I woke up a few hours later and stared blankly at the stars in the sky.

  I felt completely empty.

  My dad died.

  We got betrayed.

  I don’t know what the hell I’m supposed to do now.

  The stench of blood would probably attract more wild animals to come and eventually finish me off.

  I began to laugh as tears rolled down my eyes.

  “Fffffffuck. It’s all my fault, why did I trust my shitting intuition, I never had one before why would I trust it now?”

  I spent a couple hours laying in my blood.

  Eventually I got bored, and I slowly got up; my hand was pale from the blood loss. The moonlight lit the area perfectly.

  As expected, no corpses of the wolves were left, the caravan also gone, only the dead bodies of my father and the knights were left. Surprisingly they didn’t loot the things around me.

  There was nothing more I wanted to do anymore. Only to bury my dad.

  I clawed at the blood-stained snow around my father. Barely any progress, I then grabbed a broken blade from one of the corpses and slowly dug a hole.

  My hand went numb from the cold; I barely gripped the blade as I dug deeper into the earth.

  I dragged my father’s dead body and put it into the meter tall hole, then buried him.

  I couldn’t care less about the other bodies as I went ahead and picked up all my arrows, including the broken ones and put it in the quiver before tying the broken leather.

  I then picked up my bow.

  It had no use since I only had my left hand now, but my dad made it from scratch, and I always cherished it.

  I didn’t have my daggers; they were gone with the wolves. I didn’t have my camping supplies; they were in the caravan. And I didn’t have a will to live much longer.

  I lied earlier; I cared about the other bodies. I went up to one and used my arrow to cut the fabric of one of the knights’ shirts.

  I cut them into long strips before covering my wound with it.

  Okay maybe I do have a will to live, but I wouldn’t care if I dropped dead the next second.

  Most of the knights were looted clean, their armor gone, only broken blades were left behind.

  I twirled an arrow in my left hand before throwing it up into the air, unfortunately it stuck straight into the ground, I then spun it on the ground and followed the direction it pointed to.

  It went perpendicular from the snow prints the caravan went.

  I headed in that direction. The snow crumpled under my feet as I traveled.

  The trees around me quickly blocked out the moonlight as I headed into darkness.

  Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

  I quickly stopped.

  I heard sniffing sounds, growling, and lots of snow crunching.

  It was another pack.

  I held my breath and stayed motionless.

  Soon the sounds faded, and I let out a deep breath.

  “Rip knights.”

  I continued to trek in the snow, my body became numb to the cold.

  Although the hairs on the back of my neck were already raised, they raised once more spiritually as I froze.

  My heart raced rapidly and filled my ears with its beating.

  There was absolute silence.

  My heart slowly returned to its natural pace before I started moving once more.

  It was most likely death owls. They usually eat the corpses of animal during the night, but they were also known to kill beings on their last breath.

  I continued to move forward, at times I stopped due to a bad feeling or muffled sounds.

  At this point I wasn’t pale; I was light blue.

  Even my breath didn’t turn into clouds anymore. I had no idea how I was still alive.

  At this point I started to feel warm, like the snow was comfortable to lay on right about now.

  But I persisted, I had this urge to keep moving forward until I died.

  Eventually I started hallucinating, in the distance I saw a camp where light blue skinned people like me were around a campfire eating fresh meat and drinking blood.

  The snow around me gradually rose to my waist, then my chest as I moved along.

  Eventually one of them waved towards me, I waved back. He urged me to come closer.

  Is this what death feels like? Is it welcoming? The warmth after a long journey in the cold. The island in the vast field of snow.

  My eyes were glued onto this sight; perhaps I would see my father alive and well.

  The snow came up to my chin, each step straining more energy from me. Until. I finally fell under.

  ~~~

  There was darkness all around me, but a single star stood out.

  In the vast darkness of wherever I am, was the star floating gently.

  My body floated in the abyss; my hands were see through.

  Is this another innuendo for death?

  In any case, the star felt so far away. Yet so close. I could almost touch it.

  I had this faint connection with it, like I could slowly pull it towards me like a string.

  I decided to pull it inch by inch, day by day, year by year.

  I made very slow progress, but it was slowly getting faster.

  Until one day, it shined so brightly in my eyes and was soon in front of me.

  I reached out to grab it, but my hand passed through it. But I felt the connection was still there, that I could still move it with the string.

  Pulling it once more, it was in front of my face, I then ate it.

  I felt a calm flow of energy that dyed my body a deep purple color.

  And suddenly I could see countless stars all around the void.

  I marveled at the sight and for a while I did nothing but stare.

  “…mro be tyku, ai, mro be tyku?”

  Someone was here, I wanted to say something, but no words came out.

  “…aiiii, aiiiiiiiiiii.”

  “Kyant pelo lem.”

  Cracks started to appear in the void. The stars that appeared everywhere started to clash.

  Countless fragments of stars collided until just the void remained.

  Suddenly a large white horizontal line appeared in my vision.

  I could once again see the stars, but they were much less vibrant than before.

  Besides me was a light blue skinned man long ears and a light blue skinned girl, they both wore white furred and leather outfits and had white hair and blue eyes. On the other side was a large blue fire.

  “Lim ae, lim ae!” the man exclaimed.

  “W-where am I?”

  The girl sighed.

  “Ah ets a uman.”

  The man had a shocked expression. “Ot ce lum lib, ets ue.”

  “Het yo tuj et.” The girl pushed the man away then coughed. “Heello uman.”

  “h-hello?” I said back.

  “Ow didja git ere.” The girl threatened me and held an icicle to my neck.

  “I walked.”

  “Es tere aniwon else?”

  “n-no, I’m by myself.”

  “Gewd. Lim po xy.”

  “Uh, lim po xy to you as well.”

  She just rolled her eyes. “Umans”

  The man came back, and he held what seemed to be an assortment of different furs, a majority was white.

  “Ve sould git tribe leeda to deel wit lem.”

  “Tyku.”

  The man then wrapped me tightly in the fur before hauling me off.

  I felt bad because my bloody bandages would probably stain the furs, but I felt warmer.

  They brought me to the biggest igloo I’ve ever seen before entering, it felt much warmer in here and I relaxed.

  “Tribe leeda, yus da uman gewl.”

  The tribe leader was a buff person who was sitting on some furs in the corner of the tent, and for some reason he was shirtless.

  “I vek m uman lanug?”

  The girl then pointed at me. “Uman.”

  “Ah.”

  The tribe leader then reached into a chest and fumbled around for a moment before retrieving what looked to be a beautiful ice jade necklace.

  The girl then grabbed it and placed it on my neck.

  “Hello, hello, testing one two three is it working?”

  “Probably?”

  My head became nauseous as words that didn’t sound like English translated into words that did.

  “Ughh, my head hurts.”

  “It’s working.” The girl cheerfully added.