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The fight becao screaed places, tree branches whipped across his face, the overpowering breath of the monster dried his eyes and entered his mouth His hand was hot with blood and the slick touch of insides Though he still held the knife, he could no longer feel his hand on the grip, as if he and the blade were bound together

He thrust, slashed, and stabbed, rolling across the bloodied snow that layered the ground, and feeling the land shift around hiht, squatted down, leaped He used the solidity of the wilderness from which to launch fresh attacks, and at one point--o’s screa different

Somewhere in there, Jack heard fear

He increased his assault, fury and rage giving way to a brutality he had never known existed within him He was a wildno thought to the past or future--he was not Jack London, he had no family, and tomorroas an unknown place

At so had stopped He was stillaway again, and it took hiround was not the forest floor He was soaked with sweat and blood He could smell a fresh death And he stood upon the tuht, looking all around He was standing on the monster’s chest, left foot in a puddle of thick, dark blood Around hi’s limbs, all of them slashed and flayed, one hand alers clasped around a tree trunk and digging into the bark To his left lay the thing’s head, thrown back with its monstrous mouth open Steam rose from the mouth Steam also wafted fro whistled, bubbles burst, and Jack heard the Wendigo’s final breath

I can be ht, but he was not certain of that, because things still did not feel right His heart thundered in his chest, and his hand refused to drop the knife And that sone, and in its place the --he could s fat--and beneath that, the subtler scents of roasting root vegetables He sighed and sank down, closing his eyes, transported back to Lesya’s clearing, where he watched her preparing and cooking the kill of the day Every breath he took brought in a richer smell, and his mouth watered uncontrollably

"I thought I was no longer hungry," Jack whispered, but the smell of food all around hirier than he had ever thought possible Perhaps Lesya had been starving hi hiestion of food in hisaway layer upon layer of his fat as the days went by, seeking the hollowed core of hiain There was richness in the birdcalls, and an exuberance to the rustlings and whines of srowth Insects flew, flies buzzed, and Jack was starting to feel like the center of everything He saw several birds perching on branches snapped during his fight with the Wendigo, and he tried to listen to the song they were singing He stretched hisdark loo contact with anything outside

"I’m Jack London," he said, but the words see His stomach ruer he had sensed in the Wendigo His throat was parched Flesh will serve round was shifting beneath hi all around He looked about in confusion for a while, and then he saw that the corpse of the defeatedFlesh and skin wrinkled and fell away Blood pulsed from the raw meat as li’s head tilted to one side

Soon, whatever was left of the Wendigo would be gone Jack would have to set snares and traps, hunt a rabbit, skin and gut and cook it, and before he could do all that, nominious death beneath these wild skies

But not if…

He fell froht hand, and cut a flap of bloody flesh and skin froht, he exa with rich blood He put it to his nose, just a finger width away from his nostrils, and inhaled It sers

Jack sighed and opened his

His storoaned and inhaled, and the sick stench of rotten flesh hit the back of his throat Before he could prepare, he vo the handful of bad flesh Voain as he rolled away, Jack felt his hand open, and he discarded the knife at last He ca, and then he sat up and looked around the blood-soaked clearing

The Wendigo lay dead at its center, and its rot was accelerating A million flies seemed to buzz around the corpse as its flesh turned black, its skin withered, and it returned horribly to the shape of a ht rese not to dwell upon what he had almost done…and alroaning at the ache that had set into his ain now that the Wendigo was dead, because the dangers he ht face would be much more natural He needed a drink There was a splash of water in his canteen, and back down the hillside he’d fill up again at the river, and perhaps he’d be able to take a few shots at a rabbit on the way, skin and gut it, cook it this afternoon…

He fell to his knees I alo, he would have become one himself, a spirit cursed to haunt these wilds and prey on the innocent flesh of future travelers His hunger would be forever, his suffering eternal, until heSomeone with a knife

Jack had never known hi his battle with the Wendigo At the tiht, but afterward that wildness had al had stopped hiive thanks

"I’" The forest answered him with a brief silence, but as he went back downhill toward the river, it returned to life Normal, unhindered life

The storm lessened as he came to the river, and he could still see his footprints in the light snow covering froo It felt like weeks before, but he guessed it o’s prints as well, and that gave hihtmare, and to see physical evidence here of the creature’s existence was shocking all over again He looked at the blood coating his hands and trapped beneath his fingernails and wondered ould happen were he to s soan to panic He could feel the crust of drying blood across his face and throat, too, and he must have taken so and splashing so liberally back there in the wood