The Place Between Worlds

The storm deepens. The shelter groans.

It hit like a living thing.

Not a wind — a wall.

A great breath exhaled by the world itself, flung sideways across the trees and into the heart of the village. The outer hut that had collapsed was only the beginning. Now the main shelter groaned with the sound of old wood bending. The roof dipped, swayed, scattered snow in clumps from seams no longer sealed.

Branik barked a warning in short, harsh sign: Support now.

Vince was already moving, dragging a beam from the back corner, wedging it beneath the sagging cross-strut. Snow hissed through a fresh tear in the thatch. The wind was everywhere now—under them, inside them. The fire spat and nearly died.

Then: a new sound.

A thump.

Muffled. Inside.

Then—silence.

"Did something fall?" Maela asked, eyes wide, hands mid-sign.

Rhosyn scanned the ceiling. Branik pointed to the eastern wall, near the old supply stacks.

"No—lower," Vince said. His voice was dry, hollow.

Another sound.

A crunch. Close. Beneath.

They turned.

The snow along the eastern corner of the shelter had risen high — too high. When had it slipped in? When the beam cracked? When they'd all been pressed together, guarding the center?

Vince stepped carefully through the half-lit space, ignoring the sting of cold in his bones. He dropped to a crouch. The mound was too neat. Too clean. No debris. No tools. Just… packed snow where it shouldn't be.

He pressed a hand into it.

Solid. Heavy.

Then—a patch of cloth.

His fingers froze.

"Branik," he said, already digging.

The big man was there in two steps, hands working beside Vince's.

Then Maela saw it.

"The girl—where is she?"

No one answered.

Because they knew.

She hadn't left.

She'd been covered.

Swallowed.

Branik's hands tore at the drift. Ice cracked. A fist-sized lump gave way, then another. Vince dropped to his knees and pushed deeper.

Then—

Skin.

A tiny arm.

Still.

"No—no, no, no—" Maela was there now, sobbing. "She was right here."

They pulled gently. The child emerged like something born from the snow. Limp. Frost on her lips. Her eyes shut. No sound.

"Move!" Rhosyn yelled. She took the girl, unwrapped her own scarf and wrapped it again, tighter, pressed her to her chest, rocking.

Branik lit a clay bowl. Eldan brought breath-warm coals from the fire. Maela fed dry moss to the flame, tears streaking her face.

Vince crouched, silent, hand still in the hole where the child had been.

No tracks.

No warning.

No one had seen the snow come in.

It hadn't roared. It hadn't shouted.

It had simply arrived.

Buried her while they all sat, inches away, thinking they were safe.

He stood slowly.

The walls shook again.

Another gust.

Long. Low. Like a beast exhaling.

He turned to the door flap.

Still closed.

But it felt like the storm was already inside them.

The roof groans. The fire is too small.

The child didn't wake.

Rhosyn wrapped her tighter in a fur. "Kha sath, pethra… stay, little bird," she murmured, rocking. Her voice shivered as hard as her hands.

Branik and Eldan braced the main beam. "Too heavy," Eldan grunted.

"Snow's stacking like stone," Branik answered, teeth clacking.

A fresh gust slammed the hide. The flap ballooned; powder burst across the floor.

Maela spun from the fire pit. Smoke curled around her fingers.

"Hesha ran! This hut is coffin‑wood!" she burst out. "If we stay, we freeze or choke."

Vince lifted one hand, signing steady.

"Stop," he said—short, rough.

Maela ignored him, turning to Rhosyn. "We should run before it crushes us," she snapped. "The ridge may still be clear."

Rhosyn barked a laugh—hoarse, bitter. "Run into night‑ice with a child like glass?" She hugged the girl, eyes wild. "You'll lead us to graves, Maela."

Maela's mouth trembled, but no reply came.

The fire faltered, then died—smothered by its own smoke.

Dark.

Ferren struck flint. No spark held.

He muttered, "Dead stones…."

A baby whimpered. Then another. The sound turned the dark colder.

Vince signed listen. Then, out loud, slow:

"Storm wants fear. Wants us alone."

No one moved.

He pointed at the beam. Help.

At the torn flap. Tie.

At the dead hearth. Try again.

Simple orders. Clear hands.

Branik caught them first. "Do what he says," he told the room, voice firm. "We brace, we breathe."

Eldan dropped beside Ferren. "Here—dry bark, newer flint."

Ferren answered in a relieved rush, "Light it slow, feed it thin. Let it breathe."

Maela slumped by the wall, face streaked with soot. She muttered, "If this fails, we pray the ridge holds."

Rhosyn kissed the child's forehead. "She breathes still. That is enough prayer."

The spark caught. A fragile tongue of flame licked up. Eldan cupped it with his palms. "There," he whispered.

Wind boomed against the roof—louder, angrier. The lash‑thongs quivered.

Branik growled, planting his back under the beam. "Hold with me!"

Eldan and Vince shoved shoulder to timber. Wood screamed, sank a finger‑width, stopped.

Silence.

Then a single crack overhead—long, low, promising nothing good.

The roof did not fall.

But it wanted to.

And outside, the storm kept breathing.

Time slipped.

No one counted it. The fire flickered low again, fed only by scraps. Shadows bent across the walls like long fingers, restless, twitching. Frost grew along the inside of the shelter—white veins spreading across bark, bone, cloth, and skin.

Vince sat near the flap, legs outstretched, hands stiff with cold.

He hadn't moved in an hour.

Neither had the storm.

Outside, the wind was no longer a howl. It was a moan—long, deep, constant. Like something dying slow beneath snow that never stopped falling.

A young boy whimpered. His mother pressed her hand over his mouth—not cruel, just urgent. Quiet. Always quiet. The sound of fear carried farther than footsteps.

A few feet away, Branik breathed shallowly, back pressed to the support beam, one eye half-shut. The leather lashes creaked with every gust. He looked at Vince and gave a slow, tired nod. Still holding.

Eldan had stopped talking. He crouched near the fire with one hand open above the tiny flame, the other rubbing his leg where the cold had bitten deepest. Bloodless fingers. Slack jaw.

Rhosyn hadn't moved since the child stopped shivering. She just sat there, holding the girl against her chest. Listening for breath. She didn't cry.

Maela whispered something under her breath. A prayer, maybe. A curse. Her eyes were red. Not from weeping—from smoke, and the bitter cold.

The wood above Vince's head groaned again. Not sudden. Just pressure. The slow confession of material stretched past its limits.

He closed his eyes.

He thought of Naples. Again.

Not the streets, not the riots—this time, a night inside a warehouse with no heat. Four men, wounded. One bleeding out from the gut. They waited for a car that never came. Vince had sat on a crate, coat soaked in freezing rain, blood on his sleeves. Someone asked if they were going to die.

Vince hadn't answered. Just handed the man a cigarette and said, "Smoke if you've got breath. The rest comes later."

He opened his eyes.

Same silence now.

Same waiting.

He looked at the people huddled in the dark, breathing smoke, cradling children who might not wake. Not a mafia crew. Not soldiers.

Just survivors.

Raw. Shaking. Real.

He stood—slow, spine aching.

The others turned. Not all. Enough.

He raised one hand, palm out. Still. Wait.

He crouched near the fire. Let the heat lick his skin. Then picked up a stick, barely lit at the end, and used it to light another. Then another.

The small flame grew. Weak. But present.

He passed one to Brik. One to Maela. A third to Ferren.

Tiny torches. Small warmth. But light.

In the cold, that was enough.

"Still storm," Vince said, voice raw. "Still dark."

He gestured a slow circle. We wait. We hold. Together.

Branik nodded. Eldan grunted something like agreement. Rhosyn rocked again. The child breathed shallow, eyes closed, lips cracked.

Vince stepped to the flap. Didn't open it. Just listened.

Wind. Snow.

No steps. No voice.

Only weather.

Only time.

He looked up. The roof was still holding. Bent, yes. Straining. But it hadn't cracked. Not fully.

The village hadn't broken.

Not yet.

And so, he sat again—back to the wind, eyes on the fire, body trembling. Not from fear. From the sheer effort of staying whole.

Because sometimes survival wasn't fire or food.

It was sitting in the cold and refusing to move.