WitheverybreathItake, my lungs are closer to turning into a block of ice.
Dense vapor clouds the air in front of me each time I exhale, fighting my way through the deep snow covering everything in sight. I have no fucking idea where I am, but my captors wouldn’t be hunting people for sport if their neighbors weren’t like-minded. At this point, my legs feel numb under my ripped jeans, and the sneakers I wore on the day Van der Horn goons captured me are soaked through with icy moisture. Though maybe my nerve endings have already frozen over? How long does it take to lose one’s digits to frostbite? Am I there yet, or will it not happen before one of the armed hunters in tactical gear hangs me up on the tree for gutting?
The bare trees are like rotten skeletons reaching for me, but this is not a haunted house, and if I fail to run away, the one person laughing with relief will be the guy who promised me a chance at survival if I plow him just right.
In the corner of my eye I spot a fallen tree and dash for it like a rabbit in search of a hideout. I have no idea where I can escapeto, but I’ll worry about that when immediate survival is no longer my main concern.
I jump over the tree and as soon as I land on the other side, I meet a pair of wide eyes.
All I know about this guy is that he’s even more ragged-looking than me, and that I saw him for a few minutes before we were all let out to run for our lives. At least I had a shower yesterday. If our hunters have dogs with them, they’ll scent this guy from miles away.
“Get your own damn hiding spot,” he snarls and pushes me back
In any other circumstances, I’d fight him, get into a shouting match, and haul him over the tree for good measure. But that would only create the kind of commotion to bring the hunt closer to us.
So I clench my chattering teeth and slide down the hill behind the tree. The snow gets under my bomber jacket, then under my hoodie, making me stiffen, but there is no point in feeling sorry for myself. I have to run. Run. Run. Run, and hide. I’m in the holly bushes at the bottom of the slope when the swish of a crossbow bolt makes me spin around, with frost on my lips instead of air.
The fucker who just pushed me away collapses, spraying blood all over the snow as he rolls after me.
One of the hunters must be close. I need to run. I need to hide. Find a cave, or an abandoned mine, and survive this day… somehow.
If only I don’t freeze, I’ll have a chance none of the other hunted will. Because unless Corvus lied to me, I won’t die from poisoning. If any of the others escape or hide, they’ll perish anyway. What’s a few fingers lost to frostbite if I get to live?
“I got him!” The hunter on the hill yells to someone about his victory. “Come and see!”
While he’s distracted, I get moving. I’m leaving obvious tracks, but it’s snowing, so there’s a chance they’ll be hidden in a while. I stay low, crawling between the bushes despite the cold.
Why did I have to gamble away all that money? My shitty life choices come back to haunt me any time I’m not busy looking around. Why did I think that this one time I’d be lucky? Hasn’t life proven to me that’s never the case? I should have been content with my lot.
I still, heart in throat when I hear a voice.
“I think I saw movement,” says what sounds like a younger man.
“Where?”
“In the bushes?”
Mybushes?
I bite my tongue when I hear aswish, and a crossbow bolt passes right next to my ear, planting itself by my hand.
A deer jumps out from between the trees nearby and almost tramples me in its escape.
“See? It’s just a deer,” the older guy says.
A groan. “Well, it was worth checking.”
“You’re not the one hunting, Aspen!”
But they’re riding away. My heart beats in a frenzy, and I dash from my hideout as soon as they’re not visible anymore, because for all I know, they might descend the hill to mark the body somehow.
A few paces later, I’m on a path carrying traces of use—it’s an empty space cutting across the forest, and the snow on it is uneven, as if fresh layers covered those already disturbed. I lift my feet as high as I can, attempting to traverse a large swath of snow-covered land, and soonenough, I hear nothing but the thud of my own heart. Maybe that’s why I hear the thumping of hooves that late.
I turn around, and there he is. Another hunter. His outfit is as black as the coat of his horse. It’s as if they’re one creature, and whether it chooses to send a crossbow bolt straight in my throat or trample me, my life is over.
In the pristine white woodland, the huge animal is an aberration, even darker than the naked branches reaching out for me from under caps of snow. When it rises to its hind legs, I fall onto my ass, ready for a painful death.
But then I meet the blue eyes visible through the slit in the rider’s balaclava and I’m frozen in ways the snow and ice couldn’t make me.
