Page 106 of The Heart of Winter

"Thanks for being honest, Winter. It’s good you’re not sugarcoating it. This isn’t a tropical island with plenty of food sources…"

Winter snorted lightly. "Yeah, well, those stories are always about idyllic places. Funny, I never read any books about castaways on desolate islands with no food."

"Probably because there's nothing to write about, nobody survives on those islands longer than a few days," I muttered sourly.

"Or maybe it's just not a romantic setting for stories. It's all about the daily struggle to survive, not comfortable lounging on golden sands and swimming in blue waters full of fish and shrimp that you can almost snack on right out of the water," Winter added, his face twisting into a sarcastic grimace.

"Yeah, that's probably the reason. Doesn’t sound romantic, not when you're turning into a skeleton."

The weight of my words hung heavily in the air. Not wanting it to totally spoil the mood, I shifted the topic.

"Have you seen anything? Ships? Drones?"

Winter shook his head. "I checked my phone, it's 1 pm now, adjusted for the time zone. I don't know how long it would take for the Coast Guard to organize ships and get here."

"Probably a few hours. Maybe they're not in any rush because they know they're just coming for bodies. And those can wait."

Winter scooted deeper into his side of the mattress and wrapped his arms around his knees. He also removed his blanket, since there was no need for it here, this part of the cave was almost room temperature, though it was still pretty humid.

And so I watched him in silence.

But this time, my gaze was different than usual.

More… like hungry ogling. And I couldn't help it.

It was the heat rearing its head. I could see his profile against the light streaming from the cave entrance about twenty yards away. It was fairly dark, but since I'd been lying here for a while, my eyes had adjusted well.

Winter seemed to be deep in thought, even muttering under his breath for a moment, "The sea is empty as far as the eye can see. The slopes of the volcano aren't covered in thick snow. Makes me think this might be one of the southern Kuril Islands, but there are other islands in the Sea of Okhotsk."

The name didn’t tell me much. I wasn’t into geography, so I just blankly stared at the cave wall.

"There's one more thing, Winter, that we both haven't thought of."

He turned toward me, and from this close, I could clearly see the soft outline of his lips, which caught my attention more than they should have in these grim circumstances. A shiver ran down my back, and warmth spread through me. The closeness of this man's body… I had to steady myself!

"Think about it. Why are we alive?"

He didn’t answer, though he took a deeper breath.

"Gravity is the same everywhere on the planet," I continued. "We fell with those seats, which are really heavy. We should have been going at a crazy speed. I was never good at physics, but I think there's no way we should have survived the crash."

"What are you suggesting?" Winter’s voice grew tense.

"Something strange happened, Winter. You can't deny it… It's a miracle! And if it's a miracle, it means we might not even be as close to the plane's flight path as we thought. Whatever brought us here might have brought us even further."

Winter's face showed a hint of impatience.

"The circumstances are strange, sure. But why would we survive, and not the others? We're not special in any way."

"Someone must have helped us, Winter. There's no way any living being could have survived that crash, it was absolutely impossible."

Winter let out a loud sigh. For some reason, he seemed uneasy.

"You don't know that! Some winds have tornado-strength power. We could’ve been pushed here. Please, Sariel. There’s no point in talking about this right now, okay? We’ll think about it later. For now, let’s focus on our plan."

For a few seconds, I stared at him, trying to understand the source of his uneasy reaction. But I couldn't figure it out.

"You’re probably right. Today’s already brought us enough… emotions," I muttered, giving up.

---