Mortance: Summer's Snow

Sora Ⅰ

The cool brackish waters of the lagoon were a welcome contrast to the heat of summer. Ert's hottest season was only just beginning and I could already feel myself melting. At least here, a mile and a half out from Esson, I could melt alone. Nobody in Esson needed to see me mourning Solstice, for nobody within the walls of Sacreon's capital ever even begun to know that she existed, save for maybe the Silver Girl herself. It was half a year ago now that she died, but I still remembered that night vividly.

There'd been that terrible dream from Aerya. I'd run off in a stupid fit of emotion... if only I hadn't run off. The False Mortance had chosen that night to return... if only I'd seen the signs sooner. She killed Solstice just as I made it back to save her. And if that wasn't cruel enough already, the False Mortance had reanimated my dead lover's corpse and forced me to fight her.

The memory made me shiver, even in the heat of the summer morning that it was. Solstice was dead. Aerya was dead. The False Mortance was dead. They all died so I could come here and make the Silver Girl into what she had to be. I was the Wolf Witch, after all, and that was my purpose.

I stepped out of the lagoon, shook myself dry, and shifted back into a girl. The burns from when Solstice died were nearly all healed now, but scars and discolored patches of skin remained. At least my hair was growing back to its old length now. I smiled at that as I ran a hand through it and pulled my shirt-dress over my chocolate-colored skin.

Loose boots protected my feet from sharp twigs and everything else that littered the floor of the forest outside Esson. There was nobody else around, or I would've heard their footsteps, as my hearing was stronger than most. I practiced a few illusions offhand as I traversed my way back to Sacreon's capital. A row of trees turned from summer green to the oranges and reds they would be come fall. I painted a patch of mushrooms the color of castle forged steel. It all came to me so easily now. I was the Wolf Witch now, truly.

That hardly made anything easier.

I found the trail back to the gate easily, and fell into step behind a tired looking older man with three dogs. He was pushing a cart with two freshly slain animals on it. All three of his dogs were panting in the heat, and one was fixated on the fresh kills hungrily. Another of the dogs, the one with the darkest brown fur, turned away from the rest and fell back to where I was. I knelt to his height.

"Hello puppy," I said to him in a low voice as he sniffed at my open hand. "What's your name? Do I smell good?" he wagged his tail happily.

"Benji," the tired man's voice carried down the trail. The dog's head perked up. "Stop bothering that girl."

I stood as Benji retreated away from me. "He wasn't," I shouted to him. Stop drawing attention to yourself.

"What?"

"He wasn't bothering me," I said. "I like dogs."

The tired man stopped walking and turned to face me. "Oh, sorry, I..." he trailed off when he saw me.

There was a long awkward moment before I broke the silence. "What were you saying?"

That snapped him out of his stupor. "Nothing, I jus'... you look a bit like someone I knew." He sighed sadly. "What'd you say your name was?"

I didn't. "Sora." The name felt strange to say after so long. I'd hardly heard it since Solstice and Aerya died. Even the Silver Girl hardly cared for it.

"Sora..." the man repeated. "Pretty name. I'm called Hoger."

"Thanks," I answered awkwardly.

No more words were exchanged between us as we passed through the gates into Esson and parted ways. I would likely never see him again, not that it bothered me. The Silver Girl was all that mattered. Solstice and Aerya had not died a half-year ago so I could indulge myself with the smallfolk of Esson.