The Hemlock Stove

The stove is eating the last of the hemlock, and the frost is an inch thick on the latch.

I’ve been in this cabin since the first freeze, watching the timber turn to charcoal.

There’s a track in the snow outside the window that doesn't belong to any cat or elk.

It’s too wide, too deep, and it’s been circling the porch for three nights straight.

I checked my rounds—five left in the belt, and the oil in the lamp is turning to slush.

Hunger is a physical weight now, sitting on my chest like a wet wool blanket.

The wood started screaming an hour ago, but it’s not the wind in the eaves.

It’s the sound of something heavy testing the cedar planks, looking for a soft spot.

I used to think the woods were neutral, just a place where things lived and died.

But this thing out there... it’s got a sense of humor. It waits until I almost drift off,

Then it taps on the glass with a knuckle that sounds like a hammer hitting a bone.

It’s not hunting for meat; there’s plenty of frozen deer out in the brush.

It’s hunting for the moment I decide that the cold is better than the wait.

My father told me once that nature doesn’t have a soul, just a set of gears.

But he never sat in the dark and felt a mind pressing against the walls of his house.

The fire is a red eye now, blinking out, and the silence is starting to roar.

I can hear it breathing through the chinking—a slow, wet rattle in its throat.

It’s patient. It knows the door is only as strong as the man standing behind it,

And I haven't slept since Tuesday. My hands are shaking too much to lead the shot.

Philosophy doesn't do much for you when the food chain decides to reverse itself.

The latch just clicked. Not because of the wind, but because something learned how it works.

I’m sitting in the middle of the floor with the Winchester across my knees.

I’m not praying. Prayer is just another way of asking for a head start I don't have.

The door is swinging open now, letting in a gust of white and a smell of old earth.

It’s standing there, blocking out the stars, a shadow that’s colder than the January air.

I realized then that it isn't a beast at all—it’s just the winter come to collect its due.

I leveled the barrel, but the iron felt like ice, and my finger wouldn't move.