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She fell like a rock, doard the crashing waves Just like in the dreas were already filled ater The board tu leaf

Tally closed her eyes, waiting for the shattering irabbed her by the wrists and yanked her up cruelly, spinning her in the air Her shoulders screays

Tally opened her eyes and blinked She was being lowered onto the hoverboard, which waited rock-steady just above the water

"What the?" she wondered aloud Then, as her feet came to rest, Tally realized what had happened

The river had caught her It had been du rivers lasted, and the board’s nets had found purchase just in time

"Saved, more or less," Tallycaught by the crash bracelets, and wondered how far you had to fall before the bracelets would rip your arms out of their sockets

But she’dits way into the snowcapped mountains Tally shivered in the ocean breeze and pulled her soggy jacket tighter around her

"’Four days later take the side you despise,’" she quoted Shay’s note "Four days Might as well get started"

After her first sunburn, Tally stuck a sunblock patch onto her skin everyat dawn But even with only a few hours in the sun each day, her already brown arain tasted as good as it had that first tied froBol breakfasts, around sunset, when the ain She almost wished she would run out of the stuff and be forced to either catch a fish and cook it, or sily-fat the hard way

What Tally really dreaded was running out of toilet paper Her only roll was already half-gone, and she rationed it strictly now, counting the sheets And every day, she smelled a little worse

On the third day up the river, she decided to take a bath

Tally awoke, an hour before sunset as usual, feeling sticky inside the sleeping bag She’d washed her clothes thatinto clean clothes with dirty skin made her flesh crawl

The water in the river was fast- in the muck-trap of the purifier, which h, probably fed byhtly less freezing late in the day, after the sun had had a chance to warm it up

The survival kit did have soap, it turned out - a few disposable packets tucked into a corner of the knapsack Tally clenched one in her hand as she stood at the edge of the river, wearing nothing but the sensor clipped to her belly ring, shivering in the cool breeze

"Here we go," she said, trying to keep her teeth fro

She put one foot in and ju Apparently, there would be no easing slowly into the water She had to take a running ju for a good place to leap in, slowly gathering her courage

She realized she’d never been naked outside before In the city, everywhere outdoors was public, but she hadn’t seen another hu to her Even in the cool air, the sun felt wonderful on her skin

She clenched her teeth and faced the river Standing here pondering the asn’t going to get her clean Just a few steps and a leap, and gravity would do the rest

She counted down from five, then counted down from ten, neither of which worked Then she realized that she was getting cold just standing there

Finally, Tally ju water closed like a fist around her It paralyzed everyclaws For a moment, Tally wondered how she would make it back to shore Maybe she would just expire here, slipping under the icy water forever

She took a deep, shuddering breath, re herself that the people before the Rustiesstreams all the ti, and dipped her head under the water and out, whipping wet hair onto her back

A few nited in her stomach, as if the icy water had activated soy within her body Her eyes opened wide, and she found herself whooping with excitehts’ travel inland, see the last rays of the setting sun Tally’s heart pounded fiercely, her blood spreading unexpected wary was burning quickly She fuers, across her skin, and into her hair Another dunking and she was ready to get out

Looking back at the shore, Tally realized that she’d been carried away from her camp by the river’s current She swaed toward the rocky shore

Waist-high in the water, already shivering fro thatSo