They walked towards the trees. The she-wolf’s strength aided him in his strides and he let her help support him. The night seemed to come faster than he anticipated, and he could see all the stars of the heavens with a clear view that he had lacked deep inside his valley. The stars were splashed against the blue-black back drop of night. The goddess’s brush had made a thick swath of dense stars through the middle of the sky and all the stars were there watching him. The moon was smaller tonight than she had been yesterday. It was always thus; the moon had her phases and she moved as the natural order of things dictated. Even if he spent every night and every day of his life without sleeping, he would never be able to count the multitude of lights that inhabited this sky. Even now, exhausted almost beyond his human capacity, his heart lifted and his spirits rose to meet those stars in the heaven and he was filled with a deep contentment and joy.
“Thank you, for allowing me to see and appreciate the beauty that still exists in this world,” William whispered.
His guide led him closer to the trees and he was surprised at just how many there were. This was a small forest not just a lone clump of a handful of trees. As the wolf led him deeper into the trees he felt at home. He inhaled and he could smell cedar pines and redwoods. The pine needle floor was a welcome relief to his feet and he found his gait strengthening. The wolf led him to a clearing and he collapsed on the ground. The she-wolf watched him as he rested on the ground. She started to drop the piece of denim, but instead kept it in her mouth and ran off into the woods.
He was left alone, exhausted and disoriented.
He studied his surroundings. The trees smelled similar and the pale moonlight filtered them in much the same way that he was accustomed to. He didn’t know if the wolf was going to be back and he was too exhausted to hunt even if he had the right weapons, which he didn’t. He unsheathed his knife and stood up.
The wind had ebbed as he was protected by the surrounding trees, but he needed to think about shelter and staying warm through the night. He began to gather wood for a fire. He searched around the clearing for various sticks and pieces of wood. He was able to find a good supply of dried, dead wood on the ground and didn’t need to do much cutting. He gathered the various pieces of fuel into a nice pile and went out again for another load. Once he was satisfied that the amount of wood would last him through the night, he went looking for water.
He walked deeper into the forest, and he found what he was looking for a clear, brisk moving stream. The water didn’t look deep but it looked cold as it happily bubbled and gurgled over the various rocks of the creek bed. He followed it downstream a good distance and staying a safe distance away from the creek, he relieved himself. He hadn’t had a bowel movement in over a day and his body was not happy with him. Fighting through constipation he finished and cleaned himself with sand from the creek bed.
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He put his pants back on and walked back upstream. He leaned over the water and drank straight from the creek. The cold water lowered his core temperature a few degrees but the cold crisp water did wonders for his energy levels. He felt a little more alive, a little stronger but also ready to sleep.
He walked back to the clearing. He didn’t have to worry about double backing and covering his tracks. He knew that the she-wolf was going to be back and she would be leading him away from these woods soon. Something told him this was not their destination and, not for the first time, he wondered where exactly she might be taking him.
Once he got back to the clearing, he cut a good, strong, green branch from a nearby tree and sat down next to his wood pile. Taking his knife and some pieces of wood he gathered previously, he shaved off a good amount of kindling and shavings for tinder. As he worked, he kept his ears alert, listening to the sounds of this unfamiliar place. It was dangerous to not pay attention to your surroundings, especially since he was a visitor here. When he had a good amount of tinder piled up, he took up the green branch he had cut down. Placing it off to one side he took out his half of his denim shorts and cut a strip of material from it.
Taking the strip, he tied it to one end of the green branch. Putting that end of the branch into the ground he bent the stick until he could tie the other end of the denim to the other end of the stick. It took him one or two tries. The strip of denim was not as long as he would have liked but he had to make do with what he had. Once his makeshift bow was completed, he grabbed a good sized half branch and he split the thing down the middle. Once he had a good flat piece of wood to work with, he took his knife and dug out a small depression in the log.
He couldn’t help but stop for a moment. This was hard work and with his body already exhausted he didn’t know if he even wanted to finish. It would be so nice to just pass out right now. But that would be close to suicide. He knew that he was cold. He could feel it even through the numbness of exhaustion. He didn’t know the altitude of this place and therefore he didn’t know how long it would be before the sun came up to warm his body. He might die from hypothermia in the middle of the night. It wasn’t an impossibility That was enough for him to keep working.
Shaking himself to throw off his fatigue he picked up another dry stick that was mostly straight. With his knife he removed the outer bark till the end was nothing but smooth wood. He sheathed his knife and picked up the bow he had made. Bending the stick even more to create slack in the fabric he wrapped the denim around the straight stick he had just finished working. Placing the stick face down in the depression of the log he had cut and placing a small amount of tinder around the vertical stick he began working the bow back and forth. As he moved the bow in a sawing motion, the denim wrapped around the vertical stick and spun the stick around. He pressed down on the stick to keep it vertical and create friction. He moved the bow back and forth as the heat between the two pieces of wood and the pile of tinder rose.
It was dark at this point and he didn’t see any smoke rise from his labor but he did start to see a small red glow. He took away the bow and stick, and gently blew into the tinder. The glow grew and with a final puff of air a small flame leapt up. His spirits leapt with the flame and he added more kindling to the infant fire. The flame licked and consumed the fuel with no trouble, and he added more wood till he had a good-sized fire burning.