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She nodded once and began unfastening the girl’s outer coat, wrapping it around her more tightly.
Thomas turned to Farkas, who still clutched the box beneath his coat. “Can you manage it across?”
“I build things,” Farkas whispered. “I don’t swim laps.”
“I’ll help him,” Egret said before anyone else could speak. His voice was low but not unkind. “Just don’t drop that box.”
Rather than watch another battle ensue, I offered, “Why don’t you help Thomas? I’ll take the doctor?”
Farkas said nothing, but his arms seemed to relax their grip around the box with my words. Egret glared so long I thought he would object, then nodded once and shuffled to stand beside Thomas.
I scanned the team, memorizing their faces in this moment—their breath visible in the cold, their eyes drawn and tired, their limbs heavy with exhaustion. We were here. We were still together. That counted for something.
Maybe everything.
Thomas nodded to me.
And we began to move.
59
Thomas
Onebyone,thebrush gave way to frozen mud, then to stones, then to the slick banks of the Rába. The water was darker up close—thicker, deeper somehow—but it didn’t roar. It didn’t resist. It just waited.
The first step into the Rába stole my breath.
It was like stepping into a grave, the water clutching at my legs with a frozen grip that seemed to whisper, “You don’t belong here.” It crawled up my thighs as I moved forward, biting deep through layers of fabric until there was no more distinction between flesh and icy ache. The current wasn’t strong, but it wasn’t still either. It pushed and nudged, like it wanted us to turn back.
But we didn’t.
We moved in a line.
Sparrow held Eszter’s hand. Egret supported me, bracing my good arm. Will trudged by Farkas’s side, the stubborn man refusing to reach out, both arms wrapped around his precious package.
The moon peeked through a crack in the clouds just long enough to paint the water silver, then disappeared again, as if ashamed to bear witness.
A third of the way across, the river rose to my waist. My coat dragged, soaked and heavy. My wound burned beneath the chill, each movement a punishment.
We were halfway across when the world shattered.
I froze.
The others didn’t notice, still pushing forward.
I raised a fist.
A voice drifted through the dark.
Speaking Russian.
It wasn’t yelling. It wasn’t close. But it felt wrong.
It was casual, conversational, too relaxed for a man on watch.
Which meant the speaker didn’t think anyone was here.
Yet.