The whole world seemed to be filled with the sound of her breathing. Slow and laborious, slightly erratic, the rhythm of it pulsed against her eardrums, hissing through her senses and dulling the sounds of the snow-covered forest.
The mountain drew ever closer, and her eyes were steadily fixed on it. The star shone over the summit like a beacon, the silver-white glow holding secrets and promises that she could not fathom. Snowflakes fluttered through the frozen air, lighting upon pale, naked skin, decorating her auburn hair and catching upon her dark eyelashes. She paused, crouching down, a wild, feral thing in the moonlight.
"Don't stop now," said a faintly familiar voice, soft and deep.
Her gaze reluctantly tore away from the mountain, looking left and right, and seeing no one. Yet he was there. She could feel him. And she wasn't afraid.
"Just a moment to rest," she whispered to the air, her chest bellowing slowly as she breathed.
"There's still a long way to go. You must keep moving," replied the man.
Something gnawed at the back of her mind. She was supposed to be irritated with him. He was frustrating. Infuriating. Confusing. Demanding. But the emotions were absent now. They didn't make sense. For no reason at all, she knew she could trust him. There was a peculiar sense of the familiar, as if they were old friends.
"It's so far, though," she muttered, pushing to her feet again, feeling no shame nor giving any notice at all to her own nakedness. It wasn't her body, really, after all. Not here.
"Yes, it is far. You will become even wearier than you are now. But you must continue," the phantom voice resounded gently inside her head. "You have done well not to look back. Leave the past behind you. All of them. There will be a time to remember the ones you love, but others need you now."
She took a step and then paused. The powdery snow crunched as her foot sank down into its depths with exaggerated slowness. "But...he needs me...doesn't he?"
A gust of chilled wind pressed at her back, as if to nudge her forward. The boughs of the evergreens trembled, and silvery showers of snow rained down with an eerie, hissing noise. "No. He is with another now."
She knew she was supposed to feel sad at these words. And a soft, gentle ache seemed to rise behind her ribcage, pressing against her heart. There was something inevitable about it all. Pieces of an unseen puzzle falling into place. A wistful sadness swept over her, and the wind blustered again, trying to scatter the waking thoughts from her slumbering mind. A pulse of light flashed up ahead and caught her attention. She lifted her eyes to the mountain's peak.
"Let him go," the spectral voice commanded. "Let them all go."
Her breath echoed loudly as she drew in a quaking gasp of air, and heavily exhaled again. She fancied that she could feel her eyes growing hot, and that if she lingered another minute, she would feel the seething moisture of tears on her cheeks.
"Go, Narys," said the man.
Without taking her eyes from the mountaintop, she moved forward into the oncoming storm.
