The Ladies of Horror
Picture-Prompt Writing Challenge!

Into the Quiet 
by Kathleen McCluskey 

   The snow swallowed her screams first. A split second earlier, the slopes had been alive; skis carving lines into fresh powder, laughter on her lips as she raced the wind. Then the world thundered down in white, a torrent of snow and silence, and she disappeared.

It hadn’t hurt, not at first. Just the shock of being pressed in all directions, like the hands of a giant folding her into its icy grasp. As the snow packed tight, the pressure grew unbearable. She tried to move, to breathe, to scream again, but there was no room for sound. No room for her.

It had been hours, she thought, or minutes. Time didn’t belong here. Her body ached as her warmth was leached into the snow. The snow crawled inside her veins like a poison. Her eyes fluttered shut.

When she opened them, she was standing.

The cave of ice stretched in both directions, walls glistening like crystals in the pale, blue light. Frost coated her eyelashes, her parka, her fur lined boots her mother had bought for the trip. A trip that she would never finish. She couldn’t feel the cold anymore. Maybe that was the first sign.

She walked.

Her footsteps made no sound, and the ice beneath her was soft, like clouded glass. Shadows danced in her periphery, curling shapes that vanished when she tried to look at them. “Is this how it ends?” She thought.

The thought came not as a fear but as a whisper of knowing. She had died, hadn’t she? In that crushing avalanche, the mountain had claimed her. There would be search parties soon, brave men and women with shovels and dogs, shouting her name in the snow. But they would not find her in time. The cave of ice was now her tomb.

A faint glow appeared at the end of the tunnel and she walked toward it like her legs belonged to somebody else. The light brightened until it became blinding. Molten gold spilled through the cracks of the ice. She felt warmth again, a hint of summer on bare skin.

Memories flooded in: her father teaching her to ski at seven, her sister crying with laughter after a clumsy fall. Warm fires and soft blankets. Hands holding hers. Love. Life.

She paused just shy of the light.

Beyond it was something she could not name, something vast and endless. Perhaps it was peace. Perhaps it was nothing. But she was afraid to go any further. Her breath, though she no longer needed it, caught in her throat.

Behind her, the tunnel stretched forever, dark and waiting.

Her heart stirred. “No. Not yet.” She thought.

She turned.

Somewhere far away, buried beneath mountains of snow, there was still a chance. A thin, fragile, thread pulling her back to a world where her body lay cold but not empty yet. Her family waited there. Life waited there.

The ice trembled as if displeased. The light faded behind her and the cold howled in fury, clawing at her cheeks as she ran.

“Not yet,” she whispered. “I’m not ready.”

And from somewhere above a rescue dog barked.

.

Fiction © Copyright Kathleen McCluskey
Image courtesy of Pixabay.com 

More from Kathleen McCluskey:

The Long Fall: Book 1: The Inception of Horror

Lucifer always cunning and intelligent challenges father to a battle of wits. Being the angel of light he casts a judgemental eye upon mankind. He begins a war with his fellow archangels and God. Michael, along with his siblings defend their home and mankind from their deranged brother. Broad swords and hand to hand combat drench heaven in blood. The four apocalyptic steeds are released, each having their own destructive power. Betrayal and lust are at biblical levels. Understand the very creation of evil and the consequenses that transpire in the first of THE LONG FALL series.

Available on Amazon!