Sometime in the morning the snow had stopped falling. Gray light shone directly into the cave, and Amy Raye wondered about that. How could she be facing east? The truck had been west of where she’d shot the elk and quartered him. She tried to recall the map she had stared at for days, as well as the direction in which she had tracked the animal. To be facing east would mean she had been heading away from the direction in which she’d set out. And she could not help but wonder, given the look of the terrain, if she was as far east as Big Ridge and Cathedral Bluffs, dense terrain full of rocky crevices. How had she veered so far off course, and how would anyone ever find her? At a good pace, she could hike almost three miles per hour. She tried to remember how long she had tracked the elk. Had he moved in a straightforward direction, or had his path been erratic? The only thing she could be certain of was that she had tracked him moving downhill, which would have accelerated her pace. If the elk had been moving in a straight path, she could very well have covered six to eight miles, despite her slowing down to follow the blood trail. If she had been moving east, she would be thick into the bluffs. Even if a search party was looking for her, she doubted anyone would venture that far into the area, and with the snow, she wasn’t sure they’d be able to even if they tried. And then there was the trek she’d made after quartering the elk, after he’d gone downhill to die. By that point she’d lost her visibility because of the snow. Instead of moving northwest back to the truck, she could have hiked southward. Again, she tried to recall the map, but without knowing exactly at what point she’d come upon the elk, there was no way to be sure of her location, except to know she was miles and miles out of any reasonable search radius. And again the thought that she would not be found. She was alone, and she was lost. “Help! Someone help me!” But her voice echoed back at her as it had earlier in the night, and her breathing quickened with the sheer terror of what she knew.
Maybe her path had been erratic, or circular. Maybe the path of the elk had been erratic as well. Maybe she was not as far away from the truck as she feared. She would keep the fire burning. She would continue to hope that someone would see the smoke.
Her appetite burned in her stomach. This was a good sign, as the nausea seemed to be subsiding. The fire was strong. She held the skewer with the elk liver and heart over the flame. Despite everything, Amy Raye considered how lucky she had been. She had shelter; she had this warm fire and plenty of wood. She had food to eat. Yes, her left leg was useless, and her left hip battered with bruises, but her body was strong; no other bones had been broken. These were her thoughts as she cooked her first meal in this place and the aroma filled the cave and filled her lungs.
The fire crackled, and the pitch from the soft wood popped, and a strange peace settled over her. It was beautiful, really, this place, an anesthetic of sorts. She ate the heart first, and as she did, she thought of the animal whose life she’d taken, and who was now giving her food to eat. She remembered the sound of his last breaths, imagined his spirit moving on, imagined him running in a place without hunters and tags and ammo.
Her thoughts were startled when she heard a snapping of wood outside the cave, a small animal perhaps. She became still, slowed her breathing. The sound grew louder. Something larger than one of the squirrels or rodents was out there. And instantly she remembered the rest of the elk meat, her only source of survival should she not be found right away. “No!” She crawled closer to the entrance, wrapped her hand around a rock, threw the rock and screamed. She did not see the animal, but she heard him, another branch snapping, footfall moving away. Daylight streamed through the clouds. She was now outside the cave. She checked the elk quarter. It was undisturbed. Then she saw the cougar prints. She had lured him to her. He had smelled the meal she had cooked. He was hungry, also. She would lure him to her again when she cooked her next meal. She had to be smarter.