Garrett Thornwood's Arc

Chapter 1 of 1

Garrett Thornwood wanted to build the greatest fur trading post in all Siberia, but this morning his knife wouldn't cut rope. He crouched over a cold snare in the snow and watched the blade skid. The edge had worn to nothing. He had nicked it on bone and stone for three winters straight. His snares were worse. The wire had frayed and the loops sagged, too weak to hold a lynx, let alone the heavy game he needed. A tall man in furs, with black hair and a thick beard, he knelt there empty-handed while his breath smoked white. His fur stock was thin. He had checked it that dawn in the trapper's cabin by the river. Six pelts hung on the line. Six would not fill a trading post. Six would barely feed him through the thaw. Buyers wanted bear, wolf, and heavy elk hides. His gear could not take them. He needed better tools, and he had no money to buy new ones. So he wrapped his broken snares in a hide and walked the long road to the repair shop. The grey building sat squat in the snow. Its blue sign glowed bright against the gloom. A wooden door hung beside a wide metal garage door. Inside, a young man with blonde hair and blue eyes bent over a workbench. Randy Fitzgerald. People said he could fix anything, from a torn coat to a dead engine. "Door's open," Randy called, not looking up. "Set it on the bench." Garrett dropped the bundle. The snares spilled out, rusted and bent. Randy picked one up and turned it in the light. "You've been dragging these through rock," Randy said. He grinned. "The wire's shot. But the frame's good steel. I can rework it." "I can't pay yet," Garrett said. He hated the words. "My pelts are thin. I need the gear to get more." Randy set down the snare and studied him. "Then we trade. I fix your knife and your snares. You bring me the first good hide you take with them. A heavy one." Garrett held out his hand. Randy shook it, grease and all. Randy worked fast. He ground the knife against a wheel until the edge bit paper. He stripped the old wire and strung fresh steel through every loop. By dusk the snares held firm when Garrett pulled them. The knife split a leather strap in one clean stroke. "Now you can take something worth hanging," Randy said. Garrett walked home with sharp tools and a debt. The thin stock still shamed him, but now he had the means to fix it. His first set of the new snares went out along the river trail that night. At dawn he returned to check them. The nearest loop was sprung and full. Caught inside, pale fur gleaming, sat a small white rabbit with delicate antlers above its ears. Garrett had never seen such a creature. It was no heavy hide for Randy. It was something stranger, and it watched him with its bright Blue Eyes- A fabled Jackalope.