More shadows appeared behind him.
She finally found her voice. “Igor!”
Steven lifted her from the snow, dragging her toward the forest. “We have to go, Nat.”
“We can’t leave him.” She jerked her arm out of his grasp. She tried to run to Igor, but her sock slipped on the ice, giving Steven a chance to take hold of her again.
“Look how many there are. We have to go, now. If you want to live, come with me.”
~ Chapter Twenty ~
Upon waking, there was a blissful moment of ignorance before the pain of losing Andrew came back to her. Moaning, she pressed her face into the snow, the heat of her tears turning the surface beneath her to ice.
A hand touched her shoulder. “Nat, you’ll suffocate. Please don’t do that.”
The agony was overwhelming, so intense it felt physical, like having a limb ripped from its socket. She was missing a limb, would always be. Without Andrew, she had nothing. In so many ways, he’d been the love of her life.
“Leave me alone. Just let me die.”
“Sorry, no can do. Andrew would never forgive me if I did, and the last thing I want is his ghost haunting me for the rest of my life. We may not survive, Nat. But don’t you think we owe it to them to at least try?”
She pressed her face deeper into the snow. Ice crystals filled her nostrils, and she felt the welcome pressure on her chest as her lungs struggled for air. Fingers grasped her hair close to the roots, wrenching her upright. The freezing air hit her face like a slap.
“Ouch!”
“You have to stop feeling sorry for yourself. We don’t have the luxury.”
She narrowed her eyes. “Fuck you.”
“Maybe later, when our body heat runs low. For now, we have more important things to worry about.” Incredibly, he grinned at her. She shuffled forward, kicking his boot with hers.
“How can you smile when they’re dead? They’re all dead.” The sob caught in her throat. “They’re gone.”
“Because we’re alive, Nat. And damn lucky to be here, drawing breath. My focus is on survival, not self-pity. Have you forgotten I lost someone too?”
She turned away, sniffling. “That’s different. You knew Lana for a few days. I’ve known Andrew for most of my life.”
“Maybe I loved her enough for a lifetime in those few days. Did you ever consider that?”
“I’m sorry.” She wiped her face on her sleeve. “I’m finding it hard to care about anyone else’s pain right now.”
“It’s okay; I understand. As much as I can. I’ve never had someone be as close to me as Andrew obviously was to you. But that’s what you have to hold on to. Honor his life, not his death.”
“Easy to say; impossible to do.”
“I get that. And you have nothing to prove to me, Nat. You’ve already shown more guts than I ever gave you credit for.”
She sniffed, looking past him. “Where are we?”
Her surroundings were white, white, nothing but white. It was like being in an igloo.
“The ravine. I found it yesterday. I was going to tell you, but I never got the chance. We had… other things to discuss.” His cheeks reddened.
“The ravine? You mean the same one where—”
“Where my great-aunt died, yes. It’s been my mission to find it, though I never thought it would save our lives. It’s fitting, in a way. Lyudmila would have liked that.”
She swallowed hard and considered the ill-fated young woman. Nat wasn’t comfortable living in Lyudmila’s tomb, but what choice did she have? “I don’t mean to be a pessimist, but have you forgotten what happened to her? I don’t think it’s safe for us to stay here.”
“No, I haven’t forgotten. But there has to be a reason she lived longer than the others. All we need is a couple of days, just enough time to rest and give things a chance to calm down. Then we’ll leave.”
She knew she should thank him for saving her life—for staying calm in a crisis and getting her the hell out of there before she hurtled into her own death. But she couldn’t. Not yet. She figured Steven of all people was smart enough to understand. “What if we don’t have a couple of days?”
“Look, nearest I can tell, Lyudmila’s group made some mistake, and that’s when the creatures found them. Maybe they thought it was safer to leave the ravine at night; who knows? All we have to do is not make the same mistake they did, and we’ll be fine.”
“How are we supposed to avoid it, when we don’t know what their mistake was?”
He shrugged. “We’ve been able to observe these things for days. We’ve witnessed what they sound like, when they move, how they kill. Now we have to use that knowledge to our advantage. We’re going to get out of here, Nat. I promise you. You will not die in this ravine.”
His words were small comfort. Even less so when she heard a scraping noise and saw he was digging at the roof of their shelter.
“What are you doing?” she hissed at him, kicking the sole of his boot again.
“Making a hole.”
“I can see that. But why?”
“So I can get out.”
“Are you crazy? They could be standing right outside, waiting.” But as her paranoia quickened her pulse, she already knew it wasn’t true. She’d have been able to smell them. The snowmen had their own particular stench, a pungent aroma of dust, body odor, and rotting meat.
“They travel at night, Nat. I assume they sleep during the day.”
“That’s a big assumption to make. And a dangerous one.”
“I prefer to call it an educated guess. Anyway, it has to be done. I need to get you those boots.”
“You’re not leaving me here alone.” As awful as it was being stuck with him in the snow cave, the thought of being alone was so much worse.
“And once you have the boots, we’ll go together to get supplies.”
“We can’t go out there. That’s what they’re waiting for. What if they’ve taken over our camp? We killed their friends; I’m sure they want to kill us.”
“We have to risk it. It’s either a quick death out there or a slow death in here. We need supplies, Nat. We won’t live long on snow.”
By now, he’d dug a hole large enough to expose his head. Putting on his shades, he wiggled his way outside. She bit her lip to keep from crying out, certain something ghastly was going to happen. She kept seeing Andrew’s death, over and over again, the anguished expression on her friend’s face, until her chest squeezed so tight she could barely get air. The feeling of being buried alive intensified.
Steven lowered his arms, dropping back inside their shelter. “It’s clear. I should only be a few minutes.”
“Please don’t leave me here. I’ll go with you.” In her panic, she clutched his pant leg. With a bemused smile, he pried off her fingers.
“I can move faster without you. I’ll be right back, I promise. You have to start trusting me, Nat.”
“This isn’t about me not trusting you. It’s about me not trusting them.”
Pulling her toward him, he kissed the top of her head. “I’ll be right back. Wish me luck.”
And then there were two, she thought as she watched him disappear through the hole he’d dug.
She hoped she wouldn’t have to revise that number down to one.
Nat had expected to go half-mad waiting for him to return, but before she could blink, he was shaking her awake.
“Here, put these on.” He thrust Lana’s boots into her arms, and her stomach churned at the faint smell of decay. “Quick. We have to hurry. I found Igor.”
Perhaps it was the lack of food, or she was groggy from the unexpected nap, but he wasn’t making sense. “Why the rush? Is it getting late?” Ensconced in their cocoon of snow, she had no idea of the time.