“Yeah. The skin around my stitches just pulled a little. I’m fine.”
She nodded, but I could see the worry in her eyes. She put her forehead back on mine, and then stroked my hair and kissed my cheekbones. For several minutes we sat that way, foreheads pressed together, hands intertwined between our bodies as the dying sun illuminated the sky, reflecting off the ice in a dazzling show of sparkling color.
“What can I do right now to make you feel better?” Audra asked, placing her palm on my grizzled jaw.
I nuzzled her nose. My head was aching, my muscles were tight, and I felt so weak I feared I’d topple right over, but I forced a smile. “Show me how you used to dance with the butterflies.”
She laughed, a surprised sound. “What?”
I nodded behind her to the snow where prisms of light moved in the air, a gift from the heavens. “Can’t you see the butterflies?”
She laughed again, but then her face sobered. “Are you having delusions?”
I laughed. “No, just imagining. But it’s easy to do. Can’t you see them?” Again, I gestured my head behind her.
She glanced back, pausing, and then turning back to me, a smile, filled with wonder adorning her pretty face.
“You’re right. I do see them.”
“So dance, Audra.”
She gave me a shy glance, but smiled, standing and offering a curtsy. She put her arms in the air like a ballerina and twirled gracefully in the snow, spinning again and laughing as she raised her face to the sky. I laughed too, the joy of the moment feeling suddenly more powerful than the fever, the hopelessness of our situation, the uncertainty of tomorrow. For a brief blink of time, it was just Audra, the woman I loved with every piece of my heart, dancing in front of me with a kaleidoscope of translucent butterflies glinting in the air around her.
She turned, grinning as she held her hand out to me and I stood, answering her call, walking to her and taking her in my arms. We danced slowly together as the sun lowered behind the mountains, taking the butterflies with it. But we still remained, holding each other, heartbeat to heartbeat, as the sky grew dim.
**********
That night I dreamed. Misty visions of Audra reaching for me as I tried desperately to grasp her arm, the distance between us expanding no matter how fast I ran. I woke up gasping, my throat burning, my head cradled in Audra’s lap. She was dribbling water into my mouth and I swallowed greedily, reaching for the bottle of water so I could drink it in large gulps. I was so thirsty, so hot, it felt like my head was on fire and every muscle in my body ached.
But Audra pulled the water back, hushing me. Her words drifted to me—muted and strange—as if I were underwater and she was above. “Don’t leave me, Dane,” I thought she said. I won’t, I wanted to say, but the words wouldn’t form. Sleep pulled me back under.
I woke drenched in sweat, grimacing at the dim shafts of light through the sides of our woven door. I cried out as I sat up, pulling myself out through the door and into the light of day. What time was it? How long had I slept?
I squinted up at the light-dappled ceiling of pine branches, not able to see enough of the sun from here to guess at the time of day. God, I felt like fucking hell.
Audra was probably using the bathroom. At that thought, I wove my way over to the nearest tree, holding on to it for support as I pissed. Not much, though, and I hadn’t gone since yesterday, early evening. That couldn’t be a good sign, could it? What was happening with my body?
I zipped my pants, spotting the bottles of water sitting next to a rock and making my way toward them. As I drank, I glanced at the fire, still burning. Shame filled me when I realized Audra had to have gotten up all night to feed it. Goddamn it! It filled me with impotent fury to know that I hadn’t been able to perform that small task for her the night before. I set the water back down and then picked up a pinecone, hurling it toward the trees, the movement causing me so much agonizing muscle pain that I sat on the rock on an exhale of curses, breathing heavily. My head throbbed as the forest radiated around me and I clenched my eyes closed, holding my scalp in my hands.
That’s when I heard her scream. It rang through the forest, through the canyons, echoing off the rock. I jolted, jumping to my feet and staggering as I took three steps forward, looking around wildly. “Audra!” I called, racing in the direction her scream had come from, not out into the wide-open space, but back, through the trees, into the forest.
As I passed the back of our shelter, the silver glint of metal caught my eye and I grabbed the piece of edging I’d used as a walking stick what seemed like so long ago.
I wove through the forest, dodging trees, moving faster than my body wanted to manage, single-mindedly trying to get to Audra. I gripped the piece of metal in my hand, a weapon, though I had no idea what had caused that terrifying, blood-curdling scream. My heartbeat pounded in my ears, in my head, a raucous percussion of pain and dread. Where is she? Where is she?
“Audra!” I called again. No answer. I heard them before I saw them, a low growl of animal aggression. Breathing harshly, my muscles screaming and my head throbbing, I stepped through a gap in the trees, my stomach lurching in horror to see Audra standing near the edge of a cliff as two wolves stalked toward her, their heads low, their teeth bared as low, twin growls shattered the quiet of the forest.
Oh fuck, oh fuck, oh fuck. This could not be happening. Adrenalin spiked through my body and I gripped the weapon tightly in one hand, swiping my arm over my eyes when I felt the cold sting of sweat obscure my vision. Come on, Townsend. Get it together. Now.
Audra caught sight of me, her eyes wide with horror as her gaze beseeched desperately: Help me.
My eyes moved back to the wolves. “Hey!” I yelled and the creatures turned, snarling viciously, their jaws snapping. Oh God, fuck, they’re big. I took several steps toward them, and one lowered his head as if ready to rush me. Audra let out a tiny sob, but it echoed in the stillness of the winter morning, and the second wolf turned back to her, slinking along the ground for one step, two before it leapt into the air, hitting Audra square in the chest.
I heard a deep inhuman yell mixed with Audra’s scream and somewhere in the recesses of my mind, I realized that it was me. I threw myself toward Audra who was now screaming on the ground, the wolf on top of her, yanking his head back and forth as if tearing at her flesh. I released another battle cry as the second wolf attacked me, his jaw snapping just under my chin, a hairsbreadth away from my jugular. With every ounce of strength I had, I brought the piece of metal back and then thrust it forward. The wolf released a piercing yelp, his body jerking as we both went down, me on my back and him sprawled on top of me.
I shouldn’t be able to, but I pushed him off, pulling the weap
on from his body on a wet sucking sound. The whole thing was surreal, a horrible fever dream. I rushed to Audra, who was still screaming as she grappled with the wolf. With a yell, I thrust the bloodied metal into the wolf’s flank and it immediately jumped off Audra and came at me, stopping inches from where I stood. I swiped the metal back and forth as it made a whistling sound in the air in front of the wolf, who then backed slowly away.