The Elk
A.S.
March-November 2024
The elk, feasting on the grasses of the clearing, looks up, scanning the surrounding landscape until it reaches me. Hiding behind a shrub, I remain completely still. Locking eyes with me, it’s almost as if the elk sees me. But it returns its focus to the meal at hand.
Steadily, I knock the bow, disguised by the background chatter of nonstop cricket chirping. Aiming for a clear shot, I draw the arrow. The wooden bow bends to the string. I release. Piercing through the air, the arrow strikes the elk. It slumps to the ground with a groan.
I wait, crouching. After a few moments, I stride toward the clearing, the slain elk being the centrepiece. It was not a clean kill. I shed a tear, approaching the whining animal, knife in hand, prepared to put the poor thing out of misery. My hand reaches for the elk’s rich fur, resting on it momentarily.
I sigh.
I quickly slide the knife into the elk, like a sword slipping into a sheath. It lets out one last whimper, its liveliness evaporating from its body. Whistling sharply for my idle horse, I begin to skin the wapiti.
Wapiti is another word for elk, literally translating from Shawnee as ‘white rump.’ It sounds more elegant and meaningful than just ‘elk.’ I realise I won’t have enough space to fit the carcass on my horse.
“Shoot,” I mutter to myself. The night clouds clear out and the moon looks down on me as if to say ‘You didn’t think this through, and now you’re leaving good meat to waste.’
My horse, Hammurabi, trots up to me and snorts. He’s been a loyal stallion for years now. Ever since I was a child, I wanted a horse. I first got one when I was a park ranger. When I retired I got to keep him.
I load the pelt on the back of Hammurabi, who lets out an agitated nicker, his ears flat. Then a whinny. He lets off on his hind legs for a second.
“Whoa, whoa there… what is it, boy?” I ask.
He snorts. I mount him and lightly tug his reins, patting him. I scan the woodland for predators that could be disturbing Hammurabi.
“What is it, what’s troublin’ you?”
I spot in the distance, past the dense midnight trees, the lake, shimmering like smoke. Except, it is smoke.
My eyes went wide, and Hammurabi and I panicked together. I rode toward the lake's edge and stopped at the water. We spotted the orange blaze crackling bright in the umbral distance. The fire lit the black sky in the following minutes and turned a hazy orange.
“Come on boy,” I said as I pulled on his reins and we turned and galloped away toward my cabin. Toward home, if there even is one anymore.
The wildfire travelled fast, not far behind me, cooking the forest. Everywhere I looked, there was fire. It engulfed the woodland like an unrelenting swarm, eating everything it touched. Eventually, I met a wall of burning sycamores.
We dashed back across the clearing past the elk, but Hammurabi reared once we met another wall of fire. He neighed fiercely. The flames danced and cackled like demons, surrounding us. I turned and tried to run the other way, but that was blocked too. I felt the smouldering warmth and indifference of nature bearing over me.
The forest roared.
I was surrounded.
The fire inched inward toward the clearing, the blaze stretching from the canopy, down the trunks, onto the forest floor.
Hammurabi snorted, reared, and bucked me off his strong back in one smooth action.
“Hammurabi!” I shouted, but he bolted through the flames and disappeared.
Now prone, I reached for my holster and unclipped my flare gun. I raised and fired it, the bright star exploding in the air.
Hopefully, my call will be answered. I spotted a gap in the fire and crawled toward it while putting pressure on my bruised hip. My hand reached and gripped the ashen earth, dragging the rest of my body toward the gap.
I winced and screamed.
A sharp pain shot through my back and dissipated throughout my body. My head pulsed. I coughed and coughed and coughed as the inferno grew closer. The opening in the flames closed, sealing my fate. I slowly crawled back to the elk carcass.
From the angle I was lying, my face was next to the remaining shrubs once shrouded in darkness, now illuminated by the firestorm. I could just barely see the silhouette of my cabin between the woods, far in the distance, across the lake, with the mighty conflagration backlighting it.
I felt my back and studied my fingers. They were bloody. Not the elk’s, but mine. I gasped and wheezed. I did not shout for help. Instead, I propped myself up against a rock in the middle of the clearing, facing the lake. The lifeless elk sat next to me, moments away from being scorched.
The cycle of nature has run its course. I have protected this forest, I have taken from this forest, and now it’s the forest’s turn to take me. The sun has shined bright on the other side of the world and now has returned to me, painting the smoke over my head a glowing topaz.
The first browns and reds of autumn have yet to come. Under the faint, hazy moonlight, I think of the elk.