Tom stamped his feet on the hard—packed snow. “It’s cold enough to freeze a shadow.”

Clive nodded. “It’s so cold, it’d freeze the balls off a pool table.”

Tom chuckled. It came out in white cumulous puffs. “It’s so cold I think the rock rattling around in my boot is my big toe.”

“Amen to that.” Clive knew it was his turn, but damn, if it wasn’t 20 below in the sunshine. It wasn’t funny any more. “Pass the coffee?”

“Sure, if you can remind me why we agreed it’d be a good idea to muzzleloader hunt the last week in November.” Tom tossed the silver thermos. It caught a dazzling ray of clean winter sunlight before landing neatly in Clive’s gloved palm.

The zip of a vacuum opening was followed by the rich aroma of dark roast. “It’s the only time it’s allowed,” Clive said, inhaling deeply.

“Not what I meant.” Tom dropped his weight onto the hay bale with a labored huff and began to pack his Thompson Omega Z5. It was tricky work in this frigid temperature.

“I don’t know if you heard the news,” Tom continued, “but it turns out we can buy meat at a grocery store. We don’t need to freeze our hair off in a hay bale fort drenched with deer whiz.”

Drawing in a breath for courage, he stripped his hands down to thin polar gloves and dropped a hundred grains of powder into the barrel from a pouch at his side. Next came the .50 caliber round. He grunted when he packed both with his ramrod. His hands felt like two wooden planks with chopsticks where the fingers should be.

“Toss me the primer,” Tom said. “And I wouldn’t yell at you for moving the sun heater closer.”

Clive obliged on both counts. “We shouldn’t have brought it at all, you know. Animals catch wind of it, we might as well be on a beach in Mexico for all the deer we’ll see.”

Tom rubbed his hands together briskly in front of the glowing orange circle before yanking the breech on his rifle. He shoved in the primer with cold—clumsy hands, tapped the breech closed, and thrust his hands back into fur—lined gloves with a sigh. Jabbing his mitts toward the heater, he rubbed them together until sensation returned in the form of intense, tingling pain. “I mentioned we can buy meat at the grocery store?”

“You did.” Clive kept his eyes nailed to the lunar—white landscape. “But a ten—point rack looks a helluva lot better than a t—bone mounted over your fireplace.”

Tom grinned, and it cracked the icicles on his mustache. “That was a ten—pointer, wasn’t it?”

“Yup, and if you had let it get close instead of shooting wild, we’d be on our way home right now. Might be days before we get another chance like that.”

Tom moved in next to Clive, still smiling. “I dunno. That might have been the only deer dumb enough to stick around for the winter.”

Despite his complaints, there was no place in the world he’d rather be the last week of November, and he knew Clive felt the same. They’d been hunting buddies for over forty years—turkey, duck, deer, even elk the year one of them was lucky enough to get a license—and the colder the weather, the better.

It was especially peaceful during muzzleloader season, when all of the hobby hunters returned to the city, packing up expensive gear that was smarter than they were and leaving only the locals, those with enough pioneer blood still bubbling in their veins that they’d roll out of bed before the sun had seriously considered rising, pull on six layers of clothing, and trudge to their pickups, which would start as often as not.

Clive nodded. “Looks that way. You check the salt lick before we set up shop? Maybe the deer finished it off and that’s why we’ve only seen the one.”

“I checked it two weeks ago when we came out bowhunting.”

“But not since?”

“Not since,” Tom said, taking the hint. He stretched his arms skyward until his back made a satisfying pop. “Anyone ever tell you that you’re lazier than furniture? You’re lucky I have to water the trees anyhow. Watch for that big buck while I’m out there.”

“I’ll be doing nothing but.”

Tom left the relative shelter of their hunting blind, a cube of hay four bales high and four across to keep them out of sight and scent of the animals. He crunched over the surface of the snow. Fourteen inches of the white stuff buried the ground, but at this temperature it turned hard as rock, squeaking underfoot. The air was dry, and the sun refracted off a billion ice crystals on the ground and the trees. It was blinding.

Tom couldn’t be happier.

Clive watched his old friend footslog across the landscape. This was dedicated hunting land, over 400 acres of woods, water, hills, and prairie just across the Otter Tail County line. A mutual friend owned it, and though he charged the city folks to use it, his comrades hunted on it for free. The blinds and hunting stands were already in place, but this late in the year, they were responsible for checking the salt licks and, if they could get away with it, corn piles.

A cracking sound toward Clive’s left yanked his attention. Something rustled in the copse of trees two hundred yards up. Tom must have heard it too because across the snow tundra he froze, staring in the direction of the same grove.

No birds sang. No wind blew. There were only two men on the frost—scorched landscape of a Minnesota November, the clean blue scent of cold cracking their nostrils. The silence lasted until the magnificent buck stepped out of the woods and into the open. He sniffed the air and barked, low in his throat, a warning sound. His rack reached toward the sun, all fourteen points glistening like polished wood. The proud beast glanced across the unbroken prairie toward Tom, who stood as motionless as stone. He was 100 yards from the massive beast and an equal distance from his gun.

Clive already had his rifle at the ready, perched over the top of the blind. His breath tore out short and shallow. In one slow but fluid movement, he brought his hand to the trigger. He squinted and focused down the sight.

His target was in range, a clean shot. He couldn’t feel the press of the metal lever through his thickly—gloved finger, but he knew he was pulling it toward him, every tiny movement tumbling the powder closer to the spark. His heart was racing, pounding, forcing hot blood to his hands and feet.

The bass snap of his trigger, when it finally came, was drowned in the momentary explosion of black and red flame out the end of his rifle. The pungent tang of fired gunpowder filled his nostrils.

Tom fell to the ground instantly, his blood a violent raspberry red staining the snow. One hundred yards away, the buck sprinted back into the woods, unharmed.