Alaska 1867

“Are you sure about this?“ a soft voice asked of her husband.

He, in turn, showed her a smile as he finishes with the last of the gear and his coat.

“I must bring something back for you,” he pressed a kiss to her forehead and turns to the small child bundled up in her arms, “and you.“

As he pressed a kiss to their child, a frown transforms her face as she grabbed his arm, “Something is wrong this time,” she whispered to him, pleading his reconsideration with her eyes as she finished, “Please… don't go.“

A warning heeded would have been best but nothing would come between the man and helping his family survive as he looked back once more and left through the door, joining the rest of the men and the Inuit guide that had always brought them back home.

…

The miserable cold bit at the men as their feet sunk into the knee deep snow, as the wind crawled up their back underneath the thick coats.

A grumble erupted from the men as their tiredness began to weigh down on their bodies, feet sinking in deeper as they fought a path through the snow, pulling and pushing forward. The promise of deer nearby as they followed the guide after the tracks kept them from falling behind.

The men, proudly in their prime, began to chat amongst themselves, something to keep their minds off the grueling journey they've embarked on. Some talked about their families back in the land the left behind, others about the family waiting for them at home here in the new nation. One of the hunters decided to tell of their homeland instead.

“In Russia,” he started, a slight accent spilled in to his words, “we would send those we no longer wanted to Siberia. The undesirables; the political rivals, the prisoners, and the deformed, to the worst place on this planet. Do you know why it was Siberia?”

“To freeze there asses off,” a man said as the rest laughed and nodded at the thought.

“No,” he responded as he looked forward. Then, almost as a whisper, he said,

“Tigers.”

A chill ran through the air at the single word, as the rest of the men brushed off the feeling, the guide stood there, immobile.

He turned slowly towards the rest of the men as he said, “We no longer know the true name of bears as the mere mention of their name would invoke them.”

“But there are no tigers here,” said one of the men, shifting the position of his rifle to lift the weight off one side of his body.

The guide, with a mysterious glare in his eyes, looked at the men before before saying,

“There are.”