I scan everywhere constantly. Should I watch the snow beneath my feet? No, that’ll cause snow-blindness. So I focus on the lake.
But if I don’t watch my footing, I’ll trip and fall.
I shake that thought off immediately. That’s old thinking. Old-body limitations. I don’t stumble constantly without mobility aids anymore, and monitoring my surroundings is more crucial right now.
Especially the sky.
I immediately look up, expecting to see him flying overhead in pursuit.
Nothing but heavy gray clouds, though.
My heart continues hammering.
I look ahead. Keep pumping my arms.
Then I glance over my shoulder to check if the multi-armed creature somehow broke free and is chasing me.
But there’s only the castle growing smaller in the distance, the tower disappearing into low-hanging fog.
It hardly looks real from here.
I face forward and continue running.
I’m only mildly tired. My adrenaline supply seems inexhaustible somehow. I won’t question this gift. I won’t question anything ever again if I can just escape.
Of course... I might be running toward nothing but endless wilderness, that glint merely my imagination playing tricks.
And I’ll run until my adrenaline crashes and I die quickly of exposure.
Unless he finds me first.
A fresh surge of energy hits—impossible considering how little I’ve eaten recently.
I don’t know how long I run.
Hope diminishes with each passing mile, and still nothing appears.
Nothing but white, endless wilderness, distant trees so heavily blanketed with snow they look like frozen monuments...
Just when my eyes begin aching from the relentless white expanse, snow starts falling.
My nose runs as tears freeze directly on my face. I can’t feel my feet. My breasts have gone completely numb. My hands cutting through the air feel like ice spikes.
I feel delirious.
I want to collapse and surrender.
But the same fury against death that drove me to seek miracles in the first place—ha! some miracle—keeps propelling me forward.
The adrenaline must finally be depleting because my sprint has become more of a determined jog. The internal heat that sustained me isn’t enough against the searing wind cutting through my exposed skin. Sweat has frozen on my forehead.
Stopping means dying, but I don’t know how much longer I can continue.
When I look skyward again, I suddenly pitch forward. I must have caught my foot on something buried in the snow becausemy exhausted body dives toward the unforgiving, packed surface.
Useless tears freeze as they fall while I struggle to push myself up with aching arms and block-like hands.
I won’t die in ten years after all.
