The sky was blocked by the smoke.

Diane’s hair was scattered over the pieces of broken bricks. There was ash on her eyelashes; probably what was left of the map she once wanted so much. It was a hot February morning; her skin was burning, with a big hole in her stomach. If her blood mixed with her comrades’, she feared, she would not be the queen anymore. But did any of that mean anything at that moment? Queen, peasant, all would bleed out at similar time.

Then she opened her eyes and saw black. On clothes, on caskets. There were more than two of them. A man was holding her arm and saying something.

“Excuse me?” she asked.

The man looked concerned. “I asked if you were alright, Your Majesty.”

Diane pulled away; she had been getting lost in such horrific daydreams more often now. “Yes, certainly.”

When she turned around, she realized she was all alone. Only Thomas Hammer was standing in the distance, observing his black shoes.

“Where are the others?” Diane asked the man.

“They left, Your Majesty,” he answered softly.

“Yes, of course.”

Diane said goodbye to the man who proceeded to lower the caskets into their respective holes, one by one. Diane marched towards Thomas, not daring to turn around. Thomas gave her a dejected smile. She grabbed his upper arm as they walked through the cemetery. It was cold out, so Diane was wearing her thickest clothes; Thomas’s arm was warm, and she had to change sides a few times so her hand wouldn’t burn.

“Well,” he started, trying to sound lighthearted, “that’s over.” He sniffed a few times and wiped his eyes with his sleeve.

“Are you crying?” Diane asked.

“Of course not,” Thomas answered.

Diane smiled. “It’s alright. So am I.”

Thomas heard her sob the entire way home. She told him she had never cried so much in her life, and he believed her without a doubt. She said she remembered her mother and the funeral she didn’t get to have. She was also reminded of how she missed Meredith’s funeral; that was when she stopped talking. It took a few days for the happenings of that day to settle in her mind. In her head she was the worst kind of being; she didn’t deserve to wish to be saved, let alone have people sacrifice themselves so her pathetic little lungs could suck in other people’s air. Thomas tried to persuade her against it, to tell her all people make mistakes, and it wasn’t really a mistake in the real sense of the word, and she also couldn’t have known what Elaine was plotting, but she didn’t listen to his rants. She hated herself more than ever before. Kyla was the only one who miraculously survived that explosion. She had been unconscious for a week now despite Isaac having rushed to Lewtown to heal her. Thomas was still in shock, and he talked much more that usual. Diane let him, the sound of his voice keeping her from locking herself up in the past. He also cried in his sleep every night, and at breakfast and lunch. He never said his mother’s name, though he did reminisce a lot.

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All rulers were made aware of the encounter between George and Diane. Needless to say none of them rejoiced at her choice, but they did not have anything to say to her, especially now that her powers were back. Not fully yet, but they didn’t need to know that.

Diane still found it all a bit hard to believe. It was like a prolonged dream; maybe her entire life had been a dream, and she would, at some point, wake up in her bed, thirteen years old, and go out to play with George and Meredith. Maybe she never even existed.

It would have been better that way.

Days went by in such uncertainty and unrealistic hoping. It rained almost every day, so the dust that was Thomas’s house turned into mud.

“What do you plan to do now?” Thomas asked her on a typical March day. Neither of them cried anymore, though Thomas was still wearing black. He found Diane standing outside, her big coat on and her weapons safely tucked in her big belt. She could see heavy, gray clouds hover above her head.

“Do you think it will rain?” she asked him.

He was shivering next to her. “Maybe.”

“I hope it won’t.”

“Why?”

Diane looked into his intense, gray eyes. If only the sparks in them would light a fire big enough to enwrap her entirely, to hide all skin, maybe she would have stayed.

“I will be leaving now, Thomas,” she said softly.

Thomas smiled. “Where are we going this time? Carcer? Painron? Some other hidden place?”

Diane returned the smile. “No. I am going alone.”

“I know. I am just asking where to.”

Thomas stuffed his hands deep into his pockets to defend against the cold. The wind was carrying paper bags and newspaper around the empty street. It was a hollow town now, a hollow world, emptied by the blizzard that never came.

“I don’t know. I just… have to go somewhere I can think. Alone.” She was unusually quiet. Maybe she wanted him to ask her to stay. But he knew what she needed wasn’t his mercy. “My father is coming back to take care of things while I’m away.”

Thomas nodded. “I guess this town really is too small to hold you for long.”

Diane had tears in her eyes. She wanted something to hold onto so much she almost begged him to come with her. But she didn’t need distractions; she needed to wake up her slumberous past and become the person who would shelter the world.

“I have something for you,” Thomas said softly, his ears red; from the cold, to be sure.

He pulled the gold necklace out of his pocket, the one Maria had given him. Diane gasped.

“I knew you would leave, so… I waited to give this to you.”

Next to the small emerald Diane recognized too well, was a little, tiny, microscopic star. She looked up. His face was completely red.

“So…” His voice broke in a funny way. “So you know you have somewhere to return to. I might not have a house anymore but…” Thomas was taken aback by her suddenly crashing into him and wrapping her arms around his torso. He didn’t know if he should hug her back or stay with his arms slightly raised.

“Thank you,” she said.

They both thought she pulled away too soon. But the day was breaking, and it was time for her to leave. Thomas put the necklace around her neck and took one last look into her eyes before she mounted her horse and rode off towards the sun; his winter fairy, taking all the colors with her as she left. The first snowflake melted on his palm.

“This is going to be a cold one.”

The End of Book 1