My name is Lydia Reedstrom and I'm a causal runner and writer. This vignette is inspired by some of my recent fall runs. I haven't yet come across a deer on one of my runs, but I hope to one day.

Breath hot. Air cold. Mist tangles in her fur. The sun hides behind the mountains, autumn-shy. The forest is burning, but the trees pay no mind. Her hooves find sure ground every time. Muscles coiled, elastic despite the chill. No hunter tracks her now. She is no quarry. No debt to be paid. Before the earth slumbers ‘neath winter’s white mantle, she rejoices in the rasp of air in her lungs. Wind whistles through her ears. The song of centuries, sung to her every ancestor and descendent. Of a wildness so absolute, untouched by the hands of man. If only for a moment. She is every stone. Every silvan casualty littering the forest floor. She is the sky, the fog, the secret sigh of heaven—drifting through the tree-tops. One day her bones will feed the land. Green life will spring from soil wet with her heart’s blood. One day her limbs will falter. An arrow will fly true. But for now it is enough to run through fields unmarred, nose filled with the soft sweetness of decay. It is enough that winter’s promise chases fast on her heels. For it will not catch her. Not yet. 

With miles yet, she does not slow. Flanks heaving. Clouded breath trailing. The season’s demise is thick here. Molten gold and russet bleed across the leaves. Grass, desiccated and near-dormant whispers under hands called down from the great north. Distantly, the taste of snow, fleeting on her tongue. Soon, the grazing will grow slim. Those lean months of dark loom over the horizon. Then, the generational gift. A soft bed in lush verdancy. Small hooves, fumbling after her, steps unsteady. But only after she reaches her destiny.

In the heart of the glen the hart waits. Velvet shed mere months ago. Hart and hind. The promise of more.

Across acres, only hoof and hill. Copper sun cresting the crags of millennium-weathered granite. Light bright enough to sear. Flames flickering o’er fir and foliage. Blaze blinding through haze fast fading. Her focus never wavers. Ears swiveling to catch every creak of wood, every rustle in the detritus. Creatures long stirred from slumber watch her flight. Falcons wheel in unclouded skies. The fox, cunning and camouflaged. Vaulting deadfall, navigating root and ruin. She races her heart. And fate follows after.