Faint orange sparks crackled erratically in the night, dying on the roaring winter wind as they were ripped out into the darkness.

Frantically, the man stooped lower over the soggy wood pile, trying to shield his precious tinder against the wailing elements. The icy artic air flowed through the rips and tears in his bloody clothing and whipped against the black tips of his fingers as he struggled with the flint.

The torn wool from his tattered jacket and the scraps of sticks and wood he had pulled from the plains of snow refused to hold still as he slapped the piece of flint against the edge of his pocket knife. More sparks that were quickly lost in the abyss.

“Come on, damn it.”

Every time the knife connected, there was a flash, enough to reveal the dried blood on his hands and his frozen fingers, which had stopped trembling by now, and were left only numb, refusing to move in the manner he wanted them to. He could see it creeping down into the palms of his hands.

And yet, he persisted, ignoring the crunch of the snow behind him, and ignoring the stinging in his side that had only gotten worse with each passing minute. Somewhere behind him in the dark lay the remains of the small biplane. Maybe when the fire was finally lit, it would draw any other survivors out of the dark. The fact that he had woken up twenty yards away from the plane wreckage face-down in the snow didn’t bode that thought well, however.

And then another spark, brighter and more fierce then the others, striking the soft cotton on top of the tinder. The darkness parted underneath the burst of flame, and soon enough the crackling pyre rose to fend off the darkness.

The man sighed, stumbling backwards to sit in a pile of snow. The cutting cold he had expected was instead met with gentle numbness, and he was grateful to just be able to rest for a moment.

Curiously, he raised a heavy head to glance around. The fire spit long shadows out around the otherwise empty snowy grounds. Black tips of trees brushing against the dark horizon, and there, in the distance, a bent wing sticking up from the landscape.

Another gust of wind, loud and angry, stealing away some of the flame’s brightness and warmth. And there just on the edges of illuminated area, pawprints in the snow.

And for a moment, the wind died, leaving him in the echoing absence of silence. No crunching in the snow, just the faint methodically drip of something at his side.

He let his head hang down, eyeing the source of the noise. The light had revealed the copious amounts of blood on his coat, stemming from a small metal rod sticking out from between his ribs. But it wasn’t the pain that bothered him, that had been frozen away several minutes ago.

In that still moment, the darkness in the sky parted, the full moon dawning on the open plain, clearing the night away and illuminating the frozen landscape.

He hadn’t been wrong about being found. 

At first he had blinked, thinking it was snow in his eyes, or the leftover light from the fire sitting in his retinas. But no, another pair had appeared off to the side, and then another, and then another, encircling around him.

Tons of bright yellow eyes resting in what remained of the shadows, focused entirely on him.

The whites of their fangs reflected in the pale light of the moon.

Crackling embers echoed in the lull between the gales of wind, as the light cast from the fire receded and withered in the frozen night. Each crack and pop a little quieter than the last.

As the clouds rolled back in around the moon, the night was encased in darkness again. Leaving the man with only the tiny circle of light and warmth from the quickly fading fire.

He hoped the cold or blood loss would get him first.