Firestorm: Book III of the Wildfire Saga (53 page)

Townsen must die.
 
There was no way around it.

More death…there has been so much already…is there no other way?

And so he wandered through the storm most of the night.
 
Morning found Denny cold, exhausted, and hungry—no closer to a solution that didn’t take him back to the dark place.
 
He wanted—needed—to avoid the place he’d gone inside after the Russians came, when he’d hunted down the stragglers.
 
He’d been successful but merciless and it had cost him.
 
Denny hadn’t realized just quite how much until that dark night at the cabin when Townsen had ambushed them.
 
The fear of what he might become had been too powerful and shut down his ability to fight back.
 
He helped direct the defenders and cared for the wounded…but he couldn’t play an active role in the battle.

Frustrated at himself and weary of taking action that would only lead to more bloodshed and death, Denny stomped through the snow, not caring where he went, driven by the need to move—to do
something
.
 
He’d become determined to solve the problem or burn out his anger through exhaustion.
 
He slapped a snow-laden pine bough out of his way and panted on into a small clearing.

Denny worked his way around a drift and looked down into a slight bowl-shaped depression in the whiteness, surrounded by tall straight pines.
 
Untouched snow blanketed everything, muffling the world.
 
As he stood there, his thoughts faded into a background buzz. Gradually his senses returned as he took in the frozen tranquility before him.
 

Jays and crows squawked at each other.
 
Up ahead, a squirrel jumped between trees, creating a small shower of snow.
 
He took a deep breath and felt peace fill him along with the cold, crisp air.
 
He closed his eyes and sighed, feeling the tension escape his body, swirling with his breath as it condensed into vapor.

Something wet landed on his nose and he opened his eyes, breaking the spell.
 
The heavens had opened again, dumping more delicate flakes on an already white landscape.
 
Denny sighed.
 

I’ve got to find shelter.
 
I won’t do anyone any good if I die of exposure.

His feet, unyielding blocks of ice wrapped in snow-crusted boots, felt like lead weights.
 
Damn.
 
He stomped again, hoping to get the circulation in his feet flowing again. A gentle wind rustled the snow-capped pines as he trudged forward into an uncertain day.

Too late
…whispered the trees, kissed by the breeze.

Denny froze, listening, but the trees said no more.
 
Shaking his head, he pushed on, feeling a pang of worry tinged with hunger.
 
He stopped at the crest of a slight ridge, looking around as he struggled to slow his heart and catch his breath.
 
The snow came down heavier now, obscuring his view much further than two hundred yards.
 
It was worse than the night before.

Too late…
the trees reminded him.

“It’s
not
too late,” he growled, immediately feeling the heat in his cheeks.
 
“Jesus, now I’m talking to the trees.”
 
He shook his head and focused on his surroundings.
 
The area looked familiar, like a dream viewed from another person’s mind.
 
The realization of where he was struck him like a snowball to the face.

The cabin.
 

Fresh snow had erased the footprints and violence of two days ago.
 
The all-enveloping cold had preserved the place as if in hibernation.
 
Denny pushed all memories aside, ignored the screaming he heard in his ears and the iron smell of blood on wood.
 
Shelter—the cabin would provide shelter.
 
He had to reach it.

Each step brought him closer to his goal—an attainable one this time.
 
Each step reminded him how weak and cold he'd become since venturing out the night before.
 
Each step sent a new throb of pain into his right hand where he’d deliberately sliced his palm to seal his vow.

Denny looked down.
 
Snow had so encrusted his boots that every step seemed to slow him down a little more.
 
It felt like the cabin actively resisted his approach, as if he was not wanted.
 
Go back,
it seemed to say.
 
Go back and forget this place.
 
No good will come of it if you stay…

Denny struggled through the pain and fear of the last few steps until he stood sheltered from the storm, his hands on his knees before the front door.
 
The door had come ajar after the battle, riddled with bullet holes, but still serviceable.
 
Snow had wormed its way in the crack and sealed the opening as high as Denny’s hip.
 
He pushed forward into the drift and used both hands to force the uncooperative portal open.
 
The sound of wood scraping on ice filled his ears as he tumbled through into the darkened cabin.

He collapsed on the frozen floor just inside the door, already feeling a slight increase in warmth compared to outside.
 
The wind chose that moment to send a blast of snow in after him as a parting gift.
 
He lay there on his back, letting the snow land on his face and laughed.
 

He’d done his best to avoid this place, to avoid the memories and fear wrapped up in the brief time he'd been here.
 
And where had his wandering taken him?
 
Exactly to the place that had forced him to confront the darkness dwelling just below his skin, clawing to break free again. He’d failed to meet the challenge a few days ago and had paid the price of watching his friends fall one by one all around him, shot down by Townsen’s henchmen.

What price will you exact today?

Denny stared at the ceiling, watching snow drift down through the hole he’d created.
 
He’d climbed up to see the battle beyond the cabin walls—to escape the choice he had to make down below, to escape the death and screams.

He sighed, taking a firm grip on the darkness that scrabbled to escape his internal restraints.
 
It sensed an awakening, a chance.
 
Denny decided to give in to inevitability.

He rolled to his feet and wiped his face as he stood.
 
Heat—he needed heat.
 
He scrounged around in the dim light of the cabin and found the wood stove, dinged by several impacts but plenty serviceable.
 
Denny opened the cast-iron door on squeaky hinges and pulled some of Anse’s wood pile into the opening.
 

He opened a thigh pocket on his pants and pulled out the small deerskin wrapped bundle of survival equipment he always carried on his person.
 
Impatient with the gloves making his hands useless for fine work, he bit the fingers of his right glove and pulled his hand free.
 
He grasped the little ferrocerium rod and used the striker to create sparks over a little ball of Vaseline-soaked cotton.
 

The third spark caught and the ball ignited.
 
Using his gloved left hand, he carefully deposited the nascent flame inside the stove and added kindling.
 
Within a few minutes, he had a robust fire merrily crackling away in the stove.
 

Denny closed his eyes as he felt his hands thaw in front of the stove's open belly.
 
It would take a while longer for the rest of him to thaw out, but it was start.
 
He turned to the cabin and paused, taking in the dried, wine-dark stains on the floorboards.

That’s not wine.

He blinked and the image of Fred Sanders, the father of one of his students, laying over that stain a few nights ago vanished.
 
He was one of the lucky ones.
 
Maybe—a few of the survivors carried Sanders back to town to see Dr. Granger, but with medicine in such short supply and most of the townsfolk sick with the flu, Denny had serious doubts about Fred’s chances.

When he raised his eyes from the blood stain, he sought out one of the rough-hewn cabinets Anse had installed in the cabin.
 
Upon pulling the creaking pine door open, he found a cache of canned foods, fruit, beans, chili, vegetables, most shot through during the battle. Exploded cans of soups and stews coated the interior of the cabinet and were frozen solid.
 
There wasn't enough left to survive more than a few days and he'd have to use his knife to chip out what was viable.

Denny’s stomach voiced its enthusiasm thought, so he set to work hacking at the frozen glop to free a can of chili.
 
After a few minutes of cussing, he pried the can loose from the mess and opened it with the P52 opener from his emergency kit.
 
Denny placed the open can on the stove and worried a few more loose.
 
These he set near the stove to thaw, not cook.
 
While the chili heated, he busied himself with scooping out most of the snow on the floor and shutting the door more firmly in its frame.

The stove didn’t put out much light, but it was enough to see in the near darkness of the abandoned cabin.
 
Denny poked around, half afraid to find a body in the dark corners, though he knew that morbid work had been handled days ago.
 
It wasn’t until he sat back and looked upon the pile of supplies he'd scrounged up that he realized he’d done it all on auto-pilot.
   

He'd a amassed a small pile of canned goods, a few frozen and near-to-bursting cans of beer, one boot—two sizes too small—a pair of gloves that fit, a blood-stained John Deere hat, a handful of bullets of varying calibers, and what looked like Deputy Griswold's service revolver.
 

Denny picked up the wheel gun and fumbled with it a moment until he got the thing to open and looked in the cylinder.
 
Three shots left.
 
He snapped it closed and pawed through the bullets on the floor.
 
He wasn’t sure which ones went into the gun, having never fired one of these before, so decided it would remain half loaded for now.

He blinked and sat back, looking at the pile in front of him.
 
He’d had no conscious thought to gather supplies.
 
He’d put no more thought into what he was doing other than it kept him from thinking about what had happened here and what he knew must now be done—and how that might change him.

Haven’t I already changed?
 

No
…answered Grandfather Red Eagle’s voice.

Denny sighed and looked down at his somewhat warm hands.
 
He listened to the quiet
hiss
as his gloves dried near the stove.
 
A glance at his boots led him to remove them.
 
He’d need to get the ice and snow off those if he planned on getting out of the cabin before spring.

No use in trying to hide it.
 
I’m losing my mind,
he told himself as he put the boots next to the stove to absorb a little warmth and dry out.
 
Before Red Eagle could reply—Denny knew he would—he got to his feet and walked over to one of the shattered windows.
 
A small pile of snow lay scattered below the sill among bits of broken glass.
 
Wind whistled through the abused opening and carried with it a smattering of snow.

Stepping carefully to avoid any glass on his unprotected feet, Denny peered out into the growing darkness.
 
Night wouldn’t be too far off.
 
He clenched his jaw in irritation.
 

I know better than to wander off into the darkness.
 
In winter, no less.
 
What was I thinking?

Movement at the treeline, perhaps twenty yards away, drew his eye.
 
A big, dark shape moved awkwardly between the trees, weaving to and fro as if drunk.
 

“Is that a bear?” he asked out loud and nearly jumped at the sound of his own voice.
 
He stole a glance over his shoulder at the pile of supplies and the revolver, glowing in the light of the open stove.
 

Not a lot of good that little pea-shooter will do against a bear…

He turned back to the window and noticed the creature had cut the distance to the cabin in half.
 
Definitely on a path to his doorstep.
 
Damn
.

Denny backed away from the window and toward the stove.
 
He stooped to pick up the revolver, cradling the now-warm grip in his hand.
 
Moving to the farthest corner from the door, he waited in the shadows.
 
He strained to hear over the whistling wind.
 

Crunch…crunch…

Whatever it was, it approached the cabin slowly.
 
Cautiously.
 

Crunch…crunch…
 

Denny shook his head.
 
Think.
 
It’s winter.
 
Bears hibernate in winter…it’s got to be a man…but who?
 
The footsteps paused.
 
Denny adjusted his grip on the revolver and aimed at the door.
Go away…go away…
 

Without warning the door slammed open and a huge silhouette filled the doorway, framed by the drifted snow and whiteness beyond.
 
Denny held his breath and struggled to keep his trigger finger from twitching.
 
He couldn't be sure who it was, and didn't want to shoot an innocent person.