He wouldn’t meet her eyes. ‘I... I don’t know,’ he muttered.
No, please, no. A new stab of despair lodged deep in her belly. Because wasn’t Carly most likely right? That even though they’d been using the sun to help guide them, and following the map as best they could, they still didn’t seem to be making progress. They’d not even come across any of the trees Scott had marked yesterday, as impossible as that seemed. Perhaps they were simply walking around in circles. Everything lookedexactly the same in the jungle; it was impossible to tell whether they were simply treading the same ground.
What if it took them the whole day, another night even, to get out of here? That was possible, unless they were lucky in their choice of direction.
And luck didn’t seem to be something they’d had much of on this trip.
‘What are our chances of making it back there today?’ Naya asked.
‘I think we can manage it,’ said Scott, determination now in his voice. ‘What if we—’
But Carly interrupted him: ‘I’ve been thinking.’ She raked her fingers through the ends of her hair; Naya saw it had got tangled and knotty. She hadn’t noticed before – she’d not been close enough, perhaps – but purplish-grey circles had formed underneath eyes that were bloodshot. She looked like a different person to the one Naya had met less than two days ago: a shell, an empty casing of herself. Naya imagined she must look exactly the same.
‘What if we separate now?’ Carly suggested. ‘It might make more sense, you know – we could cover more ground that way?’
Naya frowned. ‘But... aren’t we safer all being together?’
‘Well, maybe, but the most dangerous thing now is for us not to find our way back, isn’t it? I could go with Ben and Mira, and you two could...’
Carly gestured towards them, but as she moved, she swayed on the spot, righted herself, then clasped a hand to her forehead.
Scott held an arm out, propped her up. ‘Carly, are you OK? What happened?’
She leaned against him. Her eyes darted around the treesbehind him for a moment, then landed back on his face. ‘I don’t know,’ she said weakly. ‘I got so dizzy, all of a sudden. I don’t feel too good, to be honest.’ She pushed forward slightly, sending Scott stumbling backwards towards a lush-leaved tree with bright purple flowers.
‘You need something to drink,’ he said. ‘And some food too – you didn’t eat anything when we got up today, did you? Let me find something for you – I’ve still got a few things left.’
Scott opened his rucksack; Naya watched as he started to root around inside it for something to offer Carly. But he mustn’t have been able to find what he was looking for; he crouched down on the ground, started pulling everything out of his bag, carefully at first and then frantically.
Naya reached a hand out to help calm him; but she wasn’t thinking, she wasn’t careful enough with her touch, because he startled – and as he did, his foot slid across the rainforest floor towards a small, dark hole at the foot of the tree.
‘Scott – be careful – move your foot!’ Naya yelled.
But he was distracted; he hadn’t seen the brown, yellow and black snake he’d woken from its slumber at the edge of its lair – camouflaged so perfectly amongst the leaves and bark.
And Naya could only scream in terror as it uncoiled its body, hissed, drew back its head and lunged towards him with open jaws.
BEN
Ben whirled around at the sound of Naya’s roar.
‘What the hell just happened?’
‘Move!’ Scott yelled. ‘That’s a fer-de-lance – they’re fucking lethal.’
Ben’s eyes darted towards the ground, where a large, muscular snake with diamond-shaped patterns across its back was slithering, mercifully, back towards the bottom of the tree, disappearing between its roots.
‘Scott, are you OK?’ said Naya, grabbing his arm. ‘It didn’t bite you, did it?’
‘No, I’m all right,’ said Scott, breathless. ‘Just spooked. Naya, you saw it just in time, thank fuck. But we’ve got to be more careful – a single bite from one of those is enough to kill you in minutes.’
‘Oh my God,’ said Naya. ‘I thought there weren’t many dangerous snakes in Costa Rica. Why would Hannah have planned the whole trip out here if there were lethal things waiting...’ She tailed off, blanched; realizing what she’d just said.
‘But Hannah didn’t plan for us to be out here, like this,’ murmured Mira.
‘In her defence, I think dangerous snakes like the fer-de-lance are pretty rare out here,’ said Carly. ‘We were unlucky to come across one.’
A thought occurred to Ben then – one he’d had a bunch of times over the past couple of days since they got here, but never put words to. He turned to Carly. ‘Remind me how you know so much about all this stuff? You know, jungle survival and snakes and all?’ he said.
