North Star Reindeer

I never believed the stories told to wide eyed grad students at airport bars, until my most recent research expedition to the tundras of Sakha, Russia. I had been mapping the north-most range borders of the Sundrun herd, a group of reindeer very close to the North Pole. We expected the herd to be pushing further north as climate change warmed their lower range, but had so far found that the herd hadn’t pushed beyond their northern border. Instead, the thousands of reindeer had spread latitudinally against their northern border, as if a huge, invisible gate kept them back. Thinking that perhaps the deer could smell wolf or bear tracks, I began a predator survey beyond the herd. I only took one other person for my team, hoping to move quickly over the land. 
Three days into our journey and we had no sight or sign of any creature, let alone a predator. Four days into our journey and we had burned through our food supply down to our emergency rations. We had to start for home. Five days in, and our compasses no longer consistently pointed north—we weren’t nearly close enough for the electromagnetic fields at the North Pole to make our compasses malfunction. Six days in and I lost Derrick. I stayed put, knowing that at this point a rescue team was my only hope. Seven days in and I saw a single reindeer, a huge buck with antlers ending in so many points I couldn’t count them. Among the branches of his crown I saw the gleam of a star, its light creating a path. Somewhere in my mind I knew I shouldn’t try to move—it would exhaust me even further and make it more difficult for a rescue team to find me. But against my better judgement I followed the glowing path in the snow. How many others had followed this path?