Until the Bitter End

1: Introduction. The Blizzard

He knew about blindness.

At least, he knew approximately what it was like. He knew that it was filled with darkness that heightened other senses--sense of touch, sense of taste, sense of smell, even. He knew that to be blind was to be unable to see what lay ahead of you, and that being blind meant finding alternate methods of navigating the world.

But Affogato had never been blind before. Not truly-–not that total, all-encompassing darkness. The closest he had ever come to not being able to see was when the snow was so bright in the cloudy midday sky that it hurt–-for a few hours–-to look out over the expansive, frost-ridden terrain. It was called 'snow blindness', he knew. You had to wear special goggles to protect against that, like you had to wear special snow shoes to travel through the snow.

He didn't have any of those. Not the goggles and not the snowshoes, and certainly not the vast and empty blindness, though the blizzard he was in made him feel like he was, truly, stumbling blind. What he did have were the clothes upon his back-–thinner than most, regrettably more geared for appearance and grandeur-–the metallic stave clenched in his half-frozen hand, and the windswept snow biting against his crust.

And an insatiable hunger, gnawing at his gut. His stomach was very, very empty, and very, very hungry.

Ironically, he didn't just know about this, the cold and the hunger. It was familiar, like an unwelcome friend.

The wind was smitten with him, sending frozen water kissing at his face and his hands and whatever else it could reach with rigor. Snow covered his back and the elegant fur accessory of his clothes, snuggled coldly against his cheek. His feet only seemed to dig deeper and deeper into the snow, and with each numb and frozen step, it became harder and harder to walk.

Affogato couldn't make out his own breath when he choked on a gasp, feeling his tingling legs and aching feet give way beneath him. His knees sank into the snow, and the snow climbed on top of him, doing everything it could to bury him. It's not fair, he thought, it's not fair. And it wasn't, really, but life–-simply put-–wasn't always fair.

And--he knew--it wasn't fair that he was losing the last remaining strains of his energy. And he was hanging on by a fragile thread to life as it was. And he knew that if he collapsed into this snow and indulged the warmth creeping into his body (not for the first, or the second, or the third, but the fifth time), then he would fall asleep, and the morning would greet him and receive no answer.

So he tried to march on, but his knees were already sunken. His numb feet stumbled through the thickness of it all, his body toppling forward. At some point, his grip was lost on the icy metal. He fumbled around for it blindly, huffing out hot breath after hot breath, a vacant and pleasant warmth creeping its way into his body. His body was hungry not just for food, but for heat. And, as bodies were wont to do, it was ravenous enough that it took that craving away from itself.

Affogato was dying.

And it was getting hard to think, getting hard to remember the cursed events that led to his current situation. His mind drifted like a dog, distracted from focus by the snow pelting his face and the heat burning within him. His clothes were thin but he was tempted to shed them. He resisted. The warmth was a lie, and he knew this. He was dying, and he knew this.

He couldn't find his staff. It was lost, somewhere, beneath the snow. Vaguely frustrated, he tried to stand back to his feet and press on, squinting through the pale haze of an ashen and empty night to search for someplace to rest, but he found nothing but trees, darkness, and the distant howl of a cream wolf. He didn't even know which way he came from anymore.

Affogato was lost.

He moved to walk again and fell, his legs buckling beneath him with weak protest. He slumped bodily into the ground, gasping and wheezing. He felt like he was crying, but he was too tired to feel whether anything came out. His breath was ragged and choking, and he sobbed and he screamed and he wailed until he could wail no more. And when he exhausted the air in his lungs, he took a gasp of biting, bitter cold air that stung horribly.

I have to get up. He knew he would die if he didn't. But each attempt was only met with failure. And eventually came the moment where he realized that he could no longer stand on his feet or walk any further.

The snow was suspiciously warm when he fell. Or maybe it was his body, lying to him, dying. He'd be buried under the snow and lost until the subtle thaw in a few months' time, or until the cream wolves caught his scent and dug his corpse up to eat.

Through the fatigue and the heat, he thought: What a miserable way to go.

He tried to climb to his feet over and over, feeling sweat bead against his head and his back in spite of himself. Everything was too warm even though he knew it was actually too cold, because the body was a liar. Needless to say, he no longer had the energy to stay upright, and as a direct result, he found himself lying in the snow, fog and mist, warmth and comfort filling his body and his mind. If he wanted to, he could delude himself into believing that he sat before a fire--the first fire in a while--warming his aching sugar bones and easing the tremors of his body. He could delude himself. He closed his eyes and breathed.

Yes, he could delude himself. He could almost see the fire burning beyond his lids, a warm and striking orange glow sparking in the air before him. There was little food to cook, and none of it necessarily tolerable on his stomach, but it was warm. His small hands, mangled with splinters, trembled by the fire.

The cream wolves howled. He was going to die.

And then there was nothing.