As I See the Snow Melting

by Rachel Parsons

Table of Contents
Part 1 appears
in this issue.

Conclusion

He swung the ax and bit it into a log. He grabbed me in mid-cycle.

“Then we are going inside.”

He pulled me toward the inn. He rushed so much that I almost tripped keeping up with his stride as he forced me back inside where it was warm. Once upon a time, men would not dare handle me like that, but even knowing who I am they feel they can take such liberties because of my nakedness. When they do not leer, they become overprotective; Kilydd was clearly one of those.

We stood by the fire, my arms on my hips, his arms crossed across his chest. His woolen pants, boots and shirt caught the reflections of the fire. I had not noticed what he was wearing outside; I was focused on just one thing: talking to the little varlet.

He was not really little, being five foot eleven and with a lumberjack’s body. But he was a varlet.

“What do you wish to say to me, your highness?” he said, his voice filled with the phlegm of irritation.

He grabbed a poker and stoked the fire. I could even feel my pupils expanding as he did that. A poker would make a mighty weapon, especially one heated by the fire, and he was clearly angry with me.

I felt like biting my thumb at him. “I want you to treat Rosalyn well,” I said. “She is my dearest friend in the world, kept me sane and alive when I too was a whore, and she deserves respect from you.”

My bosoms were heaving, but to my relief my nipples which had extended from the cold, were retracting. Kilydd had not indicated, by action or reflex, that he had even been aware of them, much less what they were doing. He was too aggravated, I suppose.

“I want to do that too,” he said, to my surprise. “I don’t know what Rosalyn had to endure, and I was too much of a coward to find out when I heard of her fate. But I don’t care how many men she’s had. I don’t care for her that way. I just want to be her friend.”

“Then go to her.”

“She won’t see me.

“Make her see you.”

“Now, how am I supposed to do that? She walks by me, and I call out her name, and she walks faster. I knock on your door, hoping to see her, and she won’t let me in. And now that she is such a high and mighty lady —”

“Hardly that, sirrah. She is still common.”

“But she is a lady-in-waiting and I am but a minstrel and an innkeeper’s son. If she wishes to not see me, it is my duty to let this happen.” He looked so miserable that my heart went out to him.

“I will talk to her.”

“Very well, your highness,” he said, sounding provoked. “Now, may I resume my work?”

“Do not let me keep you.” His aggravation was contagious.

“Thank you, your highness.” He stalked out.

Listening to the irate chops in the distance, I went to Rosalyn, who was in the wing reserved for the troops. It was drafty, and many of the men were bundled up in their capes, but there was a wood burning stove in the middle of one of the common areas.

Rosalyn was playing cards with some of the troops. I came in on her triumph and war-hoop. She stood up and made little fists which she pulled in and out as she shimmied. The men pulled their capes closer around their bodies when they noticed my presence, as if by doing that, they could vicariously make me warmer.

“Rosalyn, can I speak to you for a moment?”

“Of course, Rhiannon. Eat your hearts out, boys.” She winked at them. “I guess the rematch will have to wait.” Eyeing me nervously, the boys made noises showing their disappointment.

We walked back over to the more heated area of the inn, and paused by a stove. “What do you wish?” Rosalyn was still flushed from her victory over the men.

“I want you to talk to Kilydd.”

“Who?” She said, in pretense.

“You know who I mean.”

“Oh, that boy from my past. The one who thinks of me as nothing but a strumpet. Not as a bodyguard and a lady-in-waiting?”

I placed my arms around Rosalyn, and gave her a kiss. “The one who is ashamed of his cowardice in failing to rescue you and just wants to be your friend.”

“You are my friend, Rhiannon, not some innkeeper’s son.”

“Rosalyn, the men who have failed us are suffering because of it. Heveydd is quite mad because he cannot lift his daughter’s curse, and this boy, Kilydd, is wracked with guilt. Please just talk to him. I cannot stand your lamentations at night.”

“Yes, you’re so much better at that than me.” Was she covering her emotions with huffiness?

“Rosalyn! But that is my point. You are my strength. To have you crumble-”

She placed fingers delicately on my bosoms . “I will never crumble when you need me, Rhiannon. Never!!” She bowed her head, then looked back up. “And no man — no boy! — will make me do that.”

“Rosalyn, not only is he shamed by his cowardice, he now sees you as someone high and mighty.”

That took her aback. “Me? Oh, that is funny. If he saw how you abuse me.” She doubled over in laughter.

“Rosalyn, when have I abused you?”

“Rhiannon, you have me naked in your bed for my body heat, you make me bathe you; you have me run your household. You do everything but ride me like a horse.”

“But I have not done that.”

“Not yet.” I noticed the glint in her eye get bigger as I was getting more morose over her comments.

“Do you hate me so, Rosalyn?” I felt bile in my throat at the thought.

“I love you, Rhiannon.” She put her arms around me and gazed at me. “But I am your servant, and I know this. I am not high and mighty.”

“He does not know that.”

“Well, if it pleases you, I will let him talk to me.”

“Thanks, Rosalyn.”

As she started to leave the wall where we were standing collapsed, and snow — bright, white, killing snow — flooded into the inn. I was hysterical as it filled my nostrils, blinded my eyes, and set me sinking, shivering, into a cold, bitter sepulcher.

I could barely move, the snow was so thick around me. But I shook and twisted, and clawed as much as possible. I was suffocating; my body heat was gone completely and the weight of the freezing substance was holding me in a frozen charnel house. I felt ice bite circles under my eyes and realized that it was my tears.

It was almost like my soul was leaving my body. I felt my connection with my corporeal self getting less and less and I prepared myself for the final snap. I never liked being cold, and now my final moments would be spent that way. Oh, how I wish I had never insulted Graymulkin and wished that my begging of her forgiveness had been more successful. Oh, goddesses, I do not want it to end this way.

Everything went white. Timeless, dimensionless, totally without being. I had nothing to do, and was nothing. Just pure, unadulterated white. The white of a virginity I no longer had but must somehow regain in order to live uncursed. These were Graymulkin’s words; her conditions. And in the white I sought them as vainly as I did in life.

From what seemed a long, long distance, I heard saving words. Arianrhod was chanting. I heard the sounds of digging. I opened my lips to encourage them, and got rewarded with a mouth full of snow. I imagined my rescuers trying to uncover me with spoons. Digging, digging, digging, with spoons. No shovels, just spoons. Little, tiny, itty bitty spoons. Tea spoons. Bitty spoons. Spoons so small you can’t see them...

Finally hands reached out and grabbed me. I started to be pulled out. Kilydd had hold of my one upper arm; Rosalyn had hold of the other. Arianrhod’s chant was blowing the snow out, as inn workers and soldiers were shoveling it away from me, away from the inn.

I was led, teeth chattering, insensitive now, my whole body numbed, to the fire, and once again Kymideu was plying me with whisky. She and Rosalyn were rubbing me all over, as Kilydd, not wanting to offend me with a touch, went to get refills of the liquor.

Finally, sensation was returning to my limbs. “What-what-what happened?”

“Snow. Like we’ve never seen here,” Kilydd said. “It’s surely the result of enchantment.”

“Rosalyn, was it really snow?” I was too deadened to be anything but confused. I felt my senses had deserted me, especially the one of physical sensation.

She was rubbing my toes, which seemed on fire from her touch. “Yes,” she said angrily. “And if you ask me, it was aimed at you.”

“Aimed at me?”

“Arianrhod says it’s unnatural. It’s too much of a coincidence that you’d be traveling here fighting the barbarian raids, and this would happen. Someone knows of your condition and is using sorcery to freeze you.”

“But who would do such a thing? Offworlders would not do it. They do not believe in magic. The barbarians are scared of it. Who would do such a thing?” I was crying and licking my tears, deliriously happy that they were liquid.

As if in answer, Kymideu smashed the bottle and pressed its sharp edges against the very flesh she had been pampering a moment before. I screamed and recoiled; fell on my back. She was on top of me. She stabbed me with the bottle, as I shook right to left, trying to dislodge her. She was a fury. Biting, clawing, nothing was going to get her off me. She was scraping the bottle against my throat, obviously hoping to cut an artery.

“Please, cease, Kymideu. Please, please cease,” I wailed.

Rosalyn plunged a knife into Kymideu’s right kidney, twisted it to make her let me go, and then she and Kilydd pulled the wench off of me.

“You all right, Rhiannon?” Rosalyn looked at the cuts on the flesh around my clavicles and throat with horror.

“I will live. Wounds heal on me fast, remember, because the curse will be undercut if my beauty is not protected.” Small comfort if I died a pretty corpse, immobilized into a nude ice cube, or a body whose throat was torn out. “But I was so scared.”

Rosalyn hugged me, pulled her hands through my hair. “I wouldn’t let anything happen to you, Rhiannon; you know that.”

“I know that,” I repeated, still trembling. I turned to the bleeding Kymideu. “Why? You were so supportive of me. Why?” I knew I was screeching like a hoot owl but I could not help myself. I had not shaken the fear completely off.

“Why? You have to ask why, you bitch? Oh, you noblewomen are all the same. You take a girl from her way of life, just for your pleasure, and make her into a high lady-in-waiting. And my poor brother can’t even approach her.”

She turned to Rosalyn. “Oh, he knew that you were a whore, but it was your high status that shamed him. And you Rhiannon, you did this to her, to them, and simply because you wanted someone for your own amusement. I know how she caresses you at night, when you are both naked. You have turned her into your playmate and now my brother is lost, lost. You deserve to die and when you came naked and vulnerable into my father’s inn, it gave me the means.”

“But the weather was bad before we came here.”

“I made the weather bad so people would come. We make money from miserable weather as well as good weather. I can make both. I had no idea it would be you that would come to us. My fate, I guess.” She rolled her eyes up, emitted a soft moan, and was unconscious.

Rosalyn went over and touched the vein in her neck. “Dead,” she pronounced.

“From a kidney wound?” I could not believe it.

“From the pig shit I had smeared on my dagger. Arianrhod isn’t the only one to carry enchanted devices,” she said smugly.

“She was part elemental,” Kilydd said. He seemed indifferent to his sister’s fate.

“You knew this of her?”

“I didn’t know she had any power. I just knew that her mother was different from mine. She was part salamander and part ice demon, and she has been sensitive to heat and cold ever since.” He turned to Rosalyn. “I’m sorry, Rosalyn, for all of this.” Rosalyn grabbed hold of him.

“It was as much me as you. Please, let us talk of this.”

“Ah, excuse me.” They turned to look at me. “I am here by the fire, with glass shards all around me and I’m still just a wee bit cold.” I pressed my thumb and forefinger together.

“Oh, yes, sorry, mistress.”

Rosalyn got up, waltzed to the kitchen, her boots making a clunk-clunk on the wooden floor; came back with a whisky jug. “Here, have yourself a blast.”

She tossed it to me; I caught it, startled. She started walking out of the room, arm in arm with Kilydd, her skirts swishing in rhythm to the clattering of his boots. She crooked her head back at me and gave me a wink.

“Rosalyn! Come back here. Come back here, this instant!” I stamped my right foot, and then winced as I felt the glass cut my heel. “I need your body heat!” I yelled. “I need someone to rub me. I need someone to clean up this glass mess. My feet will be shredded if I try to move. And what about this body lying next to my feet? It is already beginning to smell. Rosalyn!!!”

But she was busy talking to Kilydd and hanging on his every response. I took a swig, and realized that as long as the whisky held out, I was near a fire, and did not have to pee, I would be just fine.

And so would Rosalyn. I turned to look at the windows and my mood brightened considerably as I saw the snow melting.