state of mind. I began to see my situation with clarity. I couldn’t stay there another day. The moon had begun to set over the mountains, and shades of sunrise hovered in the east, giving enough light to see smoke rising from a house in the village. There were people down there. If I made it to them, they would help me.
Eighteen
The magnificent landscape I had admired from above—the pristine craggy peaks and luxurious crevices observed from behind the thick Plexiglas of the helicopter window—became a series of treacherous obstacles on the ground. It was bitterly cold. I fought through knee-high snowdrifts, wind scraping my skin, ice crystals stiffening my hair. I blinked and my eyelashes clung together, freezing and melting, freezing and melting again. I hadn’t realized when I slipped out of the courtyard that I would be throwing myself into a glacial hell.
Within minutes, my hands had gone numb, and my feet—buried in snow and protected by nothing more than my running shoes—became wet, then frozen. I knew I could withstand cold better than most people—my walks with my grandfather had taught me that—yet I wanted to lie down, curl up in the mink coat, and sleep. Thoughts of seeing Luca again pushed me onward. I had the leather pouch Enzo had given me in Turin and would use the money to hire a helicopter. Maybe, if I were lucky, my phone would have reception in the village. If I could only get there, I would be on my way home to him.
Just as I was beginning to lose hope, the spire of a church rose into view. I pushed ahead, moving toward it, ignoring the pain in my limbs as I entered the village. I knew that Nevenero had been abandoned, but I wasn’t prepared for the extent of the desolation. The buildings were in ruins, the windows broken, the doors unhinged. The houses were shuttered, some with boards nailed over the windows. Nevenero was a wasteland: deserted, lifeless, frozen. The smoke I had spotted at the castle was impossible to see from the ground. Storm clouds had rolled in, swallowing the smoke in a roiling, ashen sky. But there wasn’t time to lose: the brittle air, the murderous wind—if I didn’t find shelter soon, I would freeze to death.
Just when I was beginning to panic I saw, behind a row of stone houses, a light flicker in a window. A person moved behind the slats of a shutter and disappeared into the depths of a room. Without thinking, I rushed to the door and began knocking. The door swung back.
“Bonjour?”
The man was young and athletic, his features chiseled, his expression a mixture of amazement and suspicion. He wore a tight microfiber shirt, ski pants, and heavy socks. A woman in similar gear stood behind him, peering at me with astonishment. The air smelled of coffee and toasted bread. A fire—the very fire that had sent smoke signals to me at the castle—burned in a fireplace beyond.
I was shivering so hard my words came out in a jumble. “Do you mind if I come in? To warm up a second?” I stammered. “Please. I’m freezing to death.”
The man blinked. He was so surprised he couldn’t speak.
“I’m sorry, but I’m very cold.” I stepped back and looked up the hill, toward the castle, its flags minuscule in the distance. “Could I come in for a just a minute? To use your phone?”
The woman stepped into the doorway, rescuing me. “Of course,” she said. From her accent, I gathered that she, like her companion, was French. “Come in, you are looking like a gla?on.”
I stepped into a room filled with climbing gear: boots and heavy jackets; backpacks and ice axes and reams of rope scattered over the floor. A black harness with buckles and straps lay on the table. I must have looked confused, because the woman said, “Alpine body harness. For ice climbing.”
I rubbed my hands together, trying to bring some feeling into my fingers. The woman said something in French, and the man brought me a steaming cup of coffee. “Un café?” he asked.
“Yes, yes, thank you,” I said, falling into a wooden chair, its thrush seat hard under me. I wrapped my fingers around the ceramic cup, the heat stinging my hands.
The couple sat down and stared, waiting for me to collect myself. I looked more closely at them. The man was tall and athletic, with wide shoulders and a receding hairline. The woman was thin,