Thaw

Ceridwen’s mind swam with thoughts of spring. She pictured the haven of sweetgrass at the edge of her village swaying gently under the caress of a balmy breeze, and how it would feel to run her fingers across the tops. She focused on waking to the warmth of morning sunlight on her eyelids, and the smell of bread baking in her family’s kitchen. How the bread would steam when she sliced into it, how the butter would melt as it spread to coat the surface. She bombarded herself with memories of fingers scorched on dying coals, of bonfire smoke stinging her eyes. Anything to trick herself into forgetting she was nearly knee-deep in snow, and its relentless chill cut through the meticulously layered clothes into her very bones.

The effort was futile. Ceridwen had long lost feeling in her extremities, and her jaw ached from clenching against chattering teeth. For the indeterminable hours that had passed since she began her trek through the woods, the barrage of snowfall had not ceased, nor slowed by any measure she could perceive through eyes squinted against the assaulting brightness of the landscape. As if to spite the chill, embers had taken residence in her lungs, burning with each shallow inhale.

Thoroughly spent, Ceridwen halted beneath a frigid elm, fighting the urge to collapse. The tree’s branches stretched skyward, barren. She pressed a palm to its trunk in solidarity.

Winter took everything, she mused with a small step onwards. All life had been bled away. No critters scurried, no blooms showed their faces, even the rippling river she had followed into the forest had given in to the chill and now lay motionless a stone’s throw away, buried in snow. Or had she since wandered from its guidance? Was she well and truly lost?

A gust of wind sent a fresh chill down her spine, along with a sinking dread. The years of research, sifting through local legends, diligently calculating coordinates, and leaving her home behind: it was all for naught. She had failed. Maybe it was just a folktale, after all. Maybe she was foolish to ever have believed that it existed, the fabled flame and its keeper. Maybe the stories were just invented as comfort, and there was no way to meet once more in this reality with those who had left their earthly bodies behind. Maybe he really was gone beyond her grasp.

I’m sorry, Jude.

As a preternatural stillness prickled against her nape, Ceridwen realized that not only had the snow stopped falling, but she was not alone.

Even lying on its side, the great elk dwarfed her body. She sensed immediately that it was of no danger to her; its fur had paled and lost its sheen, its lower half blanketed with snow, great antlers embellished with frost.

The air became heavy, haunted. Ceridwen approached, cautiously, as if the creature merely slept and she risked disturbing it. You poor, magnificent thing. Though it had evidently been dead for some time, winter had not allowed the elk to rejoin the earth as all are destined to do.

Ceridwen smelled the smoke before she noticed the path it carved through the white expanse above the treetops, crowning a brick chimney in lazy swirls and abstract puffs. The primal instinct to survive carried her one step at a time beyond the line of trees and to the front door of a dilapidated cottage. She knocked with all the force she could muster, stopping only when the wood groaned in complaint.

“Enter.”

The voice betrayed little of its speaker, but Ceridwen did not have the luxury of vigilance. Lured by the warmth emanating from the humble home, she obeyed. Ceridwen blinked hard, willing her eyes to adjust to the dim room as her surroundings slowly came into focus. The neglect did not cease at the exterior. Her gaze roamed over limp, moth-eaten curtains and stacks of mold-spotted tomes. Regardless, her gratitude did not wane as she began, “Kind stranger, how can I repay you for providing me with shelter from the cold?” Though she wasn’t of much use in her current state, after a brief respite, she could clean or mend to settle this immense favor.

The fire popped once, twice, before a pleasant voice carried across the small room from the solitary armchair facing the far window,

“I am afflicted with melancholy. Won’t you share a merry memory to soothe an aching heart?”

As sensation gradually returned to Ceridwen’s body with prickles and pokes, she allowed her gaze to drift to the window, rifling through her weary mind for a story to share. Branching patterns of frost traced each glass pane. Inspired, Ceridwen took a breath and began to weave the tale of winters passed that did not ache as this one did, of days spent playing and laughing as only carefree children can, of snow angels and steaming cups of sweetness, Jude’s flushed cheeks and radiant smile as the anchoring knot from which all of her youth had been woven. She spoke until her voice cracked beneath the weight of the grief she had carried across miles and years. And yet, she found that despite the tears that fell, she was smiling.

The fire popped once, twice, thrice, before the voice returned. “Your debt has been repaid. In fact, you have brought me such elation that I have an offer for you. I sense the fissure within your own chest. I hear its echo in your words. How would you like to see your beloved again?”

A beat of silence while Ceridwen processed the proposal. Had she yet revealed that her friend had been lost to her? Perhaps it had been plain in her voice. Or could she have been speaking to more than just a simple stranger all this time? Her mind reeled with the legends she’d been collecting in her research. Though they varied slightly by region, each story spoke of a magical, entrancing flame. They described a lulling voice, but never its owner. When she took a hesitant step in effort to gaze upon her host’s face, she was met with the armchair’s vacant seat.

“You are the keeper,” she breathed as she spun, eyes roaming the cramped room in search of the being of legend, cursed to maintain the flame even when all else turned to ash. She found only dust and webs and vines creeping along the floorboards instead. “You can bring Jude back? You can undo his death, and return him to the land of the living?”

“I can reunite you with your loved one. Peer into the flame,” purred the voice, “and you may live your merriest memory for all time, never shedding another tear.”

Ceridwen opened her mouth to accept, but something made her halt, almost as tangible as a hand on her shoulder. She’d spent so long in pain. Hadn’t she vowed to the skies she would not stop until they could be reunited once more? She had sacrificed so much to be in the place where her feet now stood. Why did she hesitate?

She blinked and found that she faced the hearth once more, unable to recall having shifted so. Her gaze sank, slow and certain as a stone in a pond, to behold the fire. Beaded sweat tracked down her temple, the sensation vaguely registering as if from a distance. For several heartbeats, she studied the flame, thoughts muffling to static, until miniature silhouettes sprouted from the coals before her eyes. With flame as their backdrop, the figures danced, embraced, melted out of sight, and reappeared. Twirl, converge, disappear, and return. Over and over.

For all time…

Curiously, Ceridwen’s mind went to the fallen elk outside. Held prisoner by the frost that did not allow it to follow the course of nature, to return to the earth and sustain the other forms of life that bustled beneath the dormant soil, unseen. Rather than embarking on its final transformation, the elk remained suspended in time.

She had been raised with the knowledge that all things undergo a cycle of transformation, into and out of this realm. She accepted that all things must die, leaving behind their earthly bodies to journey beyond. She had long recognized this as a foundational, unshakable truth. Was it wrong, this endeavor to violate nature’s laws? Why was she absolutely determined to do so now? The same instant the question entered her mind, her heart answered. Because it wasn’t fair. Because he never had the chance to grow up. Because he had dreams, loud and solid and sure, and would’ve gone on to accomplish great things.

Because a piece of her had died with him.

It wasn’t Ceridwen that wished to violate the rules of nature, she assured herself, bolstered by the recurring rage usually concealed within her. Nature had broken the contract first by taking her friend long before his time. Right?

But the rage stayed hidden now for a reason. Because it was ugly, because it tasted bitter on her tongue, and it had led her to destruction before. Destruction of new and budding friendships, of opportunities, of her own body. She couldn’t let it take control again.

The blind devotion that had driven her forward all these years shattered like an icicle that had finally relinquished its hold of the highest branch.

Although she missed her friend, even the keeper of the flame could not bring him back. Not truly. A specter, perhaps, a hollow copy of a moment trapped in time. Trapping her with it. The specter may echo the words he’d spoken in life, but would not come up with new quips as he could. It may resemble his teenage stature, but it could not grow up as Jude never did, as Ceridwen had. As Ceridwen still had many years left to do.

“I will soothe your aching heart.”

The keeper’s voice was all around her now, closing in, ringing in her ears, though still no figure revealed itself to her wide eyes. This was not the reunion she had dreamt of. She wanted to hear Jude’s laugh, wanted to watch him draw silly pictures or pluck the strings of his guitar, not chase a shadow. Though the very marrow of her bones urged her to run, Ceridwen could not tear her gaze away from the flame. As she’d stood, contemplating her decision, the magic had already begun creeping along her skin like smoke. She desperately begged her body to follow her commands, for her eyes to shut and break the fire’s spell, but they did not obey.

If words were the binding of the spell that befell her, perhaps words could release her.

“You claim that only your offer can remedy my heart, but you are wrong. For in sharing my story, my heart has since been soothed, and the memory is no longer colored by the loss. Only the joy within it.” Ceridwen’s voice rose as she spoke from a wish to a declaration as she realized her words to be true. “I have no need of your help.”

Her body no longer felt heavy as ore. The grief and rage no longer consumed her until all was dark. She missed her friend dearly, but time had been kind to her, and the light of his memory shone brighter. Brighter, still.

Mobile once more, mustering every ounce of strength left in her, Ceridwen whirled and thrust her boot through the rotting door. Winter wind rushed in to meet her. She heard the piercing hiss of a flame dampened to ash, heard the shriek of a deity thwarted, but she did not turn back. With a leap, she broke free of the keeper’s cottage. As she ran, her path was illuminated by a pale sun, promising spring.