This world is filled with wonders and horrors alike, sights that could take your breath away and places where that breath will be taken from you, by force, in a rather permanent way. There is beauty in both of those, though.

There is beauty in the mirrored bridges where once the War of Bridges was fought, in the crystalline sights they reflect from all over the world, and there is beauty in the Darkness Between, where the remnants of things that should be forgotten and abandoned rest asleep, forever, in the embrace of the Collector.

There was beauty, as well, in the place where Albert had brought Isse now:

Winter’s Last Stand.

A grand name for a not very grand place.

It is a hill overlooking the sea west of Irevia, the Sea of Wanderers, Acrimonia. Well, more an ocean than a sea, but that’s how the populace calls it, so the name’s stuck now.

The hill, and an area of more or less 10 hectares around it, was covered in knee deep snow, soft as a pillow, freezing to the touch. The cold all around deepened, but not in an unpleasant way. Many had defined the place as ‘The perfect Winter wonderland’, and everyone couldn’t agree more with the definition. Kids loved playing here because the snow was always perfect for starting snowball fights and making snowmen. There was also something… strange, about the place, that kept monsters away and blocked the birth of angry snow golems. At most, you’d probably find some kind of snow rabbit or snow puppy wandering around aimlessly.

All in all, this was a safe place.

That was not what Isse felt though. The moment her feet walked through the invisible line that separated the rest of the world from the Last Stand, her soul shuddered and she felt like falling to the ground as feelings of sadness, nostalgia, resignation and happiness bombarded her mind all at once.

A tear streamed down her face and she hugged herself inside the coat Albert had kindly given to her (it was way too big for her, but that only made it all the more comfortable), trying to comfort herself and Siidi.

“What is this place?” she asked, willing her voice not to tremble, and barely managing it.

“This, my dear, is Winter’s Last Stand. A place of joy that was born of sorrow and war. Here, winter comes before any other place in the world and leaves last, in memory of a great sacrifice made in the name of a great cause.”

What cause? she wondered, but didn’t voice the question. Although, Albert apparently read it off her face.

“Nobody really knows what the cause was. The knowledge died with the man who helped make this place, together with his name and story. The College made sure of it.”

The College. Always the College. She was beginning to think that, whenever something bad happened, it was always the College’s fault. Her family had died because of the College, the arachne before her had died because of a Skill preserved by the College, the man who had created this sad place had disappeared from history because of the College. What was that group’s purpose? Why did they exist? Why had nobody tried to rebel against it?

“I hate the College,” she whispered.

And at that Albert chuckled. He shared the sentiment. Stars, he knew many people who shared the sentiment. But, at the same time, he knew the answer to Isse’s unspoken question: why had nobody rebelled?

It was simple: because they were powerful. Because they had money and connections, because the temples worked with them, because their reach spanned all four of the continents and, once upon a time, had even reached the islands of the pirates. One couldn’t simply attack them, because they would have to fight the whole world.

“You’re not the only one,” he said as he began walking forwards, motioning for her to follow him.

She didn’t move from her spot as she watched him slowly make his way through the snow, creating a small trail in the otherwise clean, white, expanse. Part of her was telling her to run and not look back, while another was telling her to use one of her Spells to kill the man now. He was old, sure, and a [Spymaster], apparently, but he wasn’t looking at her. She could do it. She had the advantage here!

Don’t, said Siidi, carefulness emanating from her voice, You said it yourself: he’s old, and has a Class we don’t know much about. That’s two things in his favor. Let’s not test fate.

She was, obviously, right. Isse didn’t understand where the instinct had even come from. She was better than that. She wasn’t a murderer. At least, not unless someone gave her a valid reason to be one.

…

Fuck that sounded like the most awful excuse in the world, but she’d long since come to terms with her new nature as an arachne. Killing came to her as naturally as breathing. She still remembered how… indifferent, yes, that was the right word, indifferent, she had felt when she’d killed her first animal. And, more than that, the animalistic joy that had pervaded her when she’d killed her first [Soldiers].

She took a deep breath, tamping down on her raging background thoughts, strangling the desire to kill the man who had saved her even though he knew all too well her true nature, shushing that little voice that kept telling her to start running and never turn back, to take all she could from Albert’s little wagon and leave in all haste.

She began walking.

And, suddenly, the snow was no longer cold. Instead, it felt like a warm hug on her spider half. It was calming, welcoming, telling her that it was alright for her to be here, that she had been expected. That they’d been waiting. The sadness and sorrow she’d felt up until now disappeared, leaving behind only the nostalgia for a world that never was and happiness.

Again, she stopped dead in her tracks. Again, a tear ran down her eye, impossible for her to stop. Not that she would’ve. This sensation of being welcome, desired, even… no, not loved, that was too much. But still, all the rest, it was enough to make her forget, for a moment, that she was the only one left.

Albert turned towards her, an eyebrow rising questioningly as she noticed her state.

“You coming?”

His voice broke her out of her reverie and she began walking again, following his trail. Still, she had to ask.

“How does the snow feel?”

Albert didn’t even turn around as he answered: “Soft and cold, girl. What else should it feel like?”

Then I’m the only one. Or he’s lying.

He’s not lying. He doesn’t feel like a man who likes to lie.

Maybe you’re right.

They walked, and the sensation of warm snow kept making her feel unsettled and welcome at the same time. She still remembered the first time she’d seen snow back on Earth. She’d looked at the cangiant expanse in front of her house… and refused to walk out, shouting at her parents that the snow was dirty and she didn’t want to get dirty. Her parents had laughed so hard they had to sit down.

Afterwards, her father had tried to make her understand that snow was not dirty. “How can something so white be dirty, dear?” he had said, but she’d shaken her head and stubbornly kept on thinking that she was right.

That is, until a week later her grandparents had come to visit. Her grandpa proposed that they go out for a walk and, when he’d heard of her fears, had chuckled and proposed that he carry her on his shoulders. She, foolish child, had agreed.

Then, the moment they’d walked out of her home, all bundled up, her grandpa had promptly taken her off his shoulders and thrown her into the closest snow pile, laughing as he shouted: “Well, does it feel dirty?”

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She’d cried, of course, but then she’d seen the error of her ways, and since then she’d fallen in love with snow and, afterwards, the season of snows, winter.

Isse didn’t know why that memory had popped up now, but it made her smile and chuckle.

“Thinking of something funny?”

She stopped laughing to herself, but couldn’t keep the smile off her face: “Yeah, I just remembered something funny, is all. Doesn’t this place make you feel at home?”

And at that, finally, she saw Albert smile. A small, genuine, smile, that was nothing like his boisterous and mocking laughter from before or the sad smile that made him look even older than he already was. This was a simple, happy, smile, that creased his lips and made some barely noticeable laugh lines appear.

“Not home, no, but it’s safe. It welcomes us all. Especially bitter old men like me and outcasts like you.”

Isse was sure that those words should’ve made her sad, but instead she felt relief. Relief that this place was for her even though she was an arachne. Relief that this place was safe for her, no matter what happened, no matter what she would choose to become.

And then she understood: she could trust Albert. If she couldn’t, this place wouldn’t have welcomed him in. It would’ve shunned him, made the snow hard and bitterly, unbearably, cold. His steps would’ve faltered as the ground caved under his feet, trying to stop him, trying to make him fall to bury him in a tomb of ice, to be found only when the seasons changed and reached this place last.

She skittered closer to him, and asked: “What was it like, being a Spymaster?”

Albert looked up, and his smile became just a tad bigger: “I’ll tell you if you tell me what it’s like to be an arachne.”

“Deal!” she offered him her hand.

“Deal,” and he shook it.

----------------------------------------

There was a statue at the top of the hill standing at the very center of this field. It wasn’t grand, but there was something grand about the man whose features were sculpted in the ice it was made of.

His clear hair looked ruffled by the wind, his eyes were half closed, as if he had been about to fall asleep when the sculptor had eternalized him in his (or her) creation. His lips were twisted upwards in a soft smile.

He was bowing to an invisible public, his right arm raised behind him to make the gesture grander, while his left was tucked close to his body, as if he was holding something.

Around the statue were a dozen other ice statues, but their features looked nothing like the resigned, peaceful expression on this one’s face. They were shown as screaming, in fear or pain she couldn’t tell, their arms extended away from their bodies, trying to escape from some kind of great enemy, or trying to shield themselves from an attack. Their hands, always, were broken. Or rather, the fingers were, as if they’d been holding onto something and whoever had created these statues had been forced to break them to free whatever that was.

“This place is… strange.”

Albert chuckled at that: “These are a reminder of what it means to break the peace in this place. Wars cannot be fought here, neither on land nor at sea.”

“So… these people were [Generals]?”

“Most probably. Again, the story behind this place was erased from all books. I presume they were [Generals].”

Isse thought about it for a moment, then asked: “Then, why not turn the [Soldiers] into ice statues? Wouldn’t that be more effective at stopping a fight?”

“Sure, but then this wouldn’t be a place of peace. It would be a graveyard. And, I think, the man who made this place was a [Soldier] himself, once upon a time.”

There was another question she wanted to ask, but it made no sense whatsoever. Or rather, it wouldn’t have made sense back on Earth. Here, though…

“Is that a statue of the man, or the man himself?”

There, she’d asked it. She looked up at Albert, expecting him to look at her with an expression of scorn or for him to laugh at her. Instead, there was… admiration, in his eyes.

“Nobody knows the answer to that one. Historical records state that there were a few [Sculptors] at the time with the Skills and the skill to make something like this, so one would be lead to believe that this is, in fact, a statue of whoever this man was. But then, you can feel it too: this aura of peace, of kindness and sadness. That… doesn’t feel like something a [Sculptor]’s Skills should allow. Not centuries after they died. In time, even Skills fade.”

So it was actually possible.

“Are you sure you don’t know anything more about the statue? About this place?”

Albert shook his head: “I spent my whole life trying to find the answer to that question dear. A little side project of mine, you could say. But I’ve long since come to the conclusion that, if the information still exists at all, it’s in the College’s hands. We will probably never find out.”

He sighed, turning around back the way they’d come.

“Look around as long as you want girl. I’ll be waiting by the wagon. Gonna prepare some dinner.”

Isse nodded, sitting down, her spider half cradled by the warm snow while her human half was hugged by the cozy sweater. She closed her eyes and, for a while, pretended to be back in the ‘mess hall clearing’ on the Day of Defeat. While the rest of the world celebrated the end of the Silken Week, they mourned the loss of their sisters in all these years, asking that they support them from Death’s embrace and greet them warmly when, inevitably, they came to rest. The silence in that moment had been absolute, with even the spiderlings standing in silence, their arms crossed over their chest, their eyes closed, not comprehending completely the why but still understanding the importance of the moment.

She sat, letting the gentle wind caress her hair, and opened her other senses, just like Grandmother had taught her to do whenever she felt lost and in need of guidance.

The Elder had always found it mildly entertaining, how the other races thought the arachne were just killing machines incapable of empathy, and yet, it was exactly because they’d been born of Death that they understood life better than most, that they could listen to the earth unfettered by the thoughts and preoccupations other species had.

“Creation is made of opposites. Where there is kindness, there is evil. For each light, a shadow, and so on and so forth. Us living beings, we are of Creation. That means we, too, are made of opposites. A balance in al - Why are you laughing young spider? There is nothing funny or… cliché you say? But can you call something a cliché if it’s true?”

At the time, she’d laughed. Now, the simple memory made her want to cry.

What would it feel like to lie down in this snow? Would it hurt her? Could she just… stay here?

…

Before she could try to find an answer, she heard something.

A voice, no, a whisper, so low she would’ve probably missed it weren’t she listening as attentively as she was.

“Come… closer…”

She snapped her eyes open and whipped her head around, trying to see where the voice had come from. But there was nobody here. Only her and the statues.

Please, let’s not do some Weeping Angel bullshit, alright? I’ll close my eyes and you statues will still be where you were before.

She closed her eyes, trying to hear the voice again. Unless she’d imagined it, which was possible considering how altered her mind probably was.

And yet, there it was again.

“Come… closer… child…”

A new word too! Well, at least this one wasn’t following the cliché of the ‘mysterious voice keeps saying the same thing over and over again until you do what it wants you to do’. Which, admittedly, was a very long name for a trope, but she had no idea what its actual name was.

“Come… closer… gift…”

She looked around, and her eyes landed on the statue of the man whose story had been erased.

“Ok, clearly you’re the one who’s talking to me.”

“Clever… child…”

Aaaaaaand it had actually talked back. What. The. Fuck!?

I guess I was right. This is not just a statue. It’s the man, turned into a statue. Gods dammit, that’s fucking disquieting.

She skittered closer to the statue, heedless of the possible dangers. Clearly, this place wouldn’t allow something dangerous to happen to her or anyone else.

Looking closer, she noticed that the statue was wearing some kind of cloak, perfect for a wanderer and, underneath it, peaked out something that looked like a container. A small box? She couldn’t see it well, it being made of transparent ice and all that.

When she was at spitting distance from the statue, the voice spoke again.

“Take… gift…”

She watched in astonishment as the fingers of the statue’s left hand slowly, very slowly, moved, opening it, releasing its grip on… n̵o̸t̴h̶i̷n̸g̷.

A̴f̵t̵e̷r̶ ̶a̸l̶l̶,̴ ̸t̴h̷e̴ ̵s̷t̸a̴t̶u̵e̶ ̷h̷a̷d̷n̷'̸t̸ ̸b̶e̷e̷n̶ ̴h̸o̶l̷d̵i̵n̵g̶ ̶a̷n̵y̴t̶h̷i̷n̶g̶ ̵f̶r̵o̵m̷ ̴t̷h̵e̴ ̸b̸e̶g̸i̶n̸n̶i̴n̴g̸.̵ B̴u̷t̶ ̸t̴h̷e̴n̶,̵ ̸w̷h̴y̷ ̶d̸i̷d̷ ̶s̴h̶e̶ ̶f̶e̶e̷l̴ ̶l̸i̷k̷e̸ ̵t̷h̵a̵t̸ ̴w̷a̷s̷ ̸w̶r̵o̸n̵g̸?̶ ̸T̵h̶e̵ ̶s̵t̴a̶t̷u̸e̴ ̸s̴h̴o̷u̸l̷d̸'̸v̷e̴ ̵h̶e̸l̵d̶ ̸s̸o̴m̴e̵t̷h̴i̶n̷g̷,̴ ̵s̴h̷e̵ ̷w̷a̷s̷ ̴c̷e̵r̶t̴a̸i̵n̴ ̶o̷f̵ ̴i̴t̴,̶ ̷d̴e̷e̷p̶ ̸i̴n̴s̸i̷d̷e̴ ̵h̴e̵r̸ ̶s̷o̵u̶l̴.̷ ̷I̷t̴ ̴w̴a̵s̵ ̶m̸e̷a̷n̵t̶ ̵t̷o̵ ̵b̷e̵ ̸h̵o̶l̸d̵i̵n̷g̸ ̴a̴ ̸v̴-̴

[███li█ Na███]

Isse batted her eyes and looked at the statue, wondering why she’d come so close to touching it.

Suddenly, she felt very hungry. Hadn’t Albert talked about making dinner?

She turned and skittered the way she’d come. Today had been… a good day.