Endless Winter

The winters in Alfheimr had been unnaturally cold since the Jotun had once again gone to war with Asgard. The biting chill from the Frost leaked through the barriers and killed everything it touched, and the Alfar from the icy realm did little to assist in closing the breach; in fact, they seemed to enjoy the plight of the High Alfar and their forest kin, revelling in their suffering as they watched their world die a little more, day by day.

Yes...the winters had become so very cold.

For Aeryn Sivahn--the sole surviving member of the royal Tuatha family, though she would be loathe to admit to it--simply bearing the knowledge that even when the last insect faded away she would still live on ate away at her soul like a virus. Through her many lives and faded memories, one thing was always clear: she would never die. That was her penance, though her crime against Fate had long since been forgotten. As she wandered the snow and frost-covered forests of the southern regions, where her home once stood, she could feel Death nipping at her heels; nipping, but never catching. There were times that the Eldar mused she could see Death himself when she glanced over her shoulder. It made her smile, yet at the same time it drove her mad in the knowledge that she would never meet this being, a creature far older than she could imagine, and simply talk with him. She felt she would enjoy his insight.

Yet, she stood alone in that bracing cold, chilled to the bone; she rarely felt cold, but this was intense. It was painful. There was something to be said about a cold so unbelievably cold that it burned. KNeeling, Aeryn touched the ice-covered blades of grass with her gloved fingers, wincing as the brittle plants shattered at a feather-touch; the frost had come so quickly that the grass hadn't even had time to wither.

Frozen in time, simply awating a boot to trod over and crush it.

The Eldar pulled her fur-lined cloak closer to her body, the hood shielding her ears and face as the wind began to pick up. It would be dark soon, and the need for shelter would be even greater. Her home was never far, the knowledge of dimensiona rips and pocket dimension aiding in keeping her true home sealed away from those who would bother her, but the prospects of returning to her lonely cave-home were unpleasant at best. In the darkness, the nightmares would come. Memories would haunt her. The screams that could never be silenced would echo through the halls, even when there was no sound. Loneliness consumed her, but she did not have the luxury of companionship. She always outlived them.

Instead, she stood there alone in the dying forest, singing with the wind.