Bound by Hellfire

Chapter 21

I walked in silence for a short while as Ethan and Uriel took the lead in our expedition. My eyes blinked wildly at the change in scenery. The dark, dull forest we had been running blindly through was now piercing white. It wasn't just from the inches of snow that had fallen while I was unconscious. Everything from the bark of the trees to the grass at our feet was now its opposite shade. Honestly, I couldn't tell which color my eyes preferred.

A chirping noise fluttered through the branches overhead causing all of us to stop and stare. Pale blue birds whisked through the branches just above us; each one singing its sweet melody as they swirled into the treetops.

I may not have been a fan of the blinding white of everything, but there was at least a sense of life here that brought a breath of calm in all of us. I didn't feel like I was being watched with every step, and surprisingly, I took my time taking in the beauty our new surroundings had to offer.

Green and yellow reeds peppered the forest floor; poking through the thick layer of powder. Large red flowers sprouted from long linking vines which wrapped through the trunks and branches like a spider's work of art. Birds chittered through the canopies sending pockets of snow to rain down on our heads as we pushed deeper into the forest.

The air felt fresher too; cold and crisp as I huffed a smokescreen of steam in front of my face with each step.

Ethan and Uriel pressed on just a few feet ahead of me. Ethan had tried some of the fruit that Uriel had found in the forest and had begun rambling about how much better it tasted than the food on Earth. It was kind of nice not being the center of his attention, but strangely I felt left out the longer I walked through their tracks. 

I began walking faster, trying to catch up to them as we made our way around a particularly large tree, but was immediately met with a pair of backs as I rounded the corner. Ethan and Uriel stumbled forward as I plunged into them, both catching their footing as they kept their eyes ahead.

"Why'd you---," my voice fell flat as I looked over both of their shoulders.

A large brown-furred animal stood just a few yards away! Staring directly at us! Its deep black eyes watching on with curiousity as we froze in place.

Our breaths held still as the creature bellowed a deep hungering growl that shook the snow from the trees around us! We instinctively took a step back and slowly began taking another as the animal shook the snow from its bristly fur.

I looked down at its long claws as they scraped the snow. Its maw opened wide as it yawned another hefty growl into the cold air. My eyes locked back to the creature's head, to a large pair of horns that coiled into spirals on its side. It reminded me of a mountain goat's horns, assuming the mountain goat had the body of a two-ton bear.

The animal again lurched closer, releasing another groan from the depths of its belly. It was clear that it was not happy with how slowly we were exiting its home, so once again we took our steps back, faster, and faster, but the bear continued to follow.

"What do we do now?" Ethan whispered.

The bear scraped both paws on the ground before standing on its hind legs! It towered over us, its eyes a cold, dark stare. We froze in shock; staring up at the monolith of fur as it gaped its mouth down at us releasing a terrible roar that shook our bodies to the core!

"RUN!" Uriel screamed.

All of us sprinted away from the beast as its thundering paws pounded through the snow behind us!

Ethan and I had ran in the same direction; weaving through the thick layer of trees as our legs scraped against the underbrush of the forest. However, it didn't take long for us to realize that the animal was not chasing us. We stopped in our tracks, hiding behind a small patch of bone-white pushes.