Winter's End, Part 6
This is the sixth part to a longer story. Catch up on the previous parts here!
Spring
She dreams of Winter. His blue eyes, his frosted beard, the hint of softness beneath the frozen exterior and the hard lines made by the icicles in his hair. She dreams of quiet snowstorms that dull all sound and shut out the rest of the world so the pair can be alone long enough to know one another. In her dreams, she walks freely in the snow without fear of the cold, and he treads paths of verdant green without weakness.
Her eventual return to the mortal world is slow. She is torn between holding onto the wisps of her dreams and waking to seek out the source of all the world’s chill. It does not matter. The dreams fade, and in her library once more she opens her bleary eyes. Sunlight is already streaming through the window. It gives the room a cosy glow and throws much of the world outside into a strange silhouette.
A ball of white fur shifts in her lap and lifts its head. Tamber blinks the sleep from his yellow eyes and nuzzles her hands, narrowly avoiding poking her with his antlers. She scoops him up into her arms and leans against the window. One arm cradles him like a bairn while her other hand runs through his soft fur. The caress soothes her as much as it does him.
At this early stage she is still fragile, still weeks away from regaining her rule. With what little strength she has, she tugs a small cloud across the sun so that she might look out across the valley without being blinded. The world is covered in ice and snow. Even the branches of her evergreens are weighed down with it. She feels the frost in the air, no trace of her own warmth yet to be found.
This time it is different. This time she does not mind the cold.
Movement beneath the laden boughs catches her attention. A swirl of air carries its own miniature snowstorm. The flakes twirl without a breeze to guide them, a thin cloud in the vague shape of a man. It lingers on the treeline, waiting, not coming a step closer but not retreating either.
She smiles, remembering the snowdrops she left for him to find. She wonders how he reacted. Did he take their meaning? Did he follow their carefully sown path? Now is the time to know these things.
Outside, the world is too cold for her, and she too weak for it, but determination burns hot. She wraps herself in warm clothes and dons her cloak of seeds. There is no law to prevent her stepping from her home in the rule of another god. The only danger is her current state, her meagre powers, and her susceptibility to the biting cold.
And so she leaves, setting out along the mountainside. She is careful not to wake the dormant creatures – it is too early for them, and she does not want Winter to think her encroaching on his land.
When she sowed her snowdrops, she planted them along a path that leads to a small, grassy knoll where her mountains join with Winter’s. It is a midway point; an area she thought safest for their meeting. As she hurries through the woods, noting that the flurry of snow that followed her for a time has now vanished, she wonders if he will be there at all, or if she has been foolish. Perhaps all she has done is put herself in harm’s way. A head full of dreams is a dangerous thing.
The trees thin, allowing glimpses of the slope beyond, and she quickens her pace. As she steps out from between the pale boughs, she realises she has no cause for fear or doubt. There stands Winter, not as a wraith this time but as his true self.
And he is glorious.
Winter
He feels her approach in the footprints she leaves behind in his carefully laid snow, hears it in the rustling of the fir trees whispering to one another of her waking. Ever since he found the snowdrops, the white path that led him to this tranquil place, he has not stopped thinking of her. He has waited many long weeks for her to wake from her slumber. For the whole of Winter’s cold reign, he has thought of little else but Spring.
Now he turns to face her lingering on the treeline and all his fears melt away. She looks different than before. Slightly less than herself. It will be weeks before she comes into her full power, but now she is weakened. He wonders if she has ever set foot outside her castle so early. But her presence brings him joy. That she has entered his world in her current state can only mean she trusts him, or wants to.
She comes closer, perhaps emboldened by the smile he wears and matching it with one of her own. The smile of Spring is perhaps the loveliest thing he has seen in a long while.
But she is cold – so cold she shakes with it – and the nearer she draws, the paler she becomes, the tighter she wraps her arms about herself. Her lips are turning blue. It is too early for Spring.
She stumbles. He reaches out his arms and catches her before she falls but she does not respond to his cries. The little jackalope is hopping about in agitation at his mistress’ state.
Winter knows he must return her home – and quickly. He sweeps her up into his arms, praying the coldness of his heart does not do her more harm, and sets off at a run. His wolf and the jackalope follow. After only a few paces the little creature begins to feel Spring’s weariness as his own and cannot go on. Erebus plucks up the jackalope gently by the soft skin on the back of his neck and carries him in his maw.
None of them see the huntsman in the woods watching them go.
Spring wakes a few days later on her cosy window seat and again goes in search of Winter. It does not take her long, for he appears in a flurry of snow as soon as she steps outside. The cold is still there, but she is stronger now, and she is determined to bear it.
The pair walk the world together, followed by Erebus and Tamber. They roam the valley and the woods and the mountains, avoiding the village and the castles of Summer and Autumn, happy to keep each other company.
With every day that passes, she feels stronger, stands taller. Warmth begins to return to the valley. But with every day, he grows weaker, paler, his power draining out of him and into the goddess walking at his side. He holds on as long as he can. He perseveres even as her power cracks the ice of the rivers and stirs the bears in their dens.
At long last, he breaks his crown and sits with her as she weaves one of her own. They both know it is time. They part with promises exchanged, with sad eyes and hearts heavy with the thought of the long months that lie between now and their next meeting. Winter returns to his castle alone save for Erebus padding faithfully at his heels.
He enters his cold halls and settles into his library chair. In his weakened state, he did not see the men of the village gathering in the wood as he passed. Now, eyes drifting closed, he does not hear the door opening, or the footsteps across the floor. But he does feel Erebus shift at his ankles as the wolf turns its great head towards the intruders.
He does hear the howling of his wolf and that same howl cut short.
He does feel the burn of the first blade, and every blade after that, as they slice into his heart.
Continued in Part 7