A sharp pain in her ankle almost brought her down, but she stumbled on. She found the switch and suddenly the mine shaft was bathed in eerie light that revealed only jagged rock and straining wooden beams. The shadows were like claw fingers closing around her.

The coyotes, startled by the light, fell back. Their eyes glittered. Their teeth were faint white grins.

And then they came for her.

A jawlike vise closed around the muscle of her calf and she fell in a heap. The coyotes swarmed over her. Their stink was in her nose, their weight hammered her down.

She fought to get up onto her elbows. A second vise closed over her upper arm and she fell, knowing she would never get back up. She heard Patrick’s terrified barking, so much deeper and louder than the coyotes’ excited yip yapping.

All at once the coyotes released her. They yelped in surprise and pranced and twisted their heads left and right.

Lana lay bleeding from a dozen bites in an eerie circle of light cast by the lantern.

The pack leader snarled and the coyotes calmed down at least a little, though it was clear that something had frightened them, and was still frightening them.

The coyotes stirred, nervous, jumpy. All ears pricked up and turned toward the deep shadows farther down the shaft. Like they were hearing something.

Lana strained to hear what they heard but the sobbing rasp of her own breathing was too loud. Her heart pounded like a pile driver, like it would break her ribs with its pounding.

The coyotes no longer attacked her. Something had changed. Something in the air. Something in their unfathomable canine minds. She had gone from prey to prisoner.

Gone, Chapter 27