Ice Hunt

“Where’s that?”

His voice tightened with regret. “My ex-wife’s cabin.”

3

Trap Lines

APRIL 8, 10:02 A.M.

GATES OF THE ARCTIC NATIONAL PARK

Jennifer Aratuk stood, club in hand, over the trap. The wolverine glared at her, hissing a warning. Its rear end bunched up as it guarded its own catch. The dead marten, a cat-sized weasel, lay snared in her father’s trap, its black pelt stark against the snow. It had been dead and buried in the fresh fallen snow, its neck broken, but the wolverine had reached the trap first and dug it up. The wolverine, a male, was not about to relinquish its frozen prize.

“Get outta here!” she yelled, and waved her cudgel of alder.

The white-masked beast snarled and jarred toward her a foot, then back. A display that basically meant “fuck you” in wolverine. Fearless, wolverines were known to stand against wolves when food was involved. They were also equipped with talonlike claws and sharp teeth set in bone-crushing jaws.

Frowning but cautious, Jenny considered clubbing the creature. A stout knock on its skull would either drive it off or addle it long enough for her to collect the marten. Her father collected the pelts and traded them for seal oil and other native wares. She had spent the last two days running his trapline. This consisted of hunting down his snares, collecting any catches, and resetting and baiting the traps. She did not relish the chore, but her father’s arthritis had gotten worse the past year, and she feared for him alone in the woods.

“All right, junior,” Jenny said, conceding. “I guess you did get here first.” She used her club to reach and unhook the snare line from the branch of the cottonwood. With the line free, the marten was released. She nudged its body.

The wolverine growled and snatched at the marten, sinking its teeth into a frozen thigh. It backpedaled with its prize, hissing all the way as it retreated through the snow to some hidden burrow.

Jenny watched it waddle with its catch, then shook her head. She wouldn’t tell her father about this, passing on a chance to get a marten and a wolverine pelt. He wouldn’t be pleased. Then again, she was a county sheriff, not a trapper. He should be happy enough that she spent a week of her two-week vacation each year helping him with his damn traps.

She headed back to her sled, tromping in her Sherpa snowshoes. The overnight trip to run the traps was not wholly a chore. During the last three days, a storm had covered the national parklands with two feet of thick snow, perfect for her to run her team one last time before the true spring melt. She enjoyed these outings, just her and her dogs. It was still too early in the year to expect any tourists, hikers, or campers to be about. She had this section of the national park all to herself. Her family cabin was just at the outskirts of the parklands, in the lowland valleys. Her father, as a pure-blooded Inuit native, was still allowed to subsistence-hunt and -trap within certain areas of the park as a result of the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act of 1980. Hence her current overnight trip with her dogs.

The usual barks and yips from her crew greeted her as she returned. She unsnapped her snowshoes’ bindings and kicked them off. Collecting them up, she secured them atop the sled. Underneath were her sleeping bag, a change of dry clothes, a hatchet, a lantern, mosquito repellent, a plastic container of dry dog food, a soggy carton of Power Bars, a twist-tied bag of ranch-flavored Doritos, and a small cooler of Tab soda. She undid her shoulder holster, swung the service revolver over one of the sled’s handles, and cinched it in place next to a leather-sheathed ax.

Next she shook free of her thick woolen overmitts. She wore a thinner, more manageable pair of Gore-Tex gloves underneath. “Okay, boys and girls, off we go.”

At her command, those dogs still lounging in the snow climbed to their feet, tails wagging. The team was still harnessed to the gang line. She only had to go down and tighten their traces. As she did, she patted each dog in turn: Mutley and Jeff, George and Gracie, Holmes and Watson, Cagney and Lacey. They were all strays or rescue animals, a motley bunch of Lab mixes, malamutes, and shepherd crosses. She had more back at home, composing a full team of sixteen, with which she had run the Iditarod from Anchorage to Nome last year. She had not even placed in the top half of the sled teams, but the challenge and the time with her crew was victory enough for her.

With everyone ready, she grabbed the snub line and gave it a jostle. “Mush!”

The dogs dug into the snow. With a furious row of barking, they set off at an easy pace. Jenny walked behind them, steering. The wolverine-burgled trap was the last of the line. She had run a complete circuit, out and back. From here, it was an easy three miles to the cabin. She hoped her father remembered to leave a pot of coffee simmering this morning.

She guided the dogs along a slow sweeping set of switchbacks over a sparsely wooded rise. She stopped them at the top. Ahead, the world opened up. Ridge after ridge climbed to the horizon. Spruces, flocked with snow, shone emerald in the sunlight, while stands of hardwoods—alder and cottonwood—painted the landscape in subtler shades of greens and yellows. In the distance, a silver river ran over cataracts, dancing brightly.

She drew a deep breath of the cedar-scented air. There was a cold, barren beauty to the lands here. It was too much for some, not enough for others. The sun, rare in the past few days, shone sharply but warmly on her face. Across the clouded skies, a single hawk circled. She followed its path a moment.

These were the lands of her people, but no matter how much time she spent out here, she could not touch that past…not any longer. It was like losing a sense you never knew you had. But it was the least of her losses.

Turning attention back to her team, she lowered her snow goggles against the fresh glare, then climbed onto the sled’s runners and called to the dogs, “Eyah!” She snapped the line.

The dogs leaped in their harnesses, racing down the far slope. Jenny rode the runners, steering and braking as needed. They flew across the snow. A sharp gust of wind tossed back the hood of her fur parka. She reached to yank it up, but it felt good for the moment to feel the rush of cold wind against her cheeks and through her hair. She shook her head, loosening and flagging a long trail of ebony hair.

She lifted her foot off the brake and let her rig fly down a long straight run. The wind whistled and the passing trees became a blur. She guided the team around a gentle curve along a wide stream. For an endless moment, she felt in perfect harmony with her dogs, with the steel and ash of her sled, with the world around her.