Chapter 14.1

Sara sat at the table, picking the raisins out of her bag of trail mix as she snacked and made a little pile of the fruit. The thought of having a heavy meal or anything with meat in it made her stomach do somersaults. She picked a few more raisins out of the bag before raking them all into the palm of her hand. She got up and headed for the door to give them to the deer she called Ted as a treat.

“Are you there, Ted?” Sara asked before she peeked out the door.

She was greeted with the customary snort as the deer continued to lie against the cabin door. 

She laughed, “Of course you’re there. Where else would you be?” 

Sara gently held her hand out to the deer through the crack in the door. The buck happily and quickly nibbled the raisins from her hand, tickling her as he did.

“You are such a good boy. I wish I could take you home with me,” Sara told him.

The deer responded by flicking his ears and nuzzling her hand, raking his antlers against the cabin in the process.

Sara laughed, “And that, my friend, is why I can’t take you home. You would never fit in my car, and with those antlers, I can’t see anything good happening to my house.”

Sara went back to the table and sat. Picking up the journal again, she turned it in her hands several times, looking closely at the leather cover. She thought about the hardships the man who wrote it had gone through and how heartbroken he was as he wrote. Sara opened the journal to the place where she had left off and continued reading.

December 21, 1879

I sit here at this table staring at my plate. I have prepared another piece of flesh and plenty of fry bread. I have not been able to bring myself to take a bite of the flesh yet. The mere thought of doing that again makes me want to wretch.

I know there is no other option but to eat it if I want to keep going. Why did I have to make that promise to Jim? If I had not done that, I would not think twice about letting that fire go out and having the cold take me. I wonder if he would forgive me if I did. I think he would come to me and haunt me until I either built the fire back up and ate or torture me in the afterlife with his never-ending complaining about me breaking the promise. 

December 21, 1879

Second entry. I broke down and ate more flesh. I did it the same way I did last night. I cut it into tiny bits and ate each one with a bite of bread to hide as much of the flavor as I could.

The strangest part of it is that I feel like I need to eat more even though I hate it. I do not understand why I feel that way. Maybe the stories Jim told me of the wendigo are true, and that is why I want to eat it when I hate it. 

I did not even check the snow today. I can hear the wind blowing. That will either pile the drifts back up after I clear it or bring more. It is a futile effort to try to dig out, and I know that. I am going to wait until I can no longer hear the howling of the wind before I check the snow. Perhaps God will smile on me and blow some of this snow off the cabin and away from the door. It would be the first time he has.

December 21, 1879

Third entry. My Sarah, what am I becoming? I detest the taste of the flesh, yet I feel the need to eat it. Like it is some kind of unearthly urge to consume it. I do not understand what is happening. 

I can almost hear Jim’s voice in my head, telling me that I need to eat to stay alive and do what I need to do. To keep the promise that I made to him and to make it out of the forest in the spring. 

The silence in this cabin is nearly maddening. I can hear the wind if it is blowing hard, and I can hear the howls and stomps of the monsters outside. Other than that, the snow has sealed this place like a tomb. 

December 21, 1879

Fourth entry. I had another piece of flesh. I keep trying to think of ways to hide the flavor of it. I will keep making bread as long as I have flour. 

I will only eat as much as I have to so that I can keep up enough strength to dig out firewood beside the cabin door and get out of here when it comes time. I need to go out and get more wood now if I can. 

My shoulder is sore from hitting it when I slipped. That just made everything worse. I thought it was finally starting to get a little better, and then I have to go and do that. At least after this long, I am getting used to working with only one good arm.

I think I will have some willow bark tea before I try to dig out the sticks of wood. If it does what it has been, that will help take the edge off the pain if I move wrong or bump it again.

December 21, 1879

Fifth entry. I tried to sleep. What little rest I did get after I got the wood was fitful and filled with screams and strange shapes and shadows running about the trees I saw in my nightmare. It has been a long time since I have had dreams like that one. 

I have a headache, and I am not feeling well for some reason. The last thing I need is to get sick on top of being injured and trapped by this infernal blizzard. If I do, I fear that will be the end of me, and there will be nothing I can do about it.

December 21, 1879

Sixth entry. There is a sound outside like nothing I have ever heard. It sounds like someone is moaning, only much, much louder than what any human could ever be capable of. There is no way that another person could be out there in this weather. I have not seen another living soul who resided outside of this cabin in years unless I was in town, selling hides and stocking up on supplies. 

I cannot sleep. The noise has me on edge and is making my head hurt even more. I have to question if I am being punished. Punished for things that I did years ago, what I have done to Jim, and for things that I may do in the future. 

December 22, 1879

I am exhausted. I slept little last night due to the noises in the dark. Those sounds, my God, those sounds. They kept getting louder and echoed off everything. The snow should have muffled them, but it felt like it made them louder still.

I have never experienced anything quite like that before. I remember the sounds during the war, and I think last night might have been worse. At least during the war, I knew what was screaming and moaning. I have no idea what was making the racket that went on last night.

I still need to eat this morning. I have no appetite, especially since I know part of what I must eat. The vile nature of what I am doing makes me feel that I am more of a monster than what was outside the cabin during the night. 

December 22, 1879

Second entry. I forced myself to eat more flesh. After I cooked it, I minced it and mixed it into the fry bread dough before cooking that. I added a lot of salt and pepper to the dough, and all of that combined did make it slightly more palatable. It was still horrendous to eat it. I think this time, it was more of the thought of where it came from than the flavor. The taste was still not something I enjoyed. It was, however, tolerable.

After I had eaten, I proceeded to dig more firewood out of the snow against the cabin. Even with virtually no sleep, I still had the strength to do it, to my surprise. That strength did not last long, so I am resting for a while and will go back to it soon.

December 22, 1879

Third entry. I was elated when I broke through the snow and saw blue sky while digging out the firewood. That joy did not last. As I continued to dig, I began to hear the stomping of that thing that comes around the cabin at night. 

I am barricaded inside the cabin that is both my blessing and my curse. That thing is walking around on the roof again. I don’t know what it is or why it is here. It has only ever been here at night. It makes no sense for it to change its pattern and be here during the day when it is only out at night. 

For a short while, I felt brave. I stood in the doorway, looking up through the opening in the snow. I was hoping to see a glimpse of something that would tell me what it is. It did not take long for common sense to take over, and that is when I came inside and secured the door. I don’t know what I was thinking when I was watching for it. I wouldn’t be able to fight anything as enormous as it sounds, even if I were uninjured.

I think I will lie down and rest while that thing is roaming about the roof. If I do, I will be able to get more done when that thing leaves, if it leaves. It seems like it has been here more than not recently.

December 22, 1879

Fourth entry. Jim came to me in my sleep again. This dream was unsettling. Jim did not look like himself. He was gaunt and pale, almost gray. His hair was loose and disheveled. Each time he opened his mouth, that moan I heard in the woods came out of him. This was not the Jim I knew. It was not my brother.

I need more sleep, but I do not want to close my eyes. I do not want to have another dream about Jim like I had. I do not want to see him that way. I must sleep. I will lie down and wait for what happens. 

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