It was a bright night, an auspicious one for hunting. The clouds had cleared and frost glistened in the moonlight. He’d set up his snares in the morning while the animals still slept in their dens. Now all he had to do was to pick up their trapped, quivering bodies, the fruits of his labor. He made his way upwind toward the traps, his muscular thighs carving a path through the snow. He could distinguish, not too far from where he was, the thrashing form of a large animal caught in a trap—it was lying on its back, its long legs, slender yet powerful, kicking at the air for purchase, but all this achieved was to tighten the grip of the snare. The creature wheezed with exertion as it fought to escape its fate.

He approached cautiously, not wanting to scare the trapped deer. He placed a pacifying hand on its neck to stop it from strangling itself. He was dismayed to see that it was a doe.

He knelt by her side, and for a moment he was not sure what to do.

He knew from the volume of acorns the squirrels had already amassed in their nests that this was going to be a long and punishing winter. When the weather started to turn, he always checked on the squirrels and the hedgehogs to see what the animals expected of the coming months of cold. They were never wrong, and he knew now that in a few moons’ time he would need meat to survive the cold.

He ran a hand over the stiff fur of the doe’s gray-brown coat. The creature’s heart beat vigorously against its broad chest. Its belly was warm and covered in thick fuzz, and its udder was swollen with milk.

He looked up between the trees and saw it: the fawn was staring at him with enormous, liquid eyes. Its nostrils flared on its thin snout, quivering frantically as it tried to work out whether he was something he should run away from. If the fawn was still beside its mother, this must be its first winter. He noticed that its velvet-lined antlers had barely begun to sprout from their base on its forehead. They would grow to their full length by summer, then fall off the following winter only to grow back once more, over and over again for the rest of its life, and longer each time, until they formed a majestic crown.

He told himself it was old enough to survive without its mother.

The doe seemed to understand what he was thinking, and sought his eyes with her own. She had stopped struggling, though her breathing was still labored. Her neck lay slack in his arms. It would require a particularly violent twist to break it. He would have to apply considerable force, but he was capable of it.