"Are you asleep, little one?"
ZaiWin instinctively reinforced his mental hold on the silver glow, ready to protect it if she was going to try and hurt it again.
"I close my eyes and I can see you … A beautiful golden-haired little-girl … I can see you running and laughing … I can see you pout when you're unhappy …"
After so long, for an instant, some warmth poured into the darkness again. But it didn't take long before the cold, red ocean returned.
"I can dream all this … but I know I'll never get to live it. I wish you had never come to be in the first place. Maybe I should just kill myself and take you with me. We'd be together then."
She laughed softly.
"And wouldn't that be just too precious … They're all outside, pretending that you don't exist, pretending that I don't exist. But they're already counting their coin, even though there's still some time left. Already seeing themselves the proud owners of a small fortune. They don't dare come and visit me. But they're anxiously awaiting the day you are born. I say we take it all from them. I say we leave them empty-handed."
She laughed again.
"I really don't want to live anymore. After all this, am I really supposed to simply smile and go on as if nothing has happened? Am I supposed to return to the role of loving wife and obedient daughter? Ah! I say fuck them all!" she laughed some more until all she could do was cry.
ZaiWin almost sighed in relief when it was finally silent outside.
Holding that silver glow safe was more exerting than he could ever have thought. He felt feverish. And his entire body hurt, even though he knew that, in there, he had no body to begin with.
Feeling tired, he dozed off. Only for a moment, he thought, but he also knew that time was an inconstant thing, inside those memories.
He woke up with a startle. The fast heartbeat that had been keeping him company for a while now had grown so weak and slow that he could hardly hear it anymore. Everything around him was pure pain and suffering. And the silver light looked so frail and dim that he feared it might go out at any moment.
Outside people were shouting back and forth. It had been a while, since he had last heard anyone else's voice but that woman's. Now other female voices sounded angry and, at the same time, worried.
"Stop the bleeding! Stop the bleeding!!"
"What have you done, stupid girl?"
"Stop staring, dumb girl! Run and fetch some healing herbs! And some clean bandages!!"
"What about the child? Is it safe? We can't lose the child!"
"How should I know? Where did she get the blade from, anyway? I thought I had told you to check the entire bedroom and take away anything that might look even remotely dangerous!"
"And I did! I checked everywhere! I brought three servant girls to search the entire room and personally supervised the search myself!"
"Enough! Stop arguing! Just help me bandage her wrists!"
ZaiWin couldn't take his eyes off the frail silver glow as it trembled like a small flame in the wind, threatening to go out at any moment. ZaiWin knew he'd be all right, he forced himself to recall. After all, none of this was real. But he still couldn't help stare anxiously as the small glow grew dimmer. Nor could he stop feeling sorry for all the sadness and pain.
"Now remember, dumb girl! You are not to untie her in any circumstances. Every day I will send two servant-girls to help you wash your lady and take her outside for a few hours. But other than that she is to remain in bed at all times," the older woman he had heard before instructed. "We'll make sure to prepare meals that are easily swallowed."
After that, the world remained black and mostly still. And the small silver glow slowly recovered its brightness.
Did Snow really remember all this?, ZaiWin wondered, closely watching over the only source of light amidst that darkness. It felt very lonely in there. Very cold, he thought, looking around once more, but there was nothing else to see.
Outside everything was silent, he concluded, trying his best to hear something. Even though the voices that had reached that dark world had been far from comforting or pleasant, they had still reassured him that there was something else out there. Now it was as if the entire world had ended, and he would be forever lost in that darkness.
Maybe because ZaiWin was doing his best to hear as far as he could, a child's giggle suddenly echoed from afar. And that mere sound brought a thin rain of light into the dark world around him. It felt warm again, he concluded. It felt reassuring. The child's voice was much lower than the other sounds had been, almost like a lost echo, as if it were reaching him across a very long distance. But it still spoke of happiness and hope. And the silver glow fed on it like a small seed in urgent need of watering.
Wherever it might be, the child must be playing, ZaiWin concluded, even though he couldn't really understand what it was saying. Even when the giggling stopped and it was silent again, he could still feel that now something was different. Now all kinds of emotions were flooding into the dark world around him. Curiosity. Happiness. Admiration. Wonder. Hope. Love. Fear. Courage. Dedication. Sadness. Gratitude. Forgiveness. So many different feelings. As if a bridge had been established between that lonely silver glow and that child's heart, and every time the child felt something those feelings would bleed into that dark world.
From time to time the child's small voice would reach ZaiWin as well. Laughing. Arguing. Crying. Simply talking. He could never understand what was being said, but those mere sounds were more than enough to bring new joy to the silver glow. It was learning, ZaiWin concluded. Molding itself according to those emotions.
The child was obviously too naive, too hopeful. Even when sadness poured into that dark world it never lasted for long. Even when it was in pain, courage and determination always followed and the pain was gone. Even when it was hurt, the hurt would be quickly replaced by forgiveness and love. Overall, it was mostly happy. Not an overflowing, exciting kind of happiness. Just happy. As if even the smallest things could bring forth that emotion.
Too naive, ZaiWin thought again. But not a bad source of nourishment for that silver glow. In fact, he could easily recognize many of those traits in the Snow he had come to know. He too, was easy to content, finding happiness in the most insignificant things, like watching a flower dance in the wind. He too was quick to overcome sadness and pain, no matter how deeply he'd been hurt. He too was able to really forgive and to honestly care for other people, even if those people had unjustly hurt him. Up till that moment, ZaiWin had always thought that that kind, naive, bright side of Snow's personality was to be expected, taking into account that he was a Celestial. He had never thought that such traits could have been molded after someone else. The difference was that the child from far away was just that, a child. And Snow was almost an adult.
When ZaiWin looked at the small silver glow he couldn't help stare in amazement, his heart beating faster against his chest. The small glow wasn't just a glow anymore. It was actually a small baby-boy, his short, silver hair floating around his round head as if he were submerged in water. He was sucking his tiny hand and, from time to time, his even tinier toes would flex. ZaiWin really wished he could hold him, keep him warm in his embrace. But he still had no physical body, and, by the way the baby kept floating, his pale skin glowing softly, that wasn't Snow's real body either. Probably the mental image the baby had created of himself, ZaiWin considered, unable to stop himself from smiling inwardly when his small legs moved.
So here you are … finally found you.
As the baby kept softly floating, ZaiWin managed to capture a glimpse of his small, smooth back. And there they were, the silver daitai forming two small, beautiful wings. And yet there were a lot of markings missing. Which meant that VinWei had been right, and that the rest of his daitai had been formed after Snow had been born.
As to be expected, all the daitai related to his golden arrays, the markings that were more or less common to all Tien'Elhar, were already there.
Also, as to be expected, there was no trace of any of Snow's ice and wind daitai. Those he would earn later on, as he experienced the hardships of what it meant to be alive in such a harsh world.
But, as for the others, the ones responsible for the red array, even though most of them were missing, ZaiWin could still detect four of them, right in the middle of his back, two on each side of his spine. The complex and hard angles of the markings were completely different and unmatched, when compared with the other, much softer and delicate lines.
Now that the pattern formed by Snow's daitai was much simpler, ZaiWin could clearly see them and recognize them. Those were daitai of destruction, the same type of markings that covered the bodies of the feimao, the same kind that should never be present on a Tien'Elhar's back. Up till that moment, he had always thought that, like his ice markings, Snow had somehow acquired those daitai by living through some horrible event. A war, maybe. Or some huge natural disaster. He had never thought he had actually been born with a few of them.
What are you …?, ZaiWin couldn't help wonder.
Looking back, if those dark lakes that would ripple with golden waves were something like the origin of a Tien'Elhar's existence, answering to people's prayers like, as a child, he'd been taught would happen, even back then Snow's origin had been completely different.
You're not like them at all, are you?
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Ah, Snow isn't just accidentally different 😊 He was always supposed to be different, right from the start. 😊 Eh, ZaiWin was actually chosen by some strange being 👽👽👽😁
Language:
ZaiWin: Literally zai (blade) + win (chaos).
Daitai: Literally dai (light) + tai (mark), or holy Markings, considered Heavenly Blessings. They're the source of power.
VinWei: Literally vin (hard) + wei (crystal)
Tien'Elhar: Literally tien (Heaven) + el (supreme) + har (girl child). The Heavenly Beings also known as Celestials in the common language.
Feimao: Literally fei (raging / furious) + mao (beast / monster). Raving beasts that appear in unbalanced, ungoverned lands. They possess destructive markings that in turn corrupt the land even further. Hard to explain in just 2 lines -_-; Anyway. Bad, vicious things that need to be killed.