A Winter Tale

Winter has officially arrived! Here's a frosty (maybe not so frosty) story for you to enjoy.

Dec 22, 2023

Happy winter, beautiful Book Monsters!

I know these are busy times for many of us. Here is that winter fairy tale short I promised you. If you find that the dashing fellow depicted throws off serious Jack Frost vibes, it could be because I’ve been reading some on that particular folklore character. And I won’t lie, I may have been influenced by Katherine Arden’s portrayal of Morozko in her Winter Trilogy. If you haven’t looked up the Vasya and Morozko inspired character art that’s out there on the web, I highly recommend indulging.

Since this is all I have for us here in the lair, today, I’m going to get right to it. Without any further chit-chat. Please enjoy my written rendering of the Ice Mage:

original character art credit goes to JuliusH.

Steam seared the air of the backroom at the washing house, every inch of space a hot, damp cloud belying the frigid air that gusted in with each opening of the door. Despite the heat, Elaini shivered each time one of the girls pushed through it to get outside with their arms full of wet laundry to hang, or a patron walked in through the front of her employer’s establishment. A bead of sweat dropped off her brow into the sudsy water in the tub she stood over. She plunged her hands down to her elbows, pushing her workload into the lukewarm soup. Down and up, down and up, the motion reminded her of the little dipping birds that played in the puddles after a rain outside the small hut she lived in with her mother each summer.

Summer was a distant memory right now. Elaini straightened, stopping her washing long enough to wipe her forehead with the back of her arm. The muscles in her back screamed at the change of position. She winced, pressing a hand over the ache as she blew at the wet strand of hair hanging over her eye. Another swirl of cold air raced through the ragged wood wash house, this time as both the front and back doors opened simultaneously. A racket of loud footsteps and voices rode the chill sweep as a boisterous group of men from the timber camp entered.

“Look at ‘em.” Nena, another of the washer girls, nudged Elaini’s arm, nodding her mulish chin toward the workmen. Elaini looked past the partition that separated the bathing rooms at the front of the house from where she worked with the other women in the laundry in the back. Through the haze, a quick clamor of bodies moved back and forth, demands grunted toward Ivan, the wash house owner. A couple of the men ordered tub baths, while others moved swiftly, catching up the girls working the front and moving swiftly into the small private rooms with them. Mena sniffed, wiping her runny nose on the back of her sodden arm. “They make more in five minutes than you or I’ll make all week with one of those smelly louts. Not that I blame em. If I weren’t so thin en ugly, I’d much prefer turnin’ coin on my back rather’n flayin the skin off my hands every day.”

Elaini looked at her own hands, red from the water and peeled raw from washing day in and day out. The couple moved past the doorway, out of sight. Mena stomped off to find her next load of laundry, and Elaini couldn’t help thinking of the girl’s remarks about her looks. She was, indeed, a thin sight. Tall and bony, with a chin far too long and teeth far too big to ever make up for, no matter how much weight she managed to put on. But Elaini didn’t suppose she ran the risk of being considered any great beauty herself. Small and thin from many a missed meal, she was pale, with dark features like most of the folk in this area. Her one saving feature might be her full head of long, thick hair, the color of wet bark after a drenching rain or snowmelt in the spring. It remained covered under a scarf most of the time to keep it out of the way while she worked, so it didn’t make a difference, anyway. Swiping her arm over her brow again, she stuck her hands back in the tub and began wringing out the sheets she’d just scrubbed with not another thought for what went in the front half of the washhouse.

After a fair bit of trouble with the bedding, she gathered the still wet mass of it all up and whisked out the back door, into the open air. Paid for each chore, if she hurried she could get another load in, and thereby another coin, for her efforts before sundown. Elaini and her mother lived alone together in a shanty little cabin at the edge of the forest on the outskirts of the village. Money was scarce and food along with it. They’d been watering the same pot of chicken broth and some of the root vegetables they’d saved from harvest time. With an extra coin, she could buy some scraps from the farmer that lived on her way home to throw in the pot, if she got out of here before too late.

With her thoughts on what type of meat scraps the farmer might have—duck, rabbit, it didn’t matter, anything would do—her eyes held on the ground as she stepped into the yard. She kept her chin down, so she didn’t step in the mud puddle right outside the back door, a hazard of constant traffic and the fact that the boys who dumped the dirty tubs out had a bad habit of carrying them far enough away from the building. A rabbit scampered around past the edge of her skirt, scared out of hiding when she opened the door. She thought she might trip over the little animal, taking them both into the cold, dirty muck, but before her eyes the puddle went solid, frozen. The rabbit scampered cleanly across the solid path just in time to see them both on their way without a collision.

“Whu…” she gasped. “How?” bewildered, she looked up for an answer to this phenomenon. There was no explanation in sight. The girls hanging their laundry on ropes in the yard bustled this way and that in the cold, not noticing the sudden freeze cast over the ground. The sheets were starting to soak through Elaini’s sleeves and the front of her dress as she stood there unmoving. Knowing the cold would soon seep into her bones if she didn’t get a move on, she stepped across the ice toward the lines.

No sooner did she move than a man stepped out of the woods. Not one of the timbermen, but a man she’d never seen before. He wasn’t anyone she knew from the village. In fact, she’d never seen anyone quite like him before. Tall and dark, he might have passed for an ordinary traveler passing through, but something about him struck Elaini as strange. Maybe strange wasn’t the word, but there was something not right about him. When his gleaming blue eyes found hers across the yard, they froze her on the spot. He walked toward her. Elaini could have sworn she heard tree limbs crackle with each step he took. The air all around her instantly turned colder. Finally, the other girls seemed to feel the sudden drop in the temperature. They all threw the rest of their washing on the ropes and rushed inside.

A deep chill struck Elaini’s extremities, but she just kept staring straight ahead at the stranger, unable to move. As he neared, a peculiar gleam lit his eyes, like the blue flame of fire. Elaini shivered, her breath puffing out of her lips in a cloud. The man smiled, his gaze searing, bringing heat to her middle, so incongruous with the cold. How on earth could she feel any warmth inside her with this cold snap riding the air?

The stranger walked straight toward her, the cracking and popping of branches intensifying with each step he took. When he stopped right in front of her, inches away, the breath between them froze into tiny sparkling dots that hung in the air. As if commanded by his gaze, they swirled close together, forming a globe. The little ball rising high between them, slowly turning above their heads. Elaini’s eyes widened, mesmerized. The man’s smile grew as he watched her. He brought his hand up and gave a loud snap of his fingers. Just like that, the ball burst, its glittering crystals scattering and blowing away in an instant.

“Wh–who are you?” Elaini managed. Another shiver racked her body when she spoke.

His sharp stare jumped from the sky down to her, his vibrant blue eyes dimming to an icy gray. His fingertips grasped the stubborn lock of her hair that fell forward, gently rubbing it between them. The strands frosted on her cheek even as her insides fired to life all the more. The odd clash of sensations made her sway. He leaned closer, catching her by her sides as his mouth pressed close to her ear. The rough scratch of his short beard scraped her skin the moment he spoke.

“Go inside, little washer girl. Something bad is going to happen in this place.”

Well, I have a bit of a crush now. I’m thinking there may have to be some more time spent on this story. What do you think, Monsters? ;)

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