Winter was burning.

Mixing with the hellish, bright orange flames were the acrid plumes of rising black smoke; the pungent smell of charred wood and melting metal, along with the tang of blood pervaded the cold air. Then, within that dancing inferno in the middle of that bleak winter, was the reflection within a clear, crimson puddle. And within that macabre mirror, was the image of an armored man hunched over a woman and wailing baby in his arms. Varying shades of dried burgundy spotted and streaked across the layer of metal and leather of his armor like some garish design. If one looked a bit closer in that reflection, they may see the corpses scattered haphazardly around them, like some gruesome garden of death.

Dark tendrils of hair spilled out of their former twisted coil like a tangled, inky waterfall over his arms, puddling onto the dirt ground. Scarlet blossomed in profusion at the center of her torso, almost resembling a mortal peony. Her once plump, roseate lips were now deprived of any color, dried and cracked like wrinkled paper. Shallow, rattling breaths slipped in and out between them.

The distant clamor of hustling soldiers and their clanging cacophony of weapon striking weapon, combined with the crackling and crashing of incinerating wood, seemed to fall deaf on the man’s ears. The only sounds he could hear were her dying breaths, and it was as if a piece of her life line was fleeting away with each exhalation.

To him--she remained a goddess, in spite of the waxen face, smudges of gray ash smeared over the formerly-pearly plains, along with the deep shadows underneath her fluttering eyes. Although her beauty now was soon to be possessed by the Death. He knew. She knew. Even the baby knew. Perhaps that was the reason for its heartbreaking cries--it was lamenting for its mother’s impending demise.

Her mouth curved up in a small, quivering smile as a single clear droplet slipped down the side of her face, creating a pale liquid trail on her ashy cheek. The man’s heart clenched, and it was as if some thrashing beast was grieving within him. It took every bit of willpower that he possessed to keep his arms from trembling, to keep himself from pulling her up to his chest and tightly encasing her in his protective embrace.

No. He mustn’t do that. He of all people could not, must not.

The woman knew that. She knew the pain that she’d inflicted on him all this time, the hurt and the heartache he suffered of because of her.

And yet…she was helpless to ease him of that suffering.

Reaching up with a trembling hand, bluish-green veins snaking like tributaries down the back of it, she managed to graze his jawline with the tips of her slender fingers.

“Thank you,” she breathed, her quavering voice just barely audible over the roaring flames surrounding them. The man’s eyes widened slightly before they squeezed shut, and he released a shaky breath ladened with suppressed emotions. Before her hand could drop from his face, he quickly seized it, his fingers wrapping around it tightly as if her hand would disintegrate in any moment. Warmth flickered across her face as her lips formed a regretful smile. “And…I’m sorry.”