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Chapter 36

    After about four or five hours of walking, when the sun is starting to sink, driving fading golden rays through the low clouds and fog, there's a monumental crack, somewhere ahead of us. It splits the air like a gunshot, resonating through the mountain, all the way back to me and Stone, echoing over and over. Then theres the sound of crumbling stone, of rock hitting rock, from the same place. That can't be good.
    "Avalanche!" Stone yells over the concussive beating, and he pulls me over to the wall of the mountain. He holds me tightly to him, while we wait for the thunderous pounding to cease. I look him over, and am surprised at how the past three days has changed him.
    He's wearing his gloves again, so he doesn't spear me whenever he touches me with his short black wolf-claws. I realize how lucky I am that mine retract beneath my nails.
    His once white billowy shirt is stained red and brown with blood and dirt, and mud made by the blood and dirt. Particularly in the spot where I stabbed him with a bread knife. But there's also blood staining his sleeves from when we tried to heal Bow... At least, I hope that's what it's from.
    The knees of his shorts are brown and gray and red with dust and blood, and the hem of my skirt is ragged and torn from our adventures through the Wold, the white stained with dirt and whatever else we've crossed on our journey.
    But we're not going to a fashion show on top of the mountain. I doubt the rebels will care whether we come in rags or armor, so long as we get there alive. At this rate, they're going to need all the help they can get. That's if they exist at all...
    The thundering from ahead finally stops, and, cautiously, we venture forward, trying to peer around the bend of the mountain.
    "That's going to be a problem..." Stone murmurs beside me. I shrug, and step forward, right up to the edge of gaping abyss the path has just collapsed into.
    "Careful!" Stone cries, as I lean a little too far over, gazing in awe down to the jagged base of the mountain far below, hundreds and hundreds of feet... Maybe, dare I say it, a mile down, almost completely hidden by the low clouds passing below us. Yes, the clouds are passing by below us.
    My foot slips slightly, but this time Stone's there, and he grabs my arm firmly, holding me and pulling me back from the edge.
    "The avalanche wiped out the paths below us too..." I murmur in awe, still gazing wide-eyed down to the forest below. I can't believe we climbed that high in only three and a half days... Even as I stare, we seem to be getting further and further from the earth below, as if the mountain is growing...
    "Yeah. That means that anybody on the other side of the paths below isn't coming up." Stone says, but I know he doesn't want to add that, if they're high enough, they're not going back down anymore.
    "So is everybody on this side of this path." I say, looking out at the huge gap in the path. Along the wall of the mountain, there's nothing but raw, smooth stone, not even a ridge left to sidle along. The gap itself is probably twenty, twenty-five feet, perhaps even more. I think about all those families behind us, all those small children, lives so short... Unless they can fly, which I'm certain only about one of the remaining families can, they're trapped...
    "There has to be something we can do..." I murmur in despair, another, terrifying thought hitting me. We can't get over either. I hadn't even considered that. Me and Stone are trapped as well. We've come all this way, done so much, witnessed so much, survived countless things that should have been our end... All for this. 
    "I- I don't think there's anything..." Stone says, his eyes betraying how he feels like I look, with my shoulders sagged and my head drooping. No. No, no, nonononono... It can't just end here. There has to be another way... "It's over, Ash. We tried. We did everything humanly-and inhumanly, possible. But we can't beat mother nature herself."
    "No!" I say sharply, raising my head to look him in the eye, although he's at least five inches taller than me, so I'm looking up at an almost painful angle, we're so close. He raises an eyebrow at me, an unasked question ringing in the air.
    "No!" I say again, shaking my head. It can't be the end. This can't be it. Not after all we've been through... The rebels need us, I try to convince myself. Unwarranted, my subconsciousness cuts in; What about all the other families behind me? Do the rebels need them?"
    "Ash-" Stone begins, putting a hand on my shoulder. I hate to say it, but he looks almost relieved-eager, even, not to be going to the rebels after all. I glare at him through narrowed eyes, and he withdraws his hand, the other impulsively darting to the knife wound on his arm.
    "This can't be the end. This isn't the end," I mutter, more to myself than him, and I begin to back slowly away down the path, still facing the gap.
    "Ash," Stone says warningly, seeing what I'm planning to do.
    "I'm jumping." I declare unnecessarily, stopping a good thirty feet down the path. The mountain is still so wide the bend is barely clear, even at this distance, so I have an almost perfectly straight runway, ending in a twenty foot pit.
    "No. No! You can't jump i-"
    "I know I can't," I snap. "But it's better than rotting here."
    "Ash-" Stone cries as I tense and prepare myself to die. He charges at me, but I'm already running, and brush past him easily, eyes trained on the gap twenty five feet ahead of me. Twenty.
    I realize only too late that I was  maybe a little harsh on Stone. He was only trying to save me... But he still can't tell me why he tries. Why hasn't he just let me kill myself with my daredevil habits?
    I see, to, that I almost died this morning, and he saved me. Again. And now I'm pretty much committing suicide.
    Ten feet.
    I'm glad I don't even have time to think about death. That's how I've always wanted it to be. Quick, fleeting, so I don't suffer. I wouldn't mind that. Simply vanishing from the world in a split second. Yes, that might not be so bad.
    One foot.
    Any regrets? Lots. I never discovered if the rebels really did exist... I never reaped my revenge on the Rulers, never burned the Order into oblivion... Never found my mother... But, most urgent? I never told Stone how I really feel about him... One last kiss would have been nice.
    My foot finds the edge of the gap, and, with all my strength, I lunge up and out, flying out into the open air.