"When the first snow falls, child, that's when the world remembers magic."
I shake off the memory and focus on the treeline beyond the settlement's edge. The black-pine forest stretches dark anddeep, its branches heavy with accumulating snow. It's not safety—nothing in this world is safe—but it's cover, and cover might be enough.
Behind us, something roars. Not human, not entirely orc either. Something caught between worlds, like my daughter, but twisted with rage instead of wonder.
I run.
My boots slip on the increasingly slick ground, but I don't slow down. Can't slow down. Each step takes us further from the burning settlement and deeper into the forest's embrace. The snow falls harder now, thick enough to muffle sound and blur the world into soft gray shapes.
Eira's breathing evens out against my neck, her initial fear giving way to the drowsy contentment she always finds in motion. She's always been like this—soothed by travel, by the rhythm of my steps and the whisper of wind through trees. Another gift from her father's blood, perhaps. Orcs are wanderers by nature, even when they're trying to build permanent homes.
"Tell me the snow story, Mama." Her voice is barely a whisper, but it carries clearly in the muffled quiet of falling snow.
My throat tightens. Of all the things she could ask for, of course it's this. The ritual Grandmother taught me, the one I've never quite had the courage to perform. Too much like prayer, and I stopped believing in answered prayers the day the bunker elders handed me over to Gorthak's hunting party.
But Eira is asking, and her voice carries that particular note that means she needs this. Not wants—needs, the way she needed my voice singing her to sleep during the worst of the fever-sickness last winter.
So I tell her, my voice joining the rhythm of our footsteps through deepening snow.
"When the first snow falls on the longest night, when the world grows quiet and the stars grow bright..." My grandmother's words flow through me like muscle memory, carrying the cadence of older times. Times when humans believed in more than just survival.
I find a black-pine with branches low enough to reach, its needles dark against the accumulating white. Setting Eira down carefully, I unwrap the thin red ribbon I've carried in my pack since leaving the bunkers—a remnant from my sister's hair, saved from the before-times when such things mattered.
"Why that tree, Mama?" Eira watches with rapt attention as I tie the ribbon around a sturdy branch, the red silk bright as blood against the dark bark.
"Because it's strong." The words come easier now, mixing memory with improvisation. "Because it stays green when everything else sleeps. Because sometimes the world needs reminders that not everything beautiful has to die."
The wind picks up, setting the ribbon dancing like a tiny flame. Snow catches in Eira's dark curls, and for a moment she looks ethereal—caught between human and something else, between this harsh world and the gentler one my grandmother used to describe.
"Now we make a wish for warmth," I whisper, gathering her close again. "For protection. For the promise that winter always ends."
She closes her eyes, her small face scrunched with concentration. Her lips move silently, and I wonder what prayers a five-year-old offers to a world that's shown her mostly kindness mixed with constant threat.
The snow continues to fall around us, each flake a small benediction in the growing dark. Behind us, the sounds of battle fade into memory. Ahead, the forest stretches deep and silent, offering shelter to those brave enough to seek it.
I hoist my pack higher and lift Eira again, her warm weight reassuring against my chest. The ribbon flutters on its branch, a splash of color in the monochrome world, and I allow myself one moment to believe in my grandmother's magic.
Then I turn deeper into the trees, carrying my daughter toward whatever uncertain sanctuary the darkness might hold.
2
NELRISH
The world tilts sideways, pines wheeling overhead like the spokes of some massive wheel spinning out of control. My shoulder strikes something solid—tree trunk, rock, the distinction blurs behind the fire racing through my veins. Each heartbeat drives the poison deeper, a slow burn that started in my gut and now reaches fingers of agony toward my extremities.
The taste of the water was off. I thought I'd refilled my water skin in a muddied stream.
The memory surfaces unbidden, sharp-edged against the fever haze. That bitter aftertaste after I'd swallowed, the way it clung to my tongue like regret. I should have known. Should have recognized that the hunting party was too large, that I should never have let my guard down.
My legs give out completely. The impact drives what little air remains from my lungs, dirt and pine needles grinding against my cheek. The scent of damp earth mingles with the metallic tang of my own blood—a combination that should be familiar after thirty-eight years of warfare, yet feels foreign now. Distant. As if experienced through thick glass.
"You always were too trusting, Nelrish."
Her voice echoes in my skull, soft as silk and twice as cutting. The same voice that once whispered promises in the dark, that claimed love even as it sharpened the blade for my back. How long had she been planning this? How many nights had she lain beside Redmoon's chieftain, whispering poison in his ear about Wintermaw's growing influence?
I force myself to roll over, each movement sending fresh waves of agony through my core. The sky above filters through black-pine branches heavy with the season's first snow. Gray clouds gather like bruises, promising the kind of storm that buries everything beneath pristine white. Clean. Final.
My fingers find the hilt of my hunting knife—instinct born of decades leading the clan through territories where death lurked behind every shadow. The leather wrapping is slick with sweat and something darker, but the weight remains familiar. Comforting, even. Steel has never betrayed me. Never smiled while driving poison into my gut.
