Remorseless Winter

The harvest had been reaped before the first snowfall. The Weatherhills made sure of that. Each of them knew keenly that Winter would be ruthless. Last year it took more than it had any right to. This year, they would be ready.

They'd stored their food, they'd made their clothes, and they'd readied their weapons, but when their world turned white they realized only too late it wouldn't be enough. That unnatural cold seeped through the castle walls in a way they were so sure it couldn't. Soon, closeness wasn't enough for warmth. Cold penetrated old bones and nagged at wounds. It hounded them in sleep. Day became night, and night lingered.

Winter would not be defied.

And then the elements were not the only thing against them. The mage's tower in which they'd trapped themselves drew the attention of looters eager to take supplies and, if they were lucky, artifacts. Once or twice a day – if there could be said to be days through the eternal grey of this storm – came the crashing of weapons and the shouting of desperate, angry voices. The enchanted crystal walls were never at risk of falling, but the entrance of the castle... They had their doubts. It only opened to the knocks of hands it knew, but what strangers may have been familiar to it? What unsavory guests could the mage have hosted years before they'd ever arrived?

Who was now causing that magical door to split?

When the winter winds whipped in Jacob took up the family rifle. Lawrence couldn't shoot it with one arm, and Hardtman was old -- too old, these days, to move quickly enough. But Jacob was young, able-bodied, and, most importantly, he had his children to think of. If anyone was going to shoot an intruder, it was going to be him.

The family sat waiting, silent as the grave and frozen as the Nexus, as Jacob, gun in his hands, crept through the darkness of the hallway toward the door.

They heard a yelp, then silence.

Just as they began to shift, to prepare themselves to fight or run, there came the just-audible whisper of voices trying hard to stay undetected.

"What are you doing here?" demanded Jacob to their relief.

The next there could be no mistaking. A hollow echo chased the words, "I'm here to save my family."

Harrowheart.

That might not have been the name that sat on the tip of every tongue, but they thought of the same man at once. Anna gripped Matthew's arm, and Heather held her children closer. Tamminy and Lawrence shared a look of uncertainty until she found the ghost of an uncertain smile for him.

"You know I can't let you see them," Jacob whispers.

"And you know y'all can't stay here all winter." Silence passed between them a moment before Harrowheart continued. "I'm gonna save you, Jacob. And your wife – my sister. And your kids – my niece and nephew – and my parents, and my brothers and sisters. And if none of them wanna see me after that, fine. But I'm not lettin' y'all die like this."

Jacob wasn't quick to return. When he did, he was no longer alone. He came with his rifle down, and behind him scraped the metal sabatons of the dead man who loomed behind, his face concealed by his tusked helmet.

The room fell once more into silence. Each party watched the other. Harrowheart unmoving, still obscured beneath his dark armor. Anna, remaining tense, kept close to Lawrence even as he stepped toward his brother. The eyes of the runeblade kindled to magical life and Lawrence hesitated before he found the courage to stare it down.

"Well?" he finally asked. "What are we waiting for? Let's get the hell outta here."

The family didn't need to pack, but gathered the bags of emergency supplies they'd kept waiting since the first harvest of the year. They'd fled their home before without the luxury of baggage, and each of them agreed they'd never live through that again. There was a pack for every person – even Kendra, ten years old. Harrowheart, in his worgen form, was loaded like a packhorse with every spare sack and satchel they could find, each stuffed to the brim with supplies. Even then, each adult refused to say what they knew: With this many mouths to feed they wouldn't last a month.

Their final order of business was to tie themselves together. If they were going to be lost to the blizzard, at the very least they would be together.

The gateway split for Harrowheart's helmed snout, and he led the way into a world the Weatherhills couldn't recognize. Only weeks prior they had been working that land, and now, mere steps from the door of their home, they were lost. There was no sign of their table, no hint of their fence. All had been buried under hip-deep snowdrifts that rose with every gust of wind. Short as they were, Kendra and Tamminy were forced to take the rear, trailed by the rasping sound of Harrowheart's hovering runeblade as it dragged its forked tip through the packed snow.

~ * ~ * ~ * ~

Hours passed and Harrowheart continued to plow forward, scraping and scooping with his snout and helmet's tusks. He may have had the benefit of toiling tirelessly, but behind him the living were lagging. None of them were strangers to exertion, but this was a test of endurance like they'd never felt. Legs trembled, backs ached, and eyes burned. This stark white world was blinding. It was hungry.

And it wasn't the only thing yearning for victims.

Something was moving in the snow, creeping through the increasing darkness. Multiple somethings? Even Harrowheart couldn't tell. His ears caught the sound, his nose caught the scent, but he couldn't find it. His thick arms pulled him forward and he felt the tug of a dozen people behind him. They were too weak to run, and even in this form he wasn't strong enough to pull them.

And then that resistance was something more. It was a thrash, a scream, a shotgun blast into the whirling winter winds. Something had them. Something had them! Right in the middle, tearing at the ropes, grabbing at a body whose scream Harrowheart couldn't name. He tried to round on the enemy, but the snow and the satchels trapped him in the rut he'd made. He howled, snarled, and another shotgun blast knocked someone down, pulling the others with.

Enough was enough. The runeblade raised itself aloft like a javelin and lanced itself into the unseen whiteness.

Then nothing.

Screaming turned to sobbing. The rope rocked with their terrified quaking.

The runeblade returned, and Harrowheart pulled forward.

Winter doesn't end for tears.