JEM JERKED AWAKE AND lunged forward. Petar's hands were still holding him down, dragging him back into the dream. He scrabbled at them, trying to knock them away, and found that it was just his seatbelt. He looked over. Petar's eyes left the road and flickered to his.

While their eyes were locked, Jem felt a strange sense of calm come over him. He felt sheltered. Then his eyes left Petar's and he twisted in his seat to look into the Escape's rear. The gray, predawn light filled the interior with soft shadows, but Jem could see at once that the back was empty.

"Where are they?" Jem said. Panic. The calm flooded away like water from a leaky tub.

"Safe," Petar said softly.

"Safe? Safe! Where are they!"

Petar had spent the past three hours preparing what to say when this moment inevitably arrived. They're at the hospital. There's $50,000 tucked in the purse beside her bed. Oh, and by the way, I'm taking you to Colorado with me. It all sounded flat, hollow, stupid. Petar drew a blank.

"Safe," he repeated, the word coming out weak.

Leaving the hospital, Petar had turned west and hadn't stopped. Right now, they were just a little past Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, coursing down Interstate 76 toward Ohio. Dawn was barely beginning to break over the ribbon of highway laid out in front of them. Orange sunlight streamed through the rear window of the SUV. Petar's eyes were tired. His shoulder ached in the morning chill, and his thigh was throbbing from the Koschei's beryllium knife. He needed sleep. But first, he had to deal with this.

"Take me back," said Jem, voice flat and emotionless.

Petar shook his head.

"Take. Me. Back."

"Can't," Petar breathed, almost inaudible, eyes forward.

Click. Petar glanced over at the sound just in time to see the unlatched seatbelt slide up Jem's chest before he lunged across the center console and grabbed the steering wheel. The SUV lurched into the slow lane. A car horn blared. Petar wrestled for control and the Escape screeched back into the fast lane.

"Are you crazy!" Petar shouted.

"Pull over!" Jem screamed, twisting the wheel again. The car turned too fast. Drifted on the asphalt, turning sideways. Petar pushed Jem away and wrenched the wheel again. The car straightened. Now Jem was hammering the side of Petar's head with his fists. Petar raised his right hand to deflect them and kept his left on the wheel. Kept his eyes to the road. The blows slid around his blind guard and pounded against his skull. A sharp hit rapped against his ear. It stung.

"They're at the hospital!" Petar shouted. "They're okay!"

"I want to see them. That's my family, you idiot!"

"You'll have to trust me."

"Why the hell would I trust you? I don't even know you!" The blows were still falling. "You wreck my car!" Thunk. "You show up at my house!" Thud. "Your friend shoots my mom!" Thu-dunk. "And now you, what, kidnap me? Who are you? What do you want with me?"

"Can you calm down so I can explain?"

"No."

Thunk.

"He wasn't my friend."

Petar tensed for the next blow. It never fell.

"Who?"

"The Koschei."

"Who?" Jem echoed.

"The man in your house. The man who shot your mother."

"You tried to stop him," Jem said slowly.

"I did. He won't hurt her again."

"What was he?"

"A killer."

"A killer killed by a killer," Jem said, his eyes accusing.

It shouldn't have hurt. It did.

"I'm not a killer," said Petar softly. "At least, not like them. The Koscheis were made for one purpose, and that is to take lives. They're bred for it; it's all they know. The mind of a Koschei is a dark place. There's no happiness, no joy, no regret. Just hunger and blood."

"Wait, there's more of them?"

"Thousands. Maybe tens of thousands by now, I've lost track. The two at your house, they were there to stop me. I'm sorry."

It was a full admission of guilt. Petar had led the Koscheis to Jem's home. He was responsible for everything that had happened.

The silence in the car was thicker than mud. Petar waited tensely. The ball was in Jem's court. A reflective green mile-marker flew by on the side of the highway. Then another one.

Finally: "The wreck. It wasn't an accident, was it."

Acceptance? Denial? Misdirection? Petar couldn't read Jem's tone.

"No," he said.

"So you were following me."

"Yes," Petar said.

"And then you followed me to my house."

"Sort of. I put a tracker on your car so I could follow later."

"When I was getting the pencil."

"Yes." Surprise. The kid was sharp. What else had he picked up on? "Can I just explain everything?" Petar tried again.

"No. I don't want to know," Jem said stiffly. That was fine, Petar thought. Let him keep asking questions, do it his way. Let him lead. They had a long way to go anyway.

"You're not going to pull over and let me out, are you?"

"No," Petar said.

"So when I finally get a phone and reach the cops, they'll get you for kidnapping on top of breaking and entering, assault, and murder?"

For the second time in as many minutes, Petar was surprised. He regarded the teenager in the seat next to him. Tall for his age, and thin. Sharp, well-defined face finally breaking through pillowy cheeks, last relics of the baby age. A thick tangle of blonde curls dripping over his ears. Piercing, thoughtful eyes.

No seatbelt.

"Better buckle up," Petar said.

"No." Petty defiance. Petar let it slide. What could he do? He wasn't going to hurt the kid.

Suddenly, the car's radio flicked on. Petar reached over and turned it off. As his hand returned to the steering wheel, it began to blare again, now on a different station.

"Why's it doing that?" Jem asked.

"Just a thing. It happens."

"It's like with the lights."

Petar grunted and settled for simply turning down the radio's volume. The dome light switched on, then turned itself off again. Petar sighed. It was going to be a long trip, especially if he couldn't get Jem on his side.

The two settled into an uncomfortable silence, Petar searching for words to make the situation better, Jem a contemplative wall. The miles rolled by under their tires. Carlisle. Newburg. Valley Hi. Highway markers flashed by overhead declaring cities and towns that Petar would never see.

Soon, the road began to climb. Towns grew more intermittent, replaced by pine and scrub as the interstate rose into the Appalachians.

After a stretch of road that wound through a sheer-walled, man-made canyon blasted straight out of the mountain, a gorgeous vista opened up to their left. Beyond a splindly aluminum guard rail, the ground dropped away drastically. The tips of pine trees growing on the slope peeked over the edge of the road, and beyond them, rolling hills stretched away forever, brushed golden by the rising sun.

Petar eased the SUV into the right lane, hugged the white line, and put as much distance as possible between himself and the cliffside. Heights made him queasy. Jem left his silent reverie long enough to glance at him curiously, then turned to gaze out the window again. He'd given up fighting, and now seemed resigned to simply wait. He still wasn't talking, and the vehicle was silent but for the schizophrenic radio that continued to change stations every few minutes.

At Bedford, Petar exited the highway and pulled into a truck stop. He needed gas. They both needed food. This was going to be a challenge. He turned the car off at the pump, stretched his arms over his head, and turned to Jem.

"What are the chances you won't go off running the second I get out of the car?"

"Slim to none," Jem said, watching a duck peck through a patch of weeds at the edge of the truck stop flatway. At least he was honest.

"What if I said your mother's life depended on it?"

"Cheap," Jem said, looking over. "And unbelievable. You wouldn't hurt her."

"Not me, but other people would."

"Wouldn't happen, not with that hero complex you've got going on."

"I can't stop everything."

"What's that got to do with me leaving?"

"More than you know."

For the first time, an expression of interest dawned over Jem's features, but it quickly slid back under the mask of nonchalance. Petar took a leap.

"Here's what's going to happen," Petar said. "I need to fill the tank. We need to eat. Pee. Stretch. I'm going to stay here and pump the gas. You're going to go inside and buy us some grub. Snacks, soda, whatever. Something we can bring out and eat while we ride.

"Here's eighty." Petar pulled some bills out of his pocket. "Put sixty on the pump, the rest is food. Now," Petar leveled his gaze at Jem, waited until the boy looked back, "I'm putting a lot of trust in you. I think that's right. Don't make me regret it."

Without a word, Jem reached out and grasped the twenties in Petar's hand. Petar held them for a moment, then let the boy take them. Jem slid out of the car and walked into the convenience store beyond the pumps.

Petar popped the gas tank lid and stepped out as well. If he squinted, he could see Jem through the store windows. He watched as the boy approached the cashier. Petar tensed. This was it. He'd either pay for the gas or tell the clerk that there was a kidnapper in the parking lot standing beside a white Escape. Was it stupid to trust him? Too soon? He was only hours away from being frisked away from his home by a complete stranger. Why had he let the boy go by himself? Of course he was going to turn him in. He was too smart not to.

Jem was still talking to the cashier. He turned and pointed to Petar. The cashier nodded. Said something. Picked up the phone. Petar inhaled sharply. That was it. He'd blown the whistle. Petar had just gambled the fate of the world on a stranger who hated him. Just as he was about to sprint into the convenience store and snatch Jem away, the pump beside him clicked. The digital counter ticked to 0.00. Above his head, a line buzzed and a female voice said, "Thank you. Have a great day."

Through the window, the cashier placed the phone back in its cradle. Jem took his receipt and walked away.

Petar released his breath in a whoosh. He hadn't even realized he'd been holding it. He almost laughed. It had worked. Jem wasn't going to run. With a relieved smile, he stuck the pump nozzle into the tank's port, clicked up the bar to hold it on, and leaned against the SUV.

He couldn't see Jem through the window anymore; he'd walked into the stacks of food and then disappeared. Knelt to grab something, Petar assumed. He looked away and watched the intermittent cars whizz past on the nearby highway. The early-morning sunlight turned their passage into a stream of glittering jewels. It was still too early for most people to be out, but Petar got the feeling that this lonely stretch of Appalachian highway rarely got a whole lot of traffic.

The pump clicked off with a thump that reached up and snagged Petar's attention. He squeezed it a few more times to top off the tank – a trick he'd learned from a movie – then set the nozzle back in its holster. Suddenly, he realized that he hadn't seen Jem in at least a minute. Probably just taking his time, he told himself. Using the bathroom. Another minute ticked by, and Petar decided to take a stroll into the store.

A blast of cold air hit him in the face as he opened the door, smacking away the quickly rising heat of the summer morning. He scanned the store. A young, petite blonde girl in flip-flops, halter top, and Daisy Duke jean shorts was standing in line behind a teenager in a black, skull-smeared T-shirt who was buying a pack of cigarettes at the register. An elderly couple were spinning the postcard rack to the right of the door. Other than that, the store was empty. Jem was nowhere to be seen. Petar walked over to a display case filled with sunglasses with a clear line of sight to the bathroom and pretended to browse through the knockoff shades while he kept an eye on the door. The lights flickered softly.

Another minute.

The bathroom door opened, and a balding trucker with a beer belly and a bright red beard stepped out, still wiping his hands on his shirt.

Quickly, Petar walked over to the register counter and stepped in front of the girl in Daisy Dukes.

"Excuse me," he said."

"Excuse me," said a nasally feminine whine from behind him. "I was here first."

"Sorry," Petar said. "This is important."

"I'm sure it can wait another minute," rebutted Daisy Dukes, jutting out a hip. "Line's a line."

"She was there first, sir," the short lady at the register pointed out.

Petar didn't have time for this. "The young man who was just in here, the one who bought gas..."

"You'll have to wait your turn, sir," said the cashier. She looked over Petar's shoulder to Daisy Dukes. "Can I help you?"

"Pack of American Spirits. Light blue."

"It's just, I need to know where he went. Did you see where he went?" Petar tried to keep the urgency out of his voice.

"In a minute, sir." The cashier turned to reach into the rack of cigarettes behind her.

"Listen!" Petar reached over the counter and grabbed her by the shoulder. Spun her around. Her eyes were wide with shock.

"Oh my god," whispered Daisy Dukes from behind him.

"The young man. Blue shirt. Bought gas. Where is he?"

"Asked for a back door. Said he couldn't get a signal in front, had to make a call." The words came out in a terrified rush, and as she spoke her hand slid under the counter. Petar didn't miss it. There was probably a silent alarm switch under there. That sped up the timeline quite a bit.

"And where's that door?"

Silently, the woman pointed. Petar realized he was still gripping her shoulder.

"Thanks." He dropped his hand and tried to smile, then sprinted toward the rear door. "And sorry!" He shouted behind him.

"Jerk!" Daisy Dukes said.

This was bad. This was very, very bad. Petar kicked open the metal door and found himself in a loading bay behind the convenience store. He didn't see a single person.

Jem was gone.

And the police were on their way.

Thanks for reading my story! Please VOTE and let me know what you think of it so far, then check out Chapter 16!