By Mona Jean Reed
Suspense/Thriller, 436 pages
Cover art by Richard Stroud
Blurb:
Her dad’s song became her song—a
slave’s song, a wary song of anger without the means of expression, a song of
surviving--a song of escape.
Like any slave, she’d do what
she had to do.
“Dad,” she whispered. “Somehow,
I’ll get home. If it kills me, I’ll get home.
Excerpt:
Roz wondered if she’d ever see
her dad or her brother again. She bit her pointing finger and some tears
escaped, but she made no sound.
At some point, Roz slept and
knew nothing more until the darkest hour of the new day. A sound like a person
sniffling with a bad cold startled her awake. A novel she’d read said that if
awakened in a potentially dangerous situation, the best thing is to pretend
sleep. This gives you time to plan your best moves and surprise your enemy.
Without moving, she opened her
eyes a little. The fire had burned so low that only embers remained. But the
moon’s light let her see very well. Through a thin place in the brush shelter,
she could make out a foot—a foot, not a hoof. It moved and she saw its tail. It
had a tuft of hair at the end—not the brushy tail of a hyena,
Though she didn’t move, her
frightened heart exchanged places with her lungs.
What should she do? Scream? No.
Wake their master? Probably. But he slept on the other side of the fire.
If she called him, she’d wake
Chaney. Mustn’t wake Chaney. If the squirt started screaming, who knew what
that animal would do? The snuffling sound grew louder by the second and their
unstable fortress shivered. That beast meant to tear it down.
Roz had to do something. What
could she do? Still not moving, she searched through her pitiful store of
knowledge.
Throw rocks?
No.
Stare at the beast and point at it until it went away?
Worked with a snarling dog.
Not likely. Not at all.
Fire?
That’ll do.
Their collection of sticks and
small logs lay near her head. Still lying down, she raised her right arm in
slow motion. Her fingers felt for a stick or two to fuel their blaze—something
small that wouldn’t crush the fire’s remaining embers.
The creature’s noisy breathing
stopped. Slowly Roz dropped the handful of twigs into the embers. Within
seconds they blazed up.
The animal reacted with a
guttural cough and a soft growl. It probably wouldn’t bother them if she made a
bigger fire.
Still frightened, Roz sat up
slowly, picked up a few larger sticks and put them on the fire. She waited for
the larger sticks to catch and blaze.
Nothing else she could do,
except pray that the beast wouldn’t decide to knock down their defense before
she got the fire going. She prayed and she kept praying.
Again, the brush fortress
shivered. Without thought, Roz leaped to her feet and grabbed the largest hunk
of firewood in the pile.
The piece of firewood fit her
hand like the handle of a hammer; the larger end looked enough like a club to
be one.
Roz encouraged herself by
thinking of the young King David of Israel. He had killed at least a lion and a
bear when he was just a boy.
Maybe, with God’s help, I can
convince this beast to go away.
Please Jesus, let it be so.
She squatted and rocked from
side-to- side, like a tennis player ready to leap in any direction when her
opponent slammed a serve at her.
Could be that if the Lord
directed her hands, and if this creature wasn’t starving, she could convince it
to leave with a solid blow on the nose. She thought about it and stopped
panting in terror.
I won’t be afraid.
