although now I was perilously close to the driveshaft.
    I didn’t think I could hold on to the bottom of the truck much longer. I needed to get inside the truck, where I could rest. I worked my way toward the back, moving only one hand or foot at a time. The pain of my tortured muscles was excruciating—it felt like they were burning up under my skin. Tears leaked from my eyes, dried instantly by the whipping wind. I longed to let go. But every time my fingers slipped, I thought of Darla. This truck would take me to her, but only if I held on.
    I slid under the first rear axle, clinging to it with my hands and dropping a few crucial inches closer to the road. My pack dragged, and more of my supplies flew out the top. Moving one hand or foot at a time, I slowly pulled myself under the second rear axle to the back of the truck. My muscles had become ribbons of fire, scarcely holding my battered skeleton together. My butt had been dragging—it felt like everyone at my dojang had practiced round kicks on it for an hour instead of using the punching bags.
    I got a grip on the truck’s tiny rear bumper and tried to pull myself up. My feet fell and were whipped from under me. Now I was hanging from the back of the truck, my body dragging behind it. I bent my arms, pulling myself upward, groaning through clenched teeth with the effort.
    I couldn’t climb into the load bed. The canvas cover was tied too tightly. I groped for my knife, breathing a sigh of relief when I found it still on my belt. Clutching the knife, I stabbed upward, cutting a slit about two feet wide in the canvas. I heaved myself over the gate, sliding through the hole I’d made.
    I collapsed into the darkness inside the truck. My arms trembled spastically. Something sharp dug into my side—one of the spare truck parts the Cascade Peckerwoods had loaded into the truck, maybe. I tried to breathe deeply, gulping air, but that didn’t help—there was a vague rotted scent in the air that nauseated me. I jammed my head through the slit in the