M.A. Kleen

Twenty-five years ago, I self-published The River of Rain, a philosophical exploration of freedom, human nature, and the modern world. To mark its anniversary, I’m releasing a fully revised edition, one chapter every Wednesday. This is the novel as it was meant to be.

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Ariana was still asleep when Victor rose that morning. The air had turned sharper overnight, and a thin frost silvered the rocks, the leaves, and the fallen limbs around the enclave. He stretched, then stopped when he saw Ingram perched again on the fallen tree.

“Welcome back,” Victor said.

The raven gave a harsh cry and beat its wings once, restless and watchful.

“I need you today,” Victor continued. “Go see if anyone is coming. If there is, come back.”

Ingram tilted his head, black eye fixed on him, then launched himself into the pale morning sky. Victor watched him vanish above the treetops and drew in a long breath. There was still work to do.

All morning he moved along the cliffs above the river, setting what traps he could and blocking the narrow paths with brush and deadfall. His bow and spear were never far from his hand. The lances he had made the night before he hid in places where he might reach them if he had to run. None of it felt like enough. It was one thing to imagine defending this place in the dark, with Ariana asleep beside him. It was another to stand in the cold daylight and know that men with dogs and guns could come walking through the trees at any hour.

Near midday, Ingram returned, crying out as he circled once above the enclave.

Victor’s stomach tightened. He climbed into a tree some distance from the cave, close enough to watch the approach but far enough to draw danger away from Ariana. His plan had seemed clearer the night before. Now it felt like a child’s plan, made of sticks, nerves, and hope. He only knew he could not let them take everything from him without a struggle.

Soon he heard it: leaves stirring under heavy boots, low voices, and the sharp bark of a dog.

Victor pressed himself against the trunk and tried to slow his breathing. His thoughts kept turning back to Ariana. He wondered whether the night before had meant the same thing to her. He wondered whether she would choose him when the moment came, or whether she would go back with them and leave this place behind as if it had only been a sickness she had survived. He hated himself for thinking of it now, when he needed every part of his mind awake.

The dog came first, nose low to the ground, moving straight toward him.

Victor drew an arrow and held it there, trembling. The animal stopped beneath the tree and sniffed at the frost-dark leaves. Its handler, a woman in a dark jacket, followed a few yards behind, one hand near her holster. She looked tired, cold, and afraid. Not like a monster. Not like something from one of Victor’s dreams. Just a woman doing what she had been sent to do.

The dog barked.

Victor almost loosed the arrow. His fingers tightened. The bowstring creaked softly beside his cheek. Then, from deeper in the woods, Ingram cried out. The dog turned, confused, and bounded toward the sound. The officer called after it and moved away, never looking up.

Victor let out the breath he had been holding.

For a few minutes, nothing happened. Then another voice called from the ridge, closer than before.

“Police! If anyone’s out here, come out where we can see you!”

Victor slid down from the tree and ran low through the brush, keeping the river to his left. He could hear them spreading out now. Not many, perhaps three or four, but enough. Too many. His traps would not stop them. At best, they might slow them. At worst, they would only prove someone had been waiting.

He reached the rotting stump where he had hidden one of the lances and crouched behind it. Two officers came into view through the trees, moving carefully, their pistols drawn but pointed down. They were watching the ground, the brush, the shadows between the trunks. One of them stepped over a snare without seeing it. The other stopped and looked directly toward Victor’s hiding place.

Victor’s hand closed around a stone. He threw it hard into the trees to his right.

Both men turned.

He ran.

One shouted. Another answered from somewhere behind him. Victor plunged downhill toward the river, branches tearing at his clothes, his breath burning in his chest. He stumbled but kept running.

At the edge of the slope above the waterfall, he stopped. There was nowhere else to go. The river moved below him, black and silver beneath the cold sky.

“Stop!” someone yelled. “Put it down!”

Victor turned. A woman officer stood between the trees, both hands on her pistol. She was close enough now that he could see the steam of her breath.

His bow was still in his hand. He had one arrow notched.

“Put it down,” she said again, more quietly this time.

Victor raised the bow halfway, then stopped. His arm shook. He could imagine the arrow leaving the string. He could imagine her falling. He could imagine the others coming through the trees and shooting him where he stood. The whole forest seemed to hold its breath with him.

“I won’t go back,” he said.

“No one has to die,” she answered.

He almost laughed at that. It sounded like something from another world.

Behind the officer, a branch snapped. She turned just enough.

Ariana stood there barefoot in the frost, wrapped in one of the furs, her hair loose around her face. She held one of Victor’s spears in both hands, but she had not used it. Her eyes were wide and frightened.

“Victor,” she said.

The sound of his name broke something in him. The bow lowered.

The officer took one cautious step forward, then another, never taking her eyes off him.

Ariana came to his side, shivering, and took his hand. For a moment no one moved. Above them, Ingram circled once, black against the winter sky, and gave a single cry that drifted out over the river.

“I want to stay with you,” she whispered.

Victor looked at her, then at the officer, then back toward the cave hidden among the rocks and trees.

The officer was confused for a moment by what she saw. Far off through the woods came the sound of voices. Someone was shouting her name. More men. More guns. If they came crashing through the trees now, somebody was going to panic. Somebody was going to die.

Victor let the arrow fall first. Then the bow. They struck the frozen leaves with hardly any sound.

The officer kept her pistol raised, though her grip looked less certain than before. Her breath drifted into the cold air.

“You won’t survive out here,” she said quietly. The distant voices grew louder. She swallowed once, then lowered the gun just slightly.

“Go,” she said.

Victor hesitated only a moment longer before turning away. Together, Ariana and he moved down the slope toward the river, disappearing between the rocks and bare trees.

By nightfall the first true snow of winter had settled over the valley, covering the frozen ground, the footprints, and every trace of what had almost happened there.

Continued in Chapter 11…