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Just had to chase down my wife, apparently. Because as soon as I’d confirmed that Sora was gone, so was she.
It is a good thing I am a healthy young male, I thought, clenching my fangs and shoving the broken hinge into my pocket, otherwise I am not sure I would survive this.
There was no time to hammer the hinge back into shape now. I used some spare rope I had looped around my arm to secure the side of the gate enough so that it would at least swing shut.
Before it closed all the way, I slipped through and sprinted for Darcy.
15
DARCY
Once out of the gate, I didn’t run long. There wasn’t much of anywhere left to go. Beyond the far fence of Fallon’s property sprang up scraggly trees that slowed me down, and a lick of lightning through the air illuminated a creek, swollen from the heavy rain, rushing in an inky line ahead.
On the other side of that creek?
Sora and the calf.
Shit.
Fumbling around in the slick dark, I grabbed at a metre-long stick, using it to probe the creek and test the depth. It wasn’t much deeper than a metre – at least where I could reach – and despite the cacophony of thunder and water sounds, the creek wasn’t moving so rapidly that the stick got yanked out of my hand.
Another flash of lightning showed Sora cantering back and forth in front of the calf. She appeared to see me, and gave two frantic barks.
I can make it.
There wasn’t even a question in my mind. I could do it. I would do it.
I didn’t spare a thought for the fact that wading through water in the middle of a thunderstorm was possibly the worst idea I’d ever had. It could be cold, or deeper than it looked in the middle, or faster than my now-wobbly legs were prepared for. Not to mention being in water during lightning.
But literally not a single bit of that mattered. Because Sora and the calf were over there, and they were scared, and maybe Maple had been scared, too, and I couldn’t just turn around, I couldn’t just leave. Fallon had to fix his gate.
I had to fix this.
Sucking in a breath, I waded into the water. I kept hold of my big stick, using it as a support as I shakily put one foot in front of the other. The water was cold as fuck, but it wasn’t going to wash me away, at least.
It did get deeper, though. Past my waist in the middle. My breath hissed. My skin hurt and then went numb. My legs threatened to give out. But they didn’t. I shoved my way through the water until, gradually, then all at once, it was only knee high.
Sora bounded up to me, leaping about, giving worried little yips and yelps.
“It’s alright, girl. I got you,” I said through chattering teeth, petting her half-blindly in the storm-black night. My tingling fingers seized upon something in her mouth. Rope.
“Drop it!” I said. Thankfully, she did so, maybe recognizing some of the authority I’d tried to infuse my voice with even if she didn’t know the language. Last thing I needed right now was some doggy-Darcy tug-o’-war.
The soaked rope in my hands, I spun and squinted at the calf.
“Please don’t kick me,” I muttered, throwing a loop of rope around its midsection and doing my best to tie it there. There wasn’t enough rope to leave a leash at the end, but I was too scared to tie it around the calf’s narrower neck in case it got too tight.
“Alright, friends. Here’s what we’re going to do,” I said, trying to keep my voice calm. “Your daddy Fallon is fixing the fence right now and we are on our own. So we are going to get across that water. It might be a little deeper than when you first crossed it, but we’ll make it.”
Both the creatures were pretty fucking big, even the calf. Their heads would be above water the whole time, as long as we didn’t wait much longer. The rain hadn’t let up one bit. As far as I could tell in the darkness, there wasn’t a better place to cross or any easy way to go around.
“OK! Time to go!” I said, grasping the loop of rope around the calf’s middle and shoving my other hand into Sora’s fur. I started walking, and thank the lord, they both came with me. But when we got to the water’s edge, the calf balked.
“Oh, crap, come on,” I muttered, pulling on the rope. “We can’t stay here, little buddy!”
Luckily, Sora seemed to know what needed to be done. She wrenched out of my hold and got behind the calf, giving loud barks in rapid succession that sent the calf startling forwards.
“You are the best fucking dog in the universe, Sora,” I muttered with appreciation as the three of us splashed forward into the water.
