A Wolf at the table [antikvár]

If my father caught me he would cut my neck, so I just kept going. Broken sticks and sharp stones gouged my bare feet, but I didn't consider the sensation. A branch whipped across my face; I felt the sting and for an instant I was fully blind, but I didn't stop. His flashlight sliced into the woods on either side of me. The beam was like a knife, and I didn't want it on my back. He was out there, behind me somewhere in these woods. I dashed to the right through a clutch of young silver birch trees and ran up the embankment, crouching to maintain speed. With his bad knee, he would have trouble with the hill. Lumbering forward, he would need to pause and massage the swollen, throbbing kneecap, catch his breath. When I realized the jabbing slash from his flashlight was gone, I worried that he had cut around and was one step ahead of me. That he was already on the hill, climbing it from the other side. What if I reached the top and he was there waiting?