The snow was just coming down much too fast; they had badly miscalculated, John Smith thought as he gazed out of the small shelter he shared with his hunting partner. They would be stuck here this night, perhaps the next, he thought. He sighed in dismay, not knowing how his hunting partner would react to the news.

The shelter itself was cozy and warm enough, with a fire crackling gently in the center, radiating the heat to all sides; blankets and animal furs were rolled up neatly in one corner; spare weapons and cooking implements hung on one of the branches that served as a makeshift wall hook in their little shelter. There were enough food rations and water was plentiful, too, as their camp was located a few miles away from stream that led to a bigger river, but as they also plenty of water stored in canteens.

It really wasn't too bad in here, John Smith thought; he could stand a night or two ... but he had his doubts about his partner. He was a seasoned hunter and tracker, a former soldier, so, admittedly, a man who was capable of killing to survive, but also of providing for himself under less than desirable circumstances. But he worried that his companion would be unsuited for even one night roughing it in the forest. He hoped she would take the news well.

Well, as well as she could. They were far from any of her family, and their friends or neighbors, at least two days' walk away from where they were camped now. The storm had come up unexpectedly; they thought they would be home in time.

Clearly not now. The snow flurries had strengthened to blizzard strength, and it was now hard to see anything farther away than a few feet. The winds were bitter, howling. The chill was creeping up in its intensity, having grown colder all day until the snow had begun to fall. Now, breaths were frosty and fingers ached.

Anxious, John peered out of the shelter, holding back the heavy animal hide that served as the door; no sign of his partner yet. Worry began to rise in his stomach and move to his throat. He let the hide door close; he began to pace the little shelter, hoping she would return soon. He had left his pocket-watch back at his cabin in Jamestown, and no sun was visible by which to tell the time. But he knew she had been gone far too long.

Pocahontas had left the security of their shelter, after helping him hang the dressed game on the branches of a nearby tree. She had gone out past the creek, to the deep, ice-strewn river, to remove their fishing traps, ingenious inventions into which hungry fish swam, attracted by bait.

The snow had come up unexpectedly, as it often did in late autumn. There would be no more fishing, she had said, if the rest of the winter was going to be as bad as this storm; she had said she would be right back. They had both thought that the weather would hold so they could get home.

He was only grateful she had remembered, but in the time she'd set out, some time ago, the storm had intensified. Realizing both of their predictions had been wrong, and knowing that the deep river was much farther from their camp than the stream, John's anxiety intensified. Finally, after several more tortuously slow minutes, he put on his coat reluctantly banked the fire; he left the warmth of the shelter.

The iciness of the chill was breathtaking, and the few inches of snow that had been on the ground were beginning to grow rapidly in measure. His boots crunched through the snow, and the snow left a powdery finish on his black wool coat. His hands were shoved into its pockets, chilled despite his gloves. Those were impractical for the task of hunting itself, but convenient in the time one was not hunting; he was grateful to have found them shoved in a coat pocket when they set out on their journey initially.

The mile and a half to the deep river seemed interminable in the weather; he passed the shallower creek and called her name, hoping to find her there; but there, she was not. He pressed on, every so often calling for her.

Nothing.

He knew if he didn't find her soon, he would likely not be able to.

As he squinted through the blinding sheets of snow that were blowing in the wind, he saw one of the fish traps, full of plump, shiny-scaled catch, on the bank of the river, the long rope coiled up neatly.

There should have been two traps.

But he only saw one.

He began to run, but it was more like a blind stumble. "Pocahontas!" he called.

The river was wide, and the water churned powerfully. It wasn't a lazy river or a gentle one. The banks around it were steep, rocky and sharp, and the shallowest point of the river was probably strewn with sharp rocks. A monstrous waterfall downriver fed it, providing much of the churn in its wicked current. Anyone sucked that far in its current would go over the falls.

Although this river had a reputation for wicked rapids and unpredictability,it was the one with the best catch in both the spring and the fall seasons. But it was rough, notorious for overturning canoes and small boats. In fact, her tribe had lost two young men to drowning already.

"Oh, no," he muttered to himself as panic bloomed, "No, no no," he said breathlessly. "Pocahontas!" he called again, as he hurried along the length of the bank where he knew the other trap would be.

It should be ... about here ... He kept hastening, finally running, although he knew that expending all his energy in this snowstorm was less than ideal. Where was she?! his frightened mind churned. He stopped, took a breath, and looked around him, at the endless billowing whiteness that was obscuring the forest in the distance. Did he really expect her to walk out of it at any moment?

He scoffed, told himself to pull himself together, to not panic. He focused his attention once more on the river itself.

The water, always fast flowing, was now dark, freezing cold, rapid even as chunks of ice began to slowly overtake its motion. By the end of the night, it would be solid ice, he reckoned.

Oh, God. The realization hit him just as these normal thoughts ran through his head, a way of talking himself down from panic had only made it escalate.

It would be solid ice.

He had to find her, and he had to find her NOW.

Surely, if she was lost somewhere in the forest, she would know to stay in one place until he went to find her. But she was not in the forest ... she had said specifically she was going to pull in the traps. So she must be here, he reasoned.

He called her name once more.

The silence was enormous, the only force bigger than the howling of the wind and the force of the blizzard.

He continued walking the length of the river where he knew the trap to be, coming to the end of the bank and not finding it. It must have washed into the river.

The traps were large, about two feet across and a foot wide. And when they were full, they were heavy.

Indeed, that was what he next discovered, finding the rope frayed and broken off from the heavy stake that moored it to the riverbank. Cursing under his breath, he tightly clutched the sodden,threadbare rope in his hand as he rose from his position crouching by the water.

He glared angrily at the dark, churning water, desperation and fear his only emotions stronger than anger and frustration.

He reasoned with himself: She was smarter than that, to go into the water after a trap that had come unmoored. He knew the terrain around here, underneath the snow, was rocky and sharp, unforgiving, so he tread carefully, knowing that he needed to replace his worn leather boots as soon as another ship came into Jamestown with supplies.

He had never fished this area.

This was not his first trip hunting out in this area, though, but he tried to think, to quiet his thoughts, which roiled almost as fast as the river.

It was quite simple, really. She must have slipped and fallen, struggling to pull in the trap if its rope had gotten caught on something. Slipped and fallen and fell into the water.

This thought roused him.

Oh, Pocahontas ... he stared into the unforgiving black maw of the water. He pushed back the feelings of helplessness and growing fear, of what he would tell her father ...

He never should have let her go out alone. But she had insisted he stay inside, because earlier he had carried back all their game and dressed it, and she'd insisted he stay and rest, warm up.

What a fool he had been. To let her go out alone and try to pull in these heavy traps ...

He shoved his gloves into a coat pocket, and left the coat, his boots, and most of his clothes on the bank.

The water was so cold, that he cried out in terror and shock. He was a strong swimmer, but the cold was unbearable. Within seconds, he was chilled from head to toe.

"Oh, my God," he gasped in disbelief; the water must be as cold as the North Sea, which was close enough to England, back home, but certainly a place he had never been.

He cursed and then began swimming into the black water, dreading his task, but desperate.

"Pocahontas!" he cried, his voice hoarse with cold. He didn't even know if she knew how to swim, he thought idly, as strong strokes powered his body through the water.

The vantage point was better, being in the water; you could actually see in front of you more than a few feet now that you were a little lower than the eye-level snow flurries.

As his lungs burned and his body prickled with pain from the icy coldness of the water-indeed, a small ice floe just went by-as he almost wanted to give up ...

There.

Floating gently by some rocks, inky black hair...

He reached her, his hands closed on her hair, which floated and bobbed in the water like a black seaweed.