Obscure
As the man hunkered down against the howling winds outside he grew weary. Was it cold or pain that was making him sleepy? How would he know if it were the winter winds or sheer exhaustion that would overtake him? Would he even care? The wind grew angrier with every passing moment. Soon the snow would be flying. The man had two choices. Make a stand here in amongst the trees before it snowed or push on hoping to find better shelter. He knew his chances of making it home were poor.
Mother Nature made the decision easy. The flakes started falling shortly after the man found the spot beneath a giant pine. It seemed like a good place to ride out the storm, or was it? What happened when the snow piled up and buried him beneath within the tree? Actually the more snow that piled up the better. Perhaps it would serve as insulation against the wind. There would be air above so he would not suffocate. By all indications this was going to be not only a heavy snow, but also one that would be followed by extreme low temperatures.
The man swept away the pinecones and cut some boughs from higher above his head to make a carpet or mattress to lie down on. Once he completed this task, he tried to find a comfortable position to lie in. That was not proving to be as easy an undertaking as procuring the pine boughs for his bed had been. The throw from his horse had landed him in an awkward position upon a dry creek bed of stone. His right elbow, arm and hand hurt and his gun had been damaged in the fall, or more precisely, the landing. Now he was not only injured but also for all practical purposes, unarmed. All he had left with which to defend himself was his hunting knife. The cold was starting to settle in his bones and his vision was fading.
Finally he was able to find a position leaning more upright against the tree trunk than lying down that would allow him at least some comfort. As the man drifted off to sleep he thought of his family and friends. Thoughts of a warm fire and hot cup of apple cider filled his mind. The warm gingerbread cookies that were always made at the first snow would be baking in the oven. He could almost smell them.
He hoped his horse would find her way back to the ranch and that someone would notice before too long. The problem would be that the storm would make mounting an immediate rescue hazardous, to say the least. There would be no way of knowing which direction the mare came from unless the snow started falling further down the valley sooner than it was up in the foothills and then abruptly stopped before covering her tracks. The likelihood of that happening, slim to none.
Everyone knew the storm was coming, but they needed meat and plenty of it to survive the coming weeks and it had been his turn to do the hunting. Unfortunately the man's horse had come up lame a short distance from the outer fence line. He had to walk her back and take a different mount. That had cost him precious time. He had chosen the black bay mare instead of the chestnut gelding simply because he didn't like the look of the chestnut. He thought he was too old to make the trek up into the foothills, especially if the weather took a turn for the worse before they could get back. He felt the mare would be more sure-footed. Unbeknownst to him, the mare had a sore back. The ride across the valley was not a problem and she seemed to actually start loosening up but about half way up the hill she must have pulled the same muscle that had been giving her trouble two days before. That was when she decided, just as the man had a bull elk in his sights, to rear suddenly sending him tumbling off her back and down onto the hard dried creek bed. His gun jammed and twisted. The horse took off leaving him to pick himself up and make his way back down the mountain across the valley and home. He was at least ten miles from even being able to see the fence line of the property.
With no food in his pockets other than a couple of pieces of jerky, the man knew his chances of survival were slim. If he didn't freeze to death first, he was liable to either starve to death or become the meal for some hungry wolf or coyote long before help came. It was getting dark.
Evan Lorne looked up through the pine boughs at the sky above. It was swirling and angry with no moon or stars to be seen above the dense cloud cover. But he knew. He knew what was up there. Stars. Worlds with untold and unimaginable wonders. He knew that some day men would reach beyond those clouds and touch the stars. Some day, he thought, he might even be one of those men – if only in the obscure dreams of a dying man.