Sweat trickles down the back of my neck, between my shoulder blades. It ain’t just hot; it’s humid, like heaven’s dropped a hot, wet towel over the world. I take another long sip from my canteen, becoming more and more aware of a fogginess inside my brain. A tingling.
Pete snaps his compass shut. The signal to rise.
With backpacks clinking, we take to the trail again.
Pete finds another trail—a narrow passage between the firs—and keeps a steady pace. Soon we fall into a rhythm, and I figure that we’re marching.
Left, right. Left, right.
Step, step, step.
Pete, Will, Frankie, me.
And Butch.
That goof trots easily alongside me, stopping every so often to cock a leg or lap creek water or bite at flies that float around his muzzle. He sniffs at the base of one of those dark trees, then bounds off to the top of the rise in front of us, scouting ahead.
The ground rises under us; Apple Creek is falling away. We are coming into rocky hills.
Midafternoon now. The day is hot, silent, still. The straps from my pack dig deep into my shoulders. The air feels thick and close, like there ain’t another soul for miles.
Butch waits for us at the top of the rise. There Pete suddenly stops.
“Son of a gun.”
Below in the creek stands a boy. The hem of his long cotton shirt trails in the current. He’s got a pole in one hand and a burlap sack slung over the opposite shoulder.
He wears a wide, floppy hat made of black felt, and it covers most of his face and shoulders.
Even so, I know who it is, and I begin to feel dizzy.
It’s Caleb Madliner.
He wades slowly through Apple Creek. Every few steps he tests the bottom with that pole, putting one end down, tapping, feeling, searching.
“What is he doing out here?” Will whispers.
Nobody answers. Nobody knows.
I feel like someone’s punched me in the gut. Caleb Madliner is here. The boy who wanted to kill my dog. I reach for Butch’s collar, hold him close.
Frankie squints. “What’s he doing with that stick? Is he looking for something?”
My heart jumps. All at once I know that’s exactly what he’s doing. He’s plumbing the streambed, feeling for anything metal. Caleb Madliner is looking for our fighter jet.
Looking to my brothers, I can tell by their faces they’ve had the same thought.
“So it’s a race,” Pete says quietly. A thin smile tugs at the corners of his mouth.
My rage boils over. “Doggone it, I don’t wanna race Caleb Madliner!”
“Shh!” Will hisses. “Too bad. We already are. Nothing to do now but win it.”
He looks at Pete. “Think we can sneak past?”
“We can try,” Pete says. “Go cross-country and try to get out ahead of him. We’ll lose time. It won’t be easy.”
“Let’s do it,” Frankie says then.
Pete’s thin smile breaks into a grin. Without a word, he turns and heads into the trees.
The pack on my shoulders feels full of bricks. But there’s a new fire burning in my chest and legs now. Caleb Madliner is hunting our treasure, the thing that can save Pete. And there’s no way in the world I’ll let him beat us to it.
Pete sets a faster pace now, and nobody talks as Apple Creek falls farther and farther behind us.
There is no trail, no path. We crash through a patch of skunk cabbage, fat, rubbery leaves slapping at our legs and a horrible scent hanging over us. Will cusses and Frankie covers his nose at the stench, but I’m too fired up to care about their stink.
After the skunk cabbage come the stinging nettles. I can’t ignore those. Fiery pinpricks stab our legs like needles. Tiny white splotches appear on our skin where we’ve brushed up against the poison plants. When we come out of it at last, our legs are on fire.
Frankie collapses against a tree, wincing back tears and rubbing his calves. Will finds a stand of jewelweed and, quick as we can, we cut ourselves stalks of it and rub the clear liquid juice down our throbbing legs. The pain lessens, the fire dying down to coals.
“I ever mention how much I hate Caleb Madliner?” Will says.
You’re not supposed to hate anyone, and in his heart I doubt Will really means it. But truth be told, in that moment I feel the same way. When we start again, Pete takes us at a slower pace.
An hour. Two hours.
We go until that ball of white sun overhead begins burning orange and sinks a little lower in the sky. Pete calls a halt then, and he and Will look over the map once more.
“How you holding up?” I whisper to Frankie.