Tears dripped onto the bread and cheese nestled in a napkin on Rose’s lap. 

He sat alone in the middle of the forest, where the trees slept, and snow fell from a colorless sky. Night was approaching, and Rose feared he’d gotten himself lost after running away so dauntlessly, but the only thing on his mind when he left home was the hurtful words of the man he loved most. 

Things that only his brother could mend with open arms and a soft voice. 

Rose wiped his cold cheeks and wrapped up his food. Briar’s home was less than a day's walk, but there was no telling how far he had to go when he couldn’t recognize any of the paths. On the other hand, if he kept walking, he might make it before dark—and before his husband caught up with him. 

He didn’t want to cry again, but the tears fell on their own, hot and painful. Rose buried his face into his palms, sobbing until he felt like shattering under the weight of sorrow. His voice traveled as a whisper through the trees, a soft sound taken far into the forest by the wind. 

A breath of frost caressed his hair and pulled the flowers from his braid. They touched the snow, flickering with movement as Rose knelt to retrieve them. Then, one by one, he gathered them gently into his hands and reached for the last blossom sitting under the shadow of someone in front of him. 

Rose gasped and withdrew his hand from the clawed feet standing near his flower. He looked up, following the muscles and scars of a body covered in strange inked patterns. Winter-light glinted off the tips of claws and sharp ends of a smile most frightening, but his eyes glittered the most—both the color of gold coins and the blood spilled to acquire them. 

Then, a voice spoke to him, one so low and rough, it licked a cold trail up Rose’s spine. 

“Why are you crying, maiden-fair?"