Winter's Passage

Yukimi flew, and the train of her kimono, made of the lightest silk, billowed in her wake. The winter breeze tossed and played with it as the blades of her ancient, wobbly skates sliced through the ice. It mattered little that the straps bit into her skin when a single smooth stroke could send her to the far end of the pond.

She closed her eyes, let herself glide. Listened to the soft whisper of silk over ice. Surely flight, or ascending to the heavens, could be no better. Small wonder these contraptions had captured such attention, when that foreign dog had used them to glide the creek all those seasons past.

Her--no, their--place, and a full moon on a clear winter night was the perfect weather to request they join her.

She stopped in the middle, raised her hands to the moon and spun. Beckoned, every gesture an invitation. Snowflakes danced around her, carried by a wind softened by the screen of dark, leafless trees that enclosed this place. A sure sign of their presence.

Lights, in palest blues, the greens of spring and forest alike, even a few scattered pink and purple motes bobbed to life and converged on the fringes of the large pond. Foxfires. Spirits. No true children of the flame; such weather was anathema to them. Perhaps a bold one might join them later--though she hoped it would merely watch rather than join them on the ice.

Yet while the light surrounded her, they hesitated at the pond’s edge. They did not draw nearer, and not one of them manifested its true form.

“Come, little ones,” she murmured, in a voice that echoed a blizzard’s first stirrings. “It is safe. No monk lurks among the trees this night, waiting to banish us. No mortal lingers within a—”

“Hana-san.”

She stilled, though her skates propelled her forward. “That is not my name.”

“But it was once,” another voice said. Hearing it made her think of times long passed— perhaps an echo of someone she had once heard speak. Power thrummed, making the ice beneath her feet shiver. The blades sank deeper than they should have as the air filled with the flush of spring. “Long ago. And so it remains, whether or not you choose to forget.”

A bundle fell from the sky, shining whiter than the falling snow, with the faintest hints of green shimmering in and out of view. On instinct, she caught it--and stilled. Cradled what she now held.

Flowers that spanned both the summer and winter seasons lay in her arms. White chrysanthemums for mourning. A few sweet pea sprigs to bid farewell. And a single red spider lily in the center.

The flower of death.

Another spot of color nestled among the white blooms, and the bouquet was heavier than it ought to be. She carefully parted the chrysanthemums. Slowly. Almost involuntarily she cupped the small object.

The child’s toy, bright as the spider lily, bobbed its head. Dead, bulging eyes seemed to fix on her own. Tremors raced up her arms, and cold crawled in its wake.

A bull. Perhaps even the one she had cradled as she had run through the storm that night, seeking help for—

The bouquet and toy fell. Flowers scattered, strewn across ice and snow alike by the rising wind. Dozens of ghost-lights appeared among the trees. Spirits of fire manifested above her head and hovered, bathing her in summer’s warmth as they drew closer. Their presences grew brighter, tangible enough to hold her in place.

And the toy sat upright at her feet. Stared at her and waited.

“Yes,” a soft voice of indeterminate gender murmured. A shadow glided free of the trees and “It is time you remembered who you were. Reach back, child of snow. Part the mists of the past.”

A demon had invaded her small village. It had traveled unseen through rich and poor alike, taking young, old, all in its path. For days they lay in their beds, scarcely able to move as fever wracked them. Pain twisted their backs, and the oni who guarded hell pounded war drums in their heads. Moans from the stricken had filled the air in the days before that strange red rash appeared on their bodies. At last those patches filled with oozing white.

Scabs formed and fell off the wounds, leaving ugly scars behind. When they survived at all.

It had reached her home. Taken hold of her husband. And on the day he breathed his last and the demon afflicted her child, she had fled the sickness. Cradling the red bull that some had claimed warded off this strange demon-illness, she fled with the baby toward the small shrine. Surely one among the eight million gods would hear her plea and spare her family. A small one would suffice.

But the cold had stolen her breath. Snow fell so thickly that she wandered aimlessly, cradling little Akio in her arms. The trees had closed in around them, shadows in the snow that reached for her babe. And in the end, those shadows--the demons of illness and winter--had taken him.

“You see now, do you not?” the voice murmured. A gentle hand rested on her shoulder. “Your season is long past, Hana-san. For you are not the daughter of winter’s chill, the destroyer of man--but a mortal yourself.”

“No.” The words were razored ice in her mouth. The wind roared with her rising fury. A storm’s rage descended.

“The child and husband you sought to save have long since rejoined the cycle of life. Perhaps they have already left samsara, and joined the bodhisattvas. Even ventured beyond it, to—”

“I am Yukimi,” she snarled. Her hair grew long and tangled. Her fine kimono bled to the white of the deepest blizzard, tinged with the blue of true ice. Cold swirled around her, answering her call--yet she shivered with it. “I have never been this Hana, this flower you speak of. I am…”

“Yet you bear her memories, do you not, yuki onna?”

She had crawled through the trees, cradling her too-still son as the cold stole over her. Tears froze on her cheeks, and she lost her voice to the blizzard. In the end she had…

“That is not me,” she hissed. Claws grew from her fingernails, and she held them poised. Ready to slash this shadow-being to pieces. “You make me see what never was. Remove these memories at once!”

The last thing she had seen was...this pond. This spot. Her place. And for every winter season, the mortals who ventured here had held her son until they, too, fell asleep in the soul. Their warmth became his, and he changed. Slowly. So slowly.

“I cannot remove what is yours, snow woman.”

At last a winter came where he seemed too warm for a child of snow.

“You chose to forget.”

When she woke from the long sleep after the warming-time the following mortal year, he was no longer with her.

“But no longer. This world has changed, Yukimi, once called Hana. Even the hardest of ice must thaw and give way to spring in its time.”

When had Akio, her son, departed?

Arms stole around her, too strong to escape. Her face pressed into a broad, muscular chest. Green and white lights surrounded her. She smelled flowers. The night, the storm, faded into the gentle warmth of spring. Sunlight blazed in her eyes--not the dim thing of winter days, but the blazing beast of high summer.

“Your season has passed, my child,” the voice said once more. It was now recognizably male, with a cadence that set her heart racing--a tone she knew as well as her own. He drew back, no longer a shadow but a figure of glowing green in too many shades to count, and extended a hand to her. Beckoned toward a tree in blossom on the other side of the pond. “It is time for you to leave this behind and be born anew, as all things are intended to.”

In a blink he crossed the pond. Grasped a blossom, and bowed his head. Deeper greens flowed around his hand for a moment. Then he turned, and appeared at her side again. Took her limp hand in his, and placed a perfectly ripe pear in it.

“Rest here, my daughter, until you are ready.” His voice was so beautiful, so gentle, she wept. “You need but eat the pear, and your next life will begin.” He leaned down, and wiped away her tears. “May it be long, fruitful, and see you free of the cycle of suffering.”

The one who had once been her husband leaned down and whispered, “Know, wife, that I await you at the end. No matter how long it takes.”

He backed away, and turned. Began to fade into the sunlight, becoming one with the trees.

Without thinking, she dashed forward. Lunged for his hand. “You are not leaving, Yamato,”she snarled, grasping him just before he disappeared completely. Snow swirled around their joined hands, and the wind once more took on a sharp edge. “Why should I depart, perhaps never to see you again, in this life or the next?” She dug her claws in, and the chill intensified. The sky darkened, dimming the sun to something closer to its weak winter self. “We are both here. Now. At the meeting of winter and spring.”

She dropped the pear and flung herself into his arms. Pulled him down to grass that began to freeze under her hand.

For she remembered now, even if he did not. In a flood, it had all returned at once. She was Hana.

“You came for me,” she murmured. Caressed his cheek. A trail of ice followed her fingers, only to melt within seconds.

But she was also Yukimi. A child of snow and unyielding ice.

“As you always have.”

More than mortal.

“Would you truly choose to let me go, having found me again after so long apart?”

If necessary, she would freeze him in place, so he could never be lost to her again.

“I am yours, Yamato. Here. Now. As Yukimi, the yuki onna who was once the mortal woman Hana. But I have grown beyond the one you called your wife. What need have I to revert to human life when you stand before me?”

The storm descended. Snow at first. But soon it shifted, to a mix of winter and the rains of spring. Cool wind brushed over them both.

“You came to me, thinking to save a demon from its fate,” she murmured. “On the chance, the merest hope, that you would find me again at the end. Because it is right and balanced. The way of life itself.” She wrapped her arms around him and felt him stir. “Always you have denied yourself, and there is no need.”

Yamato surrendered. Sank into her embrace, whispering her name. Two who were more than mortal met and their respective seasons became one. In this moment, the world, and the cycle of life, could wait.