Free Hostage by Chris Ryan Page A

jettisoned some of their supplies, it was even more important to find what food they could on the way. Alex laid his catch out on the snow, then dismantled all his snares. They were leaving early in the morning and a responsible trapper never left snares in place when he would not be around to check them regularly. The snares had killed the rabbits swiftly and humanely, but a larger animal could catch a foot in the wire and slowly starve to death.
    Taking his single-bladed survival knife from its sheath at his belt, he got to work skinning and gutting the catch. He left the innards and heads in a pile on the edge of the thicket as a gift for the arctic fox, then he headed back to camp.
    Back at the fire, Alex packed his catch into the foil containers that had held the boil-in-the-bag meals, then he buried the three parcels in the hot wood ash on the edge of the fire. The meat would slow-bake in the ashes and provide them with a tasty, hot breakfast in the morning. Finally, he sat down on the tree-trunk seat and cleaned and sharpened his knife. Once he was satisfied, he slipped the knife back into its sheath and checked the time. His two-hour watch was over. It was time to wake Hex.
    Alex turned towards the tree shelters and saw that Li was sitting up in her sleeping bag, gazing out at him. He ducked under the branches and sat beside her on the snow platform. Amber was snoring softly behind them, completely hidden inside her thick, down sleeping bag.
    'Thanks,' said Li softly.
    'What for?' asked Alex.
    'For deciding the mission could carry on,' said Li.
    Alex nodded and they were silent for a while.
    'She was like a big sister to me,' whispered Li, gazing out at the fire. Alex reached out and squeezed Li's thin shoulder. Her lip quivered but she remained dry-eyed.
    'Don't disturb Hex,' she whispered. 'I'll do the next watch. I can't sleep anyway.'
    Alex climbed into his sleeping bag. A clean, pine-needle smell rose up around him as he settled back on to the cushioned springiness of the spruce boughs. The bag wrapped him in warmth from head to foot, and soon his eyelids began to droop. The last thing he saw before he fell into an exhausted sleep was Li's silhouetted profile as she sat beside the fire, thinking about the big sister she had lost that day.

T EN
    'Are you sure it'll hold us?' asked Amber fearfully, gripping Alex by the shoulders as he prepared to ease the snowmobile down the river bank and on to the snow-covered ice. It was the morning of the next day and, after leaving their camp before dawn, Alpha Force had successfully completed the first part of their journey. They had reached the river that would lead them to the mine.
    Alex sighed. 'Amber, I've been down and checked it. I even used the ice drill. That ice is at least a metre thick.'
    'Yeah, but the ice in Hudson Bay was really thin—'
    'Forget Hudson Bay! That was seawater. The salt in seawater means it has a much lower freezing point than freshwater. And what sort of water do we have in the river?'
    'Freshwater,' muttered Amber.
    'Plus,' continued Alex, 'temperatures are much lower here than they were on the coast.'
    'What's the hold-up?' called Li, behind them. She was standing up on her snowmobile, anxious to move on.
    'Nothing!' called Alex. 'Listen,' he said to Amber in a lower voice. 'That river surface has been frozen solid for weeks now. OK?'
    'OK,' said Amber, but her fingers dug into Alex's shoulders hard enough to make him wince.
    'Hey, ease off,' he said.
    'Sorry,' muttered Amber, fractionally reducing the pressure.
    'You can relax now,' called Alex as he guided the snowmobile down the bank. 'You've done your bit. You led us to the river!'
    The snowmobile reached the bottom of the bank and shot out on to the ice. It was rough going at first as they rattled up and down over the pressure ridges that had formed at the edge of the river as it froze, and Amber did not let go of Alex's shoulders until they reached the smoother ice in the middle.
    'OK,'