He nods once as if to tell me he’s found me, and that I’ll be okay, then jerks his head toward the dock, where a small gap of air hovers between the top of the river and the bottom of the wooden planks. My lungs are throbbing now, begging for me to take a breath. I kick my legs, struggling to move forward, but my right arm makes it difficult to swim against the current.

Quinn wraps his fingers around my left wrist and moves through the water with the same effortless grace he uses on land. I kick my feet to help propel us along, but he’s doing most of the work. My lungs ache with the need for air. Just when I’m sure I’m going to have to let the gritty water gush down my throat, we surface beneath the dock.

I gasp for air, and when that doesn’t satisfy my aching lungs, I gasp again. Quinn’s chest is heaving as well. He keeps his fingers around my wrist as boots race down the dock and men jump into the water. Judging from the length of time they swim away from the dock before plunging below the surface, the current has dragged the wagon a good forty-five yards from where we first went in.

Close to the shoreline, the donkeys’ heads bob as they swim for dry land. Someone must have cut them loose. I hope that someone also pulled Heidi to the surface.

“We can’t stay here,” Quinn says quietly, scanning our surroundings. “They’re still searching for you by the wagon. We can use the confusion to swim beneath the dock until we reach shore and then run into the forest.”

Above us, more boots tromp down the dock, but these men don’t jump into the water. I meet Quinn’s eyes and slowly shake my head.

We can’t get away. If we try to escape into the forest at the edge of the dock, the men above will see us, and I’m in no shape to run away. Worse, they’ll see that Quinn survived the fall into the river, and they’ll hunt him down as well. I can tell by his labored breathing that he still hasn’t recovered from the smoke inhalation he suffered in the fires Ian set. He won’t be able to outrun healthy trackers either.

Our only option is to swim to the opposite shore, something that would be difficult to accomplish even if we weren’t also trying to hide from any trackers who remain stationed on the boat’s upper deck. I can barely swim on my own. The weight of the armor and my useless right arm make it impossible to fight the current for more than a few seconds. Quinn would have to pull me, and it’s clear that pulling me once has already taken a huge toll.

We can’t get away. But Quinn can. He can make it to shore undetected. Especially if I provide the distraction. If they think he’s dead, they’ll stop hunting him.

Besides, I have to go to Rowansmark. Quinn will understand. He’ll have to. I can’t turn back now.

“Rachel.” Quinn’s voice is hushed. “We can’t stay here.”

I meet his eyes. “No, you can’t.”

Something like fear flashes across his normally stoic expression, and the grip on my hand becomes almost painfully tight. “I said we. We can’t stay here.”

Splashes and shouting echo across the river. I guess they’ve realized I’m not near the sunken wagon.

“I can’t swim to safety,” I say, and he’s already shaking his head.

“I’ll pull you.”

“You can barely pull yourself.”

“I can do what needs to be done. Trust me. Please.” His voice is still hushed, still barely a whisper above the slap of the river against the pillars that hold the dock in place, but there’s an intensity to it that pulls at me.

I understand that intensity. That need to fix something because if you don’t, it’s one more failure to shackle you to the darkness you’re trying to outrun. I raise my injured arm and press my hand to his cheek.

“You don’t have to save me, Quinn.”

His eyes are desperate. “Yes, I do.”

I shake my head. “I don’t need to be saved. I’m choosing to stay here. To get on the boat. I’m choosing this, Quinn. I want you to leave me behind.”

“Why?” The harsh emotion in his voice, so rare for him, makes me ache.

“Because James Rowan has the ability to summon an entire army of the beasts. An army. You can go back to Lankenshire and warn Logan, but I still have to go inside, find the stash of weaponized tech, and destroy it, because, otherwise, we’re never going to be out of danger.”

A donkey brays from the shoreline, and I glance over my shoulder to see trackers swimming toward the animals. More trackers are heading back toward the dock. We have less than a minute before they’ll be close enough to see that Quinn is still alive.

I turn back to Quinn. “Go. I’m not going to lose another person I care about. You’ve saved me several times already. It’s my turn to repay the favor.”

His jaw flexes. “You don’t need to save me.”

“Oh, so now you’re the only one with the right to make sacrifices for your friends? Don’t be insulting.”

“Don’t be stubborn.”

“I don’t think I know how to be anything but stubborn.”

He looks at the approaching trackers, and sinks a little closer to the surface of the water. “I can’t just leave you.”

“You have to. You once told me there was a difference between being a weapon and being a warrior. And you showed me that sometimes doing the right thing costs us almost everything.” My hand lingers on his cheek for another second, and then I drop it and step back, my feet sinking in the rough silt beneath me. “I’m choosing to be a warrior, Quinn. I’m choosing to do the right thing. You of all people know better than to say I shouldn’t do what needs to be done.”