The temple deep within the castle was in its heights, down winding corridors; Ro had been preparing the chambers for the past two hours. For the first hour, she had burned the fires using frostwood and the flames had danced blue-hot as she passed her blades through them, sharpened them, and passed them through again. Only after did she put them to boil over the top of the small bonfire; the smoke passed through the air and rose higher and higher, through the skylight made in the stone, and out into the dark night. After boiling them for two turns of a sandkeeper, she drained them and then put them on a cold tray, setting out the bonfire. The room would cool, but that was acceptable. Blue flame candles lit the room, wicked with twine from the same frostwoodâdesperately valuable.
The highest concentration of light was around a chair that had probably once been a dining chair, ornately carved pale wood with faded upholstery that may have once been a silver blue damask pattern, the arms bare wood and not meant for comfort. It was inlaid with iron and bone accents and it was big, bigger than Vera would need, because it was used to accommodating warriors and not those of her stature. At the foot of the chair was a large ice block, hauled freshly in, for Veraâs feet to be placed upon while Ro worked. To remember the pain of the past, it had to be surrendered into glory. It was the glory that lived on, well past the pain. It would be hard to walk after, but first steps always were the hardest.
By the time Vera was at the door, there would be no smoke, nothing to hinder Roâs sight, but for the prior hour combinations of roots and brush had been burnt to create a crisp smell, of the sort one might sense on the morning of a freshly fallen snow, when the world was swallowed down and silent. Ro was dressed entirely in white; a white hood covered her ornately braided hair, but the hood was attached to a white shift that went to the floor with tall slits to allow ease of motion for her legs; her legs were bare this time, to show she, too, could withstand the cold. Her arms were bare and the light of the room accented the scars here and there, previously unseen; none as lovely as those on her own face, done by her mentor on her Initiation, and the last ones Ro had received, kill marks notwithstanding.
Ro rarely chose someone who was not a warrior for scarring, but she did believe an ordinary person could do extraordinary things. It was the extraordinary she was concerned with, what she collected, what she gave out and offered up to the spirits, to the ice that guarded and empowered them, to the void that would take them all. These offerings were appeasements, to stave off the hardness of death by offering eternity in memory. That in this way, through these scars, events, people, momentsâthey were transcendent, eternal. It gave Ro a small comfort when she preferred so much of everything else in life to fade away. She chose carefully. She always took care to choose the right stories to endure on.
When the large iron knocker pressed its weight against the door, Ro opened it to accept Vera inâonce a girl, now a story. The story of a mouse becoming something more by the woods. She knew a story like that, herselfâhow a mouse had become a monster in the woods. Vera had always been the mouse: what would these woods turn her into? Ro gave her a wolfish smile, but did not speak. A ghost all in white, a ghost of the past and yet as unwavering as bone itself, Ro ushered Vera to the chair, gestured to settle herself, put her feet on the ice block. Waited for her to back out, if she would. This was the only time a person could choose their own birth.
