Can’t Win Me Back

Elias frowned deeply; his worry etched onto his face.

"We've been shouting Ms. Alyssa's name the whole way.

With so many of us calling out, she should've heard us by now if she were nearby!" In a deep voice, Jasper said, The wind is too strong, and then there's the heavy snowfall.

Our voices are being drowned out.

Lyse might not hear us at all." Lyse.

Her nickname slipped from his lips before he even realized it.

"I'm just afraid she's injured—or worse, fainted.

If she blacks out in this cold..." Elias trailed off, his voice heavy with dread.

"Ona day like this, she won't survive long.

She'll freeze to death." The group exchanged uneasy glances, the reality of his words tightening their chests.

It wasn't that Elias was being a doomsayer.

Rather, this was the cruel reality that might actually happen.

Crater Mountain claimed lives every year.

Danger lurked unpredictably in the woods on the mountain—anything could unfold.

"Let's split up," Jasper commanded, his eyes fixed on the shadowy forest.

His voice carried an edge of desperation.

“We're not leaving until we find her." Elias hesitated.

"But what if—" "If anything happens to her," Jasper cut him off, his voice trembling with fierce determination, "I'll make this place my grave.

I mean it." Before anyone could respond, Jasper turned and strode into the darkness, his figure quickly swallowed by the night.

disappear, exhaling

raise people with

her a promise, all she asked

she didn't mean

wanted them to

go? Jasper's heart

where he and Alyssa had once sought refuge during the

surged back —the harrowing brush with death, the

I will." That promise

had not

He had remembered it.

swirled

thud echoed as his strength gave out, sending him crashing to

weary, glistened with the weight of

"Alyssa...

he clawed at the frozen ground, forcing himself to

in protest, but he

"I have to...

midst of hopelessness, the temperature continued

ruthless and cold as

tight ball, pressing herself

almost entirely, rendering her nearly invisible to anyone who wasn't looking

shut, her lips a chilling shade of purple as hypothermia

clinging to awareness, her mind wavered in

body would be frozen stiff, and she

trembled violently as she curled

memories flickered in her mind—a fleeting warmth against

her senses, replaced by an

depths of her daze, her late mother had appeared,

"Lyse, my sweet girl.

Don't be afraid.

beautiful and

that you've been