Broken Trails

He nodded again, eyeing her in speculation. “Sounds like a plan. I hear the next stretch is boring as hell.”

“Me, too.” Lainey said her good byes and headed back toward the checkpoint. She needed to stay awake long enough for him to fall asleep. From here on out, every musher would begin to think of the Iditarod as a race, not an endurance run. No more working or running together. Getting to Nome before everyone else was the goal.

Smiling, she stepped into the armory, pressing the letters against her chest.

Getting to Nome was definitely the goal.

CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN

THE UNNAMED ROOKIE decided to weather his break inside the armory rather than in the elements. While he slumped at a table, head on his arms, Lainey yawned and made a production of going out to her sled for some shut eye. Her ruse did not work completely, however. Once she began the process of waking her dogs and cooking a quick meal for all of them, another musher appeared from the checkpoint building. The woman grinned and winked at her before beginning her own chores. Lainey sighed. At least the rookie had not gotten suspicious.

By the time everything was ready to go, the veteran musher had already left. Regardless, Lainey kept a close eye on the front door of the armory, half expecting the rookie to come bursting out as she signed the check out sheet. He did not, and she urged her dogs to get a move on. They obliged, hardly showing the effects of their twelve hour run not so long ago. Still, it was not until Shaktoolik was out of sight that Lainey breathed a sigh of relief at avoiding her competition.

As Scotch had said, the trail was easy. It was too easy. It shot straight as an arrow with little variation of scenery. Flat, bland, and boring, the only excitement was the occasional swell of ice that roughened the ride. Even the blowing wind did little to make things interesting. Lainey saw the veteran about a mile ahead, but knew better than to try to catch up. She still had two hundred miles to go. Instead, she followed Scotch’s suggestion and put her ear plugs in, listening to music as her team ate up the miles.

Distances were deceiving, as was the wind on her face. The two combined made her feel as if they sped along at a good clip of fifteen or twenty miles an hour, an impossibility for her team which had been clocked at fourteen on a short sprint and an excellent day back at the kennels. They could not maintain that pace for as long as this. The view rarely changed, giving lie to the sensation of speed. It seemed that they ran, ran, ran on a huge hamster wheel - no matter how long or hard the dogs trotted, nothing changed.

Lainey pulled out her letters frequently, especially the first one, to keep her spirits up.

The sun went down, and she stopped to snack the dogs and check them over. Everyone appeared strong and vigorous and she gave them each an extra chunk of moose liver for their efforts. Then she put on her head lamp and changed the battery pack on her iPod.

She rode on sea ice, fairly far from shore. Before she turned the music back on, she heard a deep loud crack somewhere to her left and yanked the plugs from her ears. Lainey jumped and stared, suddenly wondering if she was too far out. She had been vigilant so far, always finding the next trail marker. The dogs glanced at the sound, but did not seem anxious. The trail breakers would not send them too far out onto the sea, would they? Had it been warm enough for the threat of melting to be serious? She seemed to recall a book she read on the first woman winner of the Iditarod, something about the sea ice breaking and sending the trail marker several hundred feet out to sea. The ice had then reformed, and her team had lead her straight out to sea to get to that marker.

“You know what you’re doing?” she asked Trace.

He glanced back at her as if to say, “Well, duh. I am the one with the experience here.”

Lainey decided to leave the iPod off for the time being.

Several times through the course of the evening, she heard the ice cracking, but nothing indicated any danger to her team. Eventually, she turned the music back on and ignored the sounds, though it was difficult. Her ears strained to listen beyond the tunes and she whispered along with the lyrics in a further effort to distract herself.

After what seemed like a full night of mushing, she saw lights ahead and felt a thrill of relief. Finally. Her initial pleasure dampened as the lights sat off in the distance forever, a shining beacon that they were almost to their destination but never seemed to come closer. It was another hour or more before she actually arrived at the checkpoint.

“That sucked,” she told the volunteer.

He chuckled. “Yeah, we hear that a lot. Almost makes you wish you were back at the Burn?”

“Almost!”

The race officials had rented a building nearby for mushers and volunteers to rest in, but it was a couple of blocks from where the dogs were parked. As she fed and watered her team, she considered her options. While it would be nice to dry some of her gear, providing there was room, she could lose whatever edge she had cultivated. Anyone staying in the building would know when she left to prepare for departure. At least if she slept with the dogs she had a shot at sneaking out when no one was looking.

Decided, she devoured her dinner.

Six hours later, Lainey was at the checkpoint with her team, ready to go. She had seen the rookie she had ditched in Shaktoolik snoozing a couple of sleds over, and grinned to herself. He had yet to wake when she pulled out of the parking area. This guy was good, but Roman Spencer had been harder to trick. She wondered how he was doing and vowed to check his statistics at the next checkpoint.

“This is for you,” the volunteer, a young woman this time, said.

Lainey smiled, taking the envelope. Scotch’s handwriting was on it and Lainey tucked it into her pocket. “Thanks.”

She signed the clipboard and headed out of Koyuk at three in the morning. Keeping tabs on the trail ahead, she quickly opened the envelope.

Lainey,

Forty-eight more miles down, forty-eight to go to the next checkpoint. You’ve mushed for over nine hundred miles! You have less than two hundred to go!

When you get to Nome, I’ll introduce you to a friend of mine. Her name’s Beth. She and her girlfriend have offered us their spare room while we’re in town. They live on the outskirts of Nome. Lots of hot water for showering and clean clothes, privacy, a large fluffy bed to catch up on your rest. And Beth is a fantastic cook.

You’d better not take too long or I’ll use up all the hot water.

Love you,

Scotch

She knew the grin on her face was wide and foolish, but could not help its presence. Those cartoon hearts and fireworks twirled about her head again and she laughed aloud. Thank God those hallucinations were her own.

Soon the boredom set in as they continued along sea ice. It was ten miles or more before the trail cut inland and across low ground. She felt a modicum of relief with the knowledge that those forlorn sounding cracks from the ice would no longer indicate a perceived danger to her.

The trail began climbing a series of small hills and ridges, working its way back into a stand of trees. The added protection from the wind cut the chill. Lainey had been in the frozen breeze for hours and it felt almost balmy. This was hardly the tropical gig she had planned on getting from Strauss all those months ago.

At the final height of the last summit, she saw a red light in the distance. Switching on her head lamp, she dug out her trail notes to see if anything was mentioned there. It was a radio beacon at Moses Point, about twenty miles away from her. She wondered if she would get closer to it before Elim or if the trail would turn away.