Chapter 17

Samara

I stumble backwards, my hands desperately reaching out and catching, scraping on a rocky outcropping. I hold on, steadying myself, and scramble back to my feet.

"Thorn!" My voice is hoarse from screaming, and each cry of his name is like razor blades over my throat, "Thorn! Where are you?"

All I can see is the huge dark mass of the grizzly, the lolling face with the enormous teeth and the weight of it slumped over some rocks. I race forward, heaving with each breath.

My heart pounds throughout my body, I can feel it in my head and on my tongue and in my shaking hands.

Where is Thorn? I can't see him anywhere. All I can see is the bear and if I don't see a part of him soon, I-… I can't pull enough air into my lungs. I gasp and choke around the frigid mountain wind as I climb closer.

This panic is like nothing I've ever felt, it steals the air out of the atmosphere and the warmth from my body and the very thoughts from my brain. I'm possessed by terror, owned by it.

God… Fuck. Thorn.

I see the body of the bear, still and silent, and realize that…Thorn's under the bear. How heavy is it? Can he even breathe? I don't have the time to consider it.

I hurl myself at the side of the stomach, shrieking with the effort to move it just an inch.

There's a little give, but it has to be hundreds of pounds more than me, and I'm shaking so badly that I can't get good traction on the ground.

All I can think about is Thorn.

Thorn stuck under it. Thorn bleeding. Thorn screaming when the monster clamped down on his arm, when it slashed at his chest.

I'm not letting this thing take him.

I didn't step back and watch during the fight, and I'm not going to now.

The bear moves, and I switch from using my hands to putting my back against it and shoving off from my legs with every bit of strength I have. It topples backwards, and the weight of it helps it roll a little more. I slip in the kicked-up dirt and grass, the mud that's the result of both his and the bears blood, and nearly fall on top of Thorn.

He's here, he's-….

"Thorn!" My voice croaks out. "No, no, no. Thorn! Oh my God!"

I can't even see his wounds beneath all the blood and dirt, and I'm not even sure which of it belongs to him and which the bear. I make out his face, stained, tight with pain, his eyes squeezed shut.

"Thorn!" I reach down, gulping in huge breaths as I pull him up, away from the carcass and towards me, his head lolling in my lap. "Wake up, wake up. Please… Thorn-"

A wheezing breath shakes out of him. I grasp blindly for his pulse under his jaw and feel a faint thrumming beneath my fingertips.

He's not dead. He's not dead. Not dead.

It becomes like a mantra in my head, like a second heartbeat pounding throughout my body.

Tears spill down my cheeks, and I bend over him, my hands fluttering uselessly over his wrecked body.

Samara the nurse is gone. The nurse who'd held down the ICU with calm collection and quick thinking, the nurse who could be faced with buckets of blood and not blink.

Because this isn't a patient, this isn't work- It's Thorn. Thorn. My Thorn… and he's bleeding out in my lap and he just fought a bear for me, and I'm so relieved he's breathing but so scared at the blood that even now pools in my lap and turns into a puddle beneath us.

I cup his face, shaking his chin, pleading with him to open his eyes. I'm not even sure what I'm saying or if he can hear me but it's like a steady, sobbing stream out of me for him to wake up.

And Thorn does, his eyes clean green sticking out from the mess of filthy reds and browns, and his sight spins for a second before landing on me.

" Samara ," he gasps, as if my own name is difficult. "You… you did… not listen."

A tearful laugh shakes out of me. Only Thorn could be bossy at a time like this. "Impossible man… I wasn't going to leave you to take on a bear alone."

"Did it…for you," Thorn croaks out, and his words only make me sob harder.

Suddenly, I don't care that I was angry, I don't care that he lied, I almost lost him. All I care about is the paleness in his features, the dull color of his eyes. I grip at his neck again and again to keep convincing myself that he's not dead. He's not dead. He's not dead.

"God, Thorn," I sob. "I thought-… I thought you-…"

Thorn lifts his good hand and catches the stream of tears that pour down my cheeks against his thumb. His brows press together in concern.

I have the sense that he's barely with me now, his moss gaze glassy and distant. His hand drops, and his eyes roll back into his head.

I shout his name, once, twice, but he's out cold.

I need to fight through the panic, the gnawing, anguishing terror, and find the will to fix all this.

I force the terrified, worried Samara to retreat, and the nurse comes back in her place, my mind going into planning mode, attempting to view the situation and gain control.

Having him awake, even for just a moment, reassures me enough to fight back the tide of worry and focus on being useful.

I wipe my tears from my cheeks so that I can see better.

Thorn was responsive, that's good, but the pain in his body would have pulled him under eventually, and I'm glad that he's out because I'm going to have to bind his arm and chest and move him. It'll be excruciating.

I place his heavy head back on the ground and pull off my pack, frantically searching through it for my first aid field kit, filled with everything I had available at the camp.

I take some scraps of clean fabric, stretched out animal skins beaten to a thin texture, and bring his arm up so that I can wrap it.

Blood gushes from Thorn's forearm, where the lashes are long and deep, into the muscle. Some of them reach bone.

I know what all of this means but I don't let myself think it.

One thing at a time.

I wrap Thorn's arm tightly, tight enough that it might wake him and be painful, but to ensure that he doesn't lose too much blood.

His other arm is far better off, with only a couple scratches that need to be wrapped but nothing too deep.

His chest, however, is a crisscross of gouges and bites, and I press balled up fabric into it for a start. Nothing to the ribs, and no perforated organs. But the wounds are a deep, filthy mess oozing out blood in a steady stream.

The wrapping is trickier for his chest. I have to lift Thorn towards me, resting the considerable weight of his torso against my shoulders while I loop the strips around his chest and middle, tying it off on his back.

By the end, I'm panting like I've run a kilometer, and I'm just as soaked in sweat, blood, and grime as he is.

Once I'm certain everything is wrapped, I cast my gaze about for his pack.

I find it with the bear, torn through. I salvage what I can, using the larger strips of the tarp-like leather to make a quick sling for his arm.

I leave the bear untouched.

I know that Thorn's people would many uses for it, that they'd take apart the body, serve the meat, prepare the skins, that Ash and I would use the sinew for strings, that Storm would use some for more clothes.

A carcass like that would be like bringing Christmas back to the camp, but Thorn, bleeding still, passed out, is my priority, and with just my pack I can barely carry him. So, I leave it.

In the end, I can't lift Thorn fully off the ground.

Even though I'm one of the taller girls, all the men here tower over us, Thorn is built strong and solid, and now unconscious he's dead weight.

I have to drag him, so I loop my arms under his arms and haul him to the nearest tree-line.

In my mind, while I exert all the effort it takes to pull him towards cover, I make a mental list.

I have to clean his wounds. I have to stitch them and bind them again. I have to find some way to transport him in his state. And I have to find the trail again, I have to keep following the stranger.

Because Thorn will not survive if I don't get to that medicine, and I-

I stumble, crying out in frustration as I try not to drop his weight. I lift him once more, and continue on my journey, ignoring the trail of blood he leaves in his wake, ignoring how pale he is, how shallow his breathing has become.

I will not let Thorn die.

I can't let him die.

I drag Thorn down towards the forest, and the sun is already beginning to set by the time I set his prone body down and cast about for useful tools.

I need light to properly clean his wounds, but I also need it to make some sort of pallet or stretcher for me to carry him on.

With the orange light filtering through the pines, I decide to set aside my materials for now, and then focus on Thorn.

I take one of the bone knives I recovered from the bear carcass, Thorn's strongest ones, and cut down some large, heavy branches from the nearest tree. I'm already sweaty and drained from dragging him this far, and my arms burn as I reach up to chop through the thick wood, but I push through the stinging pain.

I have to get this done, the sooner I find the trail and then the medicine, the sooner Thorn is saved from infection.

Every moment I waste catching my breath or shaking out my sore muscles is another minute that brings him closer to death.

That's all the motivation I need.

Once I have two strong branches and some smaller to thread between them, I carry my pile of wood and make a spot beside Thorn and my pack.

Next up is a fire, which I make quickly and without much finesse, sparking some dried wood and letting it burn down while I turn my attentions to Thorn.

He's still unconscious, his face ghastly white and his brows drawn together, as though he's in pain even in sleep.

Sweat beads his forehead and the handsome swell of his upper lip, creating droplets of clean amidst the dirt and blood that covers him practically head to toe.

I have to undo all the work I did earlier, carefully unwrapping his shredded arm and chest. The dirtied fabrics I place in a small pot to boil along the fire so that I can use them later.

I cut through his leather shirt and toss it aside, the fabric so shredding from the attack that its basically useless.

With the dying light, I focus on the worst of his injuries, knowing that I'll have to see them well enough to clean and maybe stitch them up before the sun is completely gone.

The second the wrappings are stripped away, the reality of Thorn's wounds sets in. Faced with the torn flesh, the seeping blood, the glint of bone in his forearm, I have to fight the swell of nausea and panic that climbs up my throat.

I don't have enough sunlight to despair, to sob into his pained face and beg him not to leave me. I only have enough to keep working.

"You're a nurse, Samara," I need the reminder now, whispered under my breath. "You can do this."

I pull out my first aid and start with his arm.

I try to clean it as best I can with what I have on me. I know that the pine tea is antiseptic, so I flood some through the wounds, washing away the worst of the dirt and mud caked between the long gashes.

I have some fir that Ash recommended for scrapes, and some lavender salve that River said he used on Grace's burns, but those wounds are nothing compared to Thorn's.

The arm could be lost if I don't decide what to do, but I'm torn between wanting to stitch him up to stop the blood loss or leave the wounds open and packed with herbs to prevent infection.

In the end, I decide to leave the arm open and close the chest. Thorn's forearm wounds are the deepest, and the bear used filthy claws and teeth to shred at the muscle.

So, I throw everything I have at his arm.

I pack herbs and salves and clean fabric between the chunks of flayed flesh and then use the boiled fabric to tie it all back up.

Working on him staves off the panic, but it's like a massive tsunami rising up inside me.

I might be the most trained, I might have been one of the top performing nurses at my hospital, but I don't have any of my medicine or tools, I don't have the pristine hospital around me.

I'm covered in bear blood and Thorn's blood and dirt and sap, and I'm sitting on the forest floor. And I'm working on the one person I don't think I could survive losing.

It's like some huge cosmic joke, me knowing how to save him but not being able to do it.

With shaking fingers, I turn to his chest and thread a small bone needle with some animal sinew that Ash had been storing away. I wash out the long lacerations with more of my herb and tea mixture and get started.

Behind me, the sun had dipped below the top of the trees, and I have to tilt in certain directions to keep the remaining light trained on Thorn's chest instead of obscured by me.

At the second pass through of the needle through his skin, Thorn's eyelids begin to flutter.

"Samara," he rasps, and his good arm jerks at his side, reaching blindly until it catches on my leg.

"I'm here," I tell him.

I take a clean cloth and smooth away the sweat from his brow, the dried blood, until I can make out Thorn's handsome, pained face better, until he looks more like he should.

"My…chest," his hand flutters in my own, as if he was going to place it over his chest. Thankfully, I'm able to keep him from adding more dirt to the wounds. I bring his hand to my collar, warming his chilled fingers with my hot skin.

"I know it hurts," I soothe. "I'm stitching up the cuts. I'll be as fast as I can."

Thorn glances down, his reaction slow and delayed to the blood and gore on his own body. His head falls back again, and the column of his throat takes a difficult swallow.

In time, he meets my gaze again, "It is bad. You should leave it."

I startled laugh shakes out of me. "I'm not going to leave it. I'm going to patch you up. We're going to find that medicine and you're going to feel so much better when we do. I promise. A morphine shot from my time is going to blow your mind."

"Samara…" Thorn's brow furrows, and it seems to cause him some difficult to get the words out. "You should go… back to camp. Alone. I will not…I am not going to survive-"

"No!" The force of my own voice shocks us both. Thorn stares at me with wide green eyes while I give my head one furious, stubborn shake. "We're not going to even discuss it, understand? Nobody is leaving anyone, and I'm not going back to camp. I'm bringing you to that medicine."

"You are… too stubborn." His voice is hoarse, but for the moment, he seems too exhausted to argue anymore.

I bring that bloodied hand from my chest to my lips and press kisses along his scarred knuckles, knowing I'm just as filthy from the attack right now that he is, knowing that my tenderness will seem misplaced after I swore to hate his guts forever.

But I can't help myself.

I press his palm to my cheek, the way he'd held my face cupped in his hands so many times…days ago.

I need to keep reminding myself that he's alive, that he's here with me, that I pulled him out from under that bear and that we have a plan.

"I'm not leaving you," I tell him again, though my voice breaks this time, and my eyes are brimming with tears. Our fighting is so far away in my mind that it barely registers, like some distant squabble over something unimportant. All that matters is that we're together and we're both alive and I'm going to do everything in my power to keep him alive until we get to the cache. I tell myself that we'll fight when he's better, that we'll hash everything out when he's standing, and his arm is usable, and he can wave it around in his frustration. I refuse to consider any alternative. "Please don't ask me to."

Thorn's expression softens, and his thumb presses into my chin, the pressure so small but so meaningful.

I have no clue how hard it is right now for him to just do that. "I will not. My strong Samara."

A sob climbs up my throat and barely makes it across my lips before I clamp my teeth together. Crying doesn't help, crying doesn't fix anything, yet that tsunami wave is taking every single ounce of my strength to fight back.

I can't lose Thorn.

I won't allow it. I'll fight infection, I'll fight fever, I'll fight back death itself if I have to. I'm not letting him go when I've only just found him in this awful, dangerous future.

"My brave Thorn," I commend him. "Fighting a bear. It has to be the stupidest thing you've ever done."

"It is the…second stupidest thing I've done," he heaves a sigh. "First was lying…to you."

I cling to his hand, my breath shaking in my tight chest. "When did you figure that one out?"

"With a bear's claw…over my heart," Thorn's teeth begin to chatter, and his hand shudders in my own. He's going into shock, by the look of things, which means I have to get my work done quickly and then bundle him up.

"I'm almost done," I tell him, tucking his good arm back against his aside and washing my hands off again.

I pick up the needle and resume my stitching, and Thorn floats in and out of consciousness.

When he's present, he keeps his eyes pressed tight against the pain of the needle, his breathing labored, jaw rigid.

When he's asleep, his face only relaxes some, but I can get more done without feeling the anguished tightening of his muscles beneath my hands.

I've never had to suture someone without numbing before, and I have to fight through the awful guilt that tastes like bile when every stitch causes him pain, when every pass of my needle through his flayed, red flesh feels like a knife into my own heart too.

When it's done, I apply more herbs and wrap him back up, and in the expansive darkness of the forest, I work on the stretcher.

I don't sleep.

I continually check on Thorn, forcing him to drink tea, adding more furs on top of him when he shakes so violently with cold and shock that I'm worried he'll crack his teeth, preparing more clean fabric and salve and herb mixtures for the days ahead, making a pot of bone broth for him to eat in the morning.

By the time the sun rises, my eyes burn from pouring over details all night, and exhaustion is a droplet in the sea of worry that makes up my emotions.

Just like Thorn and I's fight, I'll deal with it later.

I drag Thorn onto the stretcher, which holds up pretty well given that it's made of furs tightened between two long sticks, and then we set off back up the mountain to look for footprints.