The Snow Lady - woven blanket

She watched the old woodcutter from the shadows as he strayed too far from safety, darkness falling around him. Another life about to end in winter. It simply was—inevitable, impersonal, like snow covering the ground.

She was winter itself. Cold, beautiful, and utterly detached. For centuries, humans had been nothing more than fleeting shadows passing through her realm. She didn't hate them. She didn't mourn them. She simply didn't feel.

Then a young man crossed the woodcutter's path.

He stopped. Changed his route. Helped the old stranger gather his wood, noticed the failing light, guided him to a small shelter. Shared food from his own meager pack, built a fire with careful hands, spoke gentle words to ease the old man's fear.

There was something about him—a warmth that had nothing to do with the flames. A brightness in the cold dark winter night that she couldn't name. Why would he do this? For a stranger. For nothing in return. It made no sense.

And yet she couldn't look away.

When the fire died in the night, she entered. The old man first—one breath of ice, and he was gone. Then she turned to the young man.

He woke. Their eyes met—and in his gaze, she saw a spark. Bright and alive, flickering like flame against the endless dark.

She leaned close—close enough to end him—and felt his breath against her face.

Shockingly warm.

She pulled back, startled. The storm rose around her—or did she summon it? She didn't know. Confusion flooded through her, sharp and disorienting. She had left him alive. Why had she left him alive?

That warmth—his breath, his spirit, that inexplicable brightness—had pierced through the ice of her heart and touched something she thought had never existed. Something in her chest had cracked open, and she didn't understand what was pouring out.
She fled into the blizzard, but she couldn't leave. Couldn't stop watching.

The next morning, he emerged from the shelter. He didn't run. He wrapped the old man's body with reverence, lifted it onto his back, and began the long walk through the snow to find the woodcutter's family. Even in grief. Even in cold. Even alone.

He burned with that warmth.

And she realized—with a force that terrified her—that she needed to follow him.

Not curiosity. Not fascination. Need. Deep and primal and undeniable. That warmth had awakened something she had spent centuries denying, something she had convinced herself didn't exist. A yearning for connection. For touch. For something more than the endless, solitary cold.

She had built walls of ice around herself—so thick, so impenetrable, she had forgotten there was anything beneath them. She had told herself she didn't need warmth, didn't want it, was better without it. She had believed her own lie for so long that it had become truth.

Until his breath touched her face and shattered everything.
So she did the impossible. She took human form and went to find him—risking everything she had been, everything she had protected herself with. Because that connection, that warmth, that feeling—it was worth more than safety. Worth more than the fortress she had built.

For the first time, she chose to feel.