The Warmth

The boots left tracks in the frigid, freshly fallen snow. As each minute passed, the heavy, silent precipitation came to a rest within them, filling the shoes gradually until the only signs of life in the region disappeared once again.

The prints meandered between the swaying trees of the fir forest, across the frozen metal tracks of the long-abandoned railroad. 

They lay faint on the surface of a frozen lake. A slight crack on the ice twisted perilously in a zigzag. The prints barely made it to the shore, where they disappeared into the skeleton’s of once densely-populated evergreens.

A second set of prints began parallel to them, however it was the small spread of a wolf's paws. 

For a hundred meters or so, the prints lay on top of each other as the wolf presumably began to shorten the distance between predator and prey.

The body of the wild dog lay under a tree, it’s abdomen ripped ruthlessly with the piercings of a knife. It’s bowels spilled crimson onto the chalk-white ground. The boot prints continued, however now accompanied by a streak of red stains.

The prints shambled to the door of a small wooden cabin. It was surrounded by a circle of dizzying trees. They moaned and creaked with every gust of wind that howled across the frigid landscape.

From the windows of the cabin, a homely orange glow illuminated. Dusk was falling faster than the ever increasing fury of a blizzard.

Inside, a man lay in a pool of blood beside a stove. From the stove, a fire blazed wildly. A bite wound next to the mans groin leaked heavily. The carpet of the cabin floor was blackened with blood. He stared into the flames, a content look hiding behind his grizzly beard.

As he felt life slipping from his weakening grip, memories flooded in. Memories of every little thing.

Memories of his grandmother taking him to the horse field. Memories of his 17th birthday. Memories of sitting by the window, waiting on his father, oblivious to the fact he had been emitted to a mental hospital just that morning. The day he graduated, the night of the crash.

Everything.

Now his vision began to diminish, and the long dark began it's takeover. His heart beat one last, warm pump of lifeblood around his head and limbs.

He had finally escaped the cold. He had found the warmth.