[Aster]
Shallow, ragged breaths, the only sound in the small hut of snow and branches, swallowed in darkness save for the sliver of morning light sneaking through the tiny gap in the ceiling. No wood burned in the fire, the smell of smoke hanging in the cold air, the chill permeating everything. Silence, the kind that has a weight to it, the kind that makes ears ring. Ashes are all that remain from the flames, gray and cold. There, on the floor, wearing nothing but boots and his dirty half-cloak, lay a silver-haired boy, curled in on himself, trembling.
His body shivered as if from the cold, but his skin was hot and sweaty, burning up, vomit and saliva coating his mouth and chin. He didn't move, save for the rise and fall of his chest and the twitching of his eyes beneath the blindfold, golden gaze darting back and forth at the images that ran through his mind, memories of the past days. Memories that made no sense, memories that were a blur, a feverish dream of which he could recall nothing but bits and pieces.
Shifting in his curled-up position, the boy turned to his other side, whimpering from pain that shot through every joint in his body, muscles spasming. His flushed cheek landed into a puddle of vomit and piss, soaking his silver hair in the process, his youthful face scrunching in disgust. The stench was so intense that it woke him up. 'What... the hell happened?' was the first coherent thought that came into his mind after what felt like an eternity. His arms and legs wanted to twist and bend in all the wrong ways, the feeling of which he fought by clenching his jaw with every bit of strength, his teeth grinding together so hard that he thought they'd break.
His trembling, scarred hand rose from the floor and touched his cheek, trying to wipe the mess off his face, only to smear it across his pale skin. Another whimper left his mouth, this one from the sharp pain that shot through his arm from the movement. Slowly, his fingers slid up to his nose and then further to the blindfold that covered his eyes. He tried to pull it off, but his hand was too weak, and he failed. He tried to call for his mother and sister, but only managed to choke on his own saliva.
With a quiet, defeated sob, the boy just lay there, his body shaking, tears spilling from under his blindfold and soaking the cloth. It hurt. Everything hurt. Minutes went by, full of pain and misery, and nothing else. Then, he tried again and managed to pull the piece of cloth down just enough for his golden eyes to take in the light of the day that filtered through the branch-covered hole in the ceiling.
Just a few weak rays, but it was enough for him to squint in pain, his sight all blurry and unfocused, a splitting headache threatening to split his skull in two. 'How did I...?' he thought, but couldn't quite finish the thought, his brain all mushy.
Despite the pain, he kept staring at the light, watching the dust dance in its glow. 'I... I remember us hunting the rabbit and eating it. And then... and then... we had a good night. I remember that, the good night. Then what? Why can't I remember?' he kept thinking, his mind a feverish, aching mess. 'Something happened...' he continued thinking, slowly, trying to remember. His left arm suddenly twitched and jerked on its own, trying to bend backward in an unnatural, painful way once again. A silent scream tore from his throat at that, full of fear and confusion. A minute passed, and so did the pain.
Then, one more piece of the puzzle clicked into place as he remembered the morning after the feast, how his mother was so cutely angry at him, the kind that involved a lot of hushed scolding, for not cleaning up after himself and leaving her butt all covered in his sticky stuff. From her words, it took her almost an hour to clean every little drop of white between her thighs and fingers, and between her buttcheeks. Meanwhile, he had slept through it all, only waking up to her gentle scolding. He smiled at that, which made a bit of puke dribble down his chin.
Aster had apologized profusely that morning, of course. He massaged her gently, kissed her tenderly, all the things a good son should do, and soon she was giggling and sweet again, her earlier anger forgotten. He also recalled feeling bad about the bite marks he had left on Silvia's pinky kitty and how she had been grumpy about them. That, too, was easily remedied with a bit of cuddling and massage, her cute, girly giggles filling the hut. That's how the morning went, he remembered—a sweet and lazy kind of morning, the perfect kind. 'Then what?' the boy thought, his aching brain trying to remember. He did, eventually.
The image of them walking through the forest came back to him: his mother carrying him on her back while Silvia held her hand and walked beside them, trembling with every gust of wind that came her way. They kept walking towards the rising sun, trying to put even more distance from that cursed tunnel full of worms they crawled out of, all while trying to hunt something along the way, with little success. It was a slow, quiet journey, the snow crunching beneath their feet, the cold winter winds howling all around. Nothing but trees as far as the eye could see. That entire morning, Silvia had been shivering, her cloak too thin to protect her from the biting wind.
A few birds they spotted took flight before they could get close, and the few squirrels they managed to sneak up on scurried up the trees long before Silvia could aim her ice arrows at them. Despite not finding anything to eat, they didn't feel bad about it in the evening. They were full, still, from the previous night's feast, and there was the entire tomorrow to look for something. They built another small hut of ice, snow, and branches, a bit less cozy than the previous one, but it was good enough.
Without turning his head, Aster squinted a bit harder and took a look at the walls and the ceiling, trying to remember whether or not it was the same hut he was in now. 'Yeah... maybe,' he concluded after a moment of looking at the familiar-looking shape. It seemed to be the same one in his blurry sight, the only difference being that most of the branches that cushioned the walls and floor were missing; the hard, cold ground beneath his head instead of the comfortable, springy bed of pine needles.
The next thing he remembered was the following night, when the sickness first hit. The memory was a blurry one, but he did remember waking up hours before the first morning rays, feeling like crap, with a headache that pounded his skull and pain all over his body, sweat and trembling included. Nivalis and Silvia weren't doing much better; the two of them curled on their sides, shivering and moaning in their sleep. It felt as though he had woken up in a nightmare, and he even pinched himself to make sure he wasn't dreaming. It still feels like one, even now. It was all too sudden.
He didn't understand it back then, but he's beginning to now. It was the worm meat, he was almost sure of it. It has to be. The worms... or rather, the lack of them. As soon as the symptoms started, an intense craving filled his mind, an unhealthy hunger for those soft, wriggly, disgusting creatures that no sane person would ever have. His mouth watered at the mere thought of them, at the memory of their taste. And it made sense once he put enough thought into it.
For more than a year and a half, the three of them subsisted on nothing else but those slimy, wriggling, disgusting things. Whatever was in their meat, whatever made the cravings so intense, they must've gotten addicted to it, and now that they'd been gone from their diet for a few days, this happened.
'Wait, wait... I'm forgetting something. Something important,' Aster suddenly thought with a frown, his brain aching in the process, the headache only getting worse the more he tried to think. He remembered Nivalis waking up late in the morning, looking like a mess but still taking care of him and Silvia, keeping them warm and hydrated. She held strong back then. 'Then why is it so cold in here?' he wondered, finally putting effort into turning his head to the side, sinking his cheek back into the puke and urine.
A miserable face of his mother immediately came into view, so close that their noses almost touched, covered in a shiny layer of sweat and vomit just like him, her silver hair all sticky and messy, her mouth open as she breathed loudly. She was just lying on her side, trembling so violently from cold that her body seemed to convulse, her blue eyes half-open, unfocused as if lost in some fever dream.
Between them, curled in the tightest ball, was Silvia, looking the worst of them all, just a small, trembling mass of silver hair and nothing else, barely breathing, her bare, skinny legs sticking out of her cloak all wet and sticky from piss. "Fu...ugh...ck!" came a panicked gasp from Aster's mouth the moment he saw them, a sudden burst of adrenaline washing over him.
He tried to push himself up, but his body refused to move, a sharp pain shooting through every muscle in his skinny frame, and with a pathetic, defeated sob, he fell back to the floor, his body hitting the puddle of vomit and urine beneath him with a splash. He just couldn't do it, couldn't move, no matter how much his brain screamed at him to do so.
For a moment, he just lay there, panicked thoughts spinning in his mind, tears streaming down his cheeks, mixing with all kinds of disgusting fluids. Then, anger surged through him, a hot wave of rage that made his small hands clench into fists, his teeth grind together. This anger wasn't directed at anyone else but at himself, for being so weak and helpless, for not trying harder, after seeing how much the girls needed him. 'Get up, you useless piece of shit, get up!' he thought, screaming inside his mind.
With a determined grunt, the boy ignited a shitload of mana within his heart, sending it all into every muscle in his body until they felt like being boiled in oil, burning, aching, and throbbing all in one. Yet, this pain was well-familiar to him, a pain he knew how to fight against, a pain he could control. He embraced it, welcomed it even, and soon enough, the gold of his eyes began to glow as the strengthening spell kicked in.
Another determined, angry grunt left his mouth as his arms pushed against the floor, his elbows trembling from the effort as his back slowly arched off the ground. This time it was much easier, and soon, he found himself sitting on his bum, his hands propped behind him for balance. Everything spun, his head dizzy, the world blurring and twisting in front of him, the taste of puke and urine still lingering on his tongue. "M-Mom, S-Silvia..." he mumbled, his voice weak and pathetic, chapped lips barely moving.
The boy reached for his mother's face with his scarred hand and gently patted her cheek, trying to get a reaction out of her, but got only an unintelligible mumble, something he couldn't quite make out. "Come on, Mom, wake up. You gotta wake up..." He kept patting her, his palm slapping against her soft skin, his own cheeks streaked with tears. He then shifted his focus to Silvia and tried to wake her up as well, shaking her tiny body by the shoulders. The girl didn't react either, just breathing in a shallow, weak rhythm, trembling like a leaf.
Wiping his nose with the back of his hand, Aster swallowed thickly, throat so dry that it felt like sandpaper. "W-warmth," he croaked, his voice barely audible. "They need to get warm..." His eyes drifted to the empty spot where the fire should have been, only ashes and charred wood remaining.
Their stockpile of wood in the corner was almost empty except for a handful of small sticks; all the pine needles that cushioned the ground were gone, likely used by Nivalis to keep the fire burning. Enough for a small, pathetic fire, but that was all he needed. His golden mist could handle the rest. The spell that had helped them survive the last winter would be helpful again. It would trap the heat, keeping everything inside warm and cozy.
Getting on all fours, he crawled towards the remaining pile of wood, hands and legs trembling, every joint in his body screeching like an old door's hinges. A few seconds later, he was there, grabbing the sticks with shaky hands, stacking them on top of each other in the middle of the hut. "D-dammit..." he mumbled, his feverish eyes kept unfocusing at the most inconvenient moments.
When the last branch was placed on top of the pile, a small flick of his wrist lit it on fire, a soft burst of mana igniting it. Before long, it grew into a cozy, orange flame, instantly filling the place with the much-needed warmth. Not wasting any time, he closed his eyes and focused on the feeling of mana coursing through his blood and, after a moment of concentration, the pale-golden mist began to escape his trembling hands, wrapping everything around in a gentle, soothing cloud.
The boy's lips stretched into a relieved, tired smile when he opened his eyes and noticed his mother and sister visibly relax, their bodies losing some of the tension, the trembling lessening slightly. 'Alright, alright, that's good... that's a start,' Aster thought, his head bobbing a few times, the exhaustion almost taking over. For a second, he considered lying back down next to the girls and sleeping for a bit.
But he fought it off, forcing his eyes to stay open by giving himself a rather nasty slap across the face, leaving a red mark on his pale cheek. "Water," he muttered, blinking the tears away and looking towards the exit. Outside, snowflakes swirled behind the branches, the wind blowing them around and around. "Water!" he repeated more urgently as he forced himself to crawl, dragging his body across the floor.
His eyes squinted from the brightness of the morning sun the moment he poked his head out of the hut, the stinging pain in them intensifying tenfold. Yet he ignored the discomfort and grabbed a handful of snow, bringing it to his mouth; the searing heat of his body instantly melted the white, fluffy flakes on his tongue.
Then another, and another, and soon the water trickled down his throat, quenching the unbearable thirst he felt, soothing the dryness of his throat. After a solid minute of eating the snow—not the yellow one, worth mentioning—he stopped, realizing that his mother and sister needed it much more than he did.
With a tired groan, Aster grabbed a bit of snow into the half-cloak he wore and went back inside, almost falling flat on his face in the process. He was panting by the time he was back next to the girls, feeling more and more exhausted with every passing second, his body begging him to stop.
He didn't. Instead, he carefully slid his arm under his mother's head and grabbed a handful of snow and squeezed it right above her mouth, melting it with his body heat. His hand shook with the effort, some of the icy water spilling onto her cheek and neck, but most of it went into her mouth, a soft, relieved sigh leaving his lips as she started swallowing. "Like that... yes, keep going, Mom," he whispered, squeezing more and more of the snow into her mouth, watching water trickle down her throat and chin.
When all the snow in his hand had melted, he did it again and again, squeezing another handful and then another. When more than half of the snow in his cloak was gone, he moved to Silvia and fed her the same way, watching her drink greedily and moan in a weak, relieved way. "Good... good... that's really good," he kept whispering, a tired smile on his face. If not for the strengthening spell that burned in every fiber of his body, he'd already be asleep, too exhausted to even think.
A few more minutes went by, the only sound being the crackle of the fire and the quiet, exhausted breathing of the three of them, until the last bit of snow finally melted. With a sigh, Aster let go of Silvia and just let his head slump on the floor, his eyelids heavy and hard to keep open. "I'll... I'll get some more..." he murmured, more to himself than anyone else, his face scrunching from the pain in his arms as he pushed himself back to his hands and knees.
The world spun around him, a dizzying blur of shapes and colors that made his head pound. Yet Aster ignored it all and crawled to the exit once again, gathering as much snow as he could into his cloak and then dragging himself back to his mother and sister. Then, he did the same thing over again, squeezing the water into their mouths, drop by drop, until they swallowed every last bit of it.
Just when Aster thought he was good to lie down next to the two of them and get those five minutes of rest for his eyes, the fire began to die, the last bits of wood and branches slowly turning to ash. 'Fuck,' was the only word that went through his mind.
Once again, he found himself pushing against the ground, raising his upper body from the floor. 'Just a little longer... hold out, just a little longer...' he thought, blinking his tiredness away, tears running down his cheeks from the sheer effort of it. Grabbing his mother's rusty knife from her side, the boy muttered a quiet, "I'll... be right back... don't move." Then, with a quiet sob of pain, he crawled out of the hut, right into the blinding world of white and blue, the wind howling all around him.
His eyes hurt so much that he could barely keep them open, but he forced them to and took a look around. For a moment, he considered just using the branches that covered the entrance as fuel, but quickly decided against it. The cold air would get in, and the girls would freeze. There were also the branches that lined the walls, there to blend them with the environment, but those, too, had to stay. Without those, anyone passing nearby would instantly spot the hut, which was a big no-no.
Having no choice, the boy focused his blurry sight on the nearest smudge of green and brown, hoping that the smudge was a bush or a small tree. He began crawling toward it, one shaky hand in front of the other, one aching knee after another, watching the blurry shape slowly come closer.
It seemed to take forever, but eventually, he was there, his forehead pressing against the rough bark, a few quiet whimpers leaving his mouth from relief. It was a young tree, its trunk almost as thin as his arm, the perfect kind to get some firewood from. Without much thinking, Aster tightened his hold on the knife and, in a quick, clumsy motion, stabbed the blade right into the nearby branch, no wider than his finger.
With a weak, angry grunt, he began cutting at the wood, making the knife go in and out, in and out, until a crack came, and the branch fell to the ground. A satisfied sigh left his mouth, his feverish eyes closing for a moment in relief. He didn't rest, though. Instead, he wiped his sweaty forehead on his shoulder before stabbing the next branch and repeating the process, and the next one, and the one after that.
It was a slow, grueling task that required more energy than he had left; every new branch he cut almost made him give up from exhaustion. And yet, he didn't. He kept going and going, a never-ending prayer of 'just one more' repeating in his head. By the time he was finished, his arms felt like noodles, barely capable of keeping a hold on the knife anymore.
'Now... Now to bring it back...' Aster thought, his feverish, blurry gaze looking at the pile of sticks and branches he had made, all spread around the tree. The tree itself was now a sad sight, a sorry, naked thing with its branches cut off, its green needles scattered across the snow. With a quiet sigh and another painful burst of mana, the boy gathered everything into his arms and began his slow, agonizing crawl back to the hut. He spotted a few bushes nearby that he could cut next time, but that was for later. Right now, he needed to get home.
He didn't remember much of the way back. All he remembered was that the branches were heavy in his arms, and his body refused to work the way he wanted it to. What he did remember, though, was the crying face of his mother the moment he reached the entrance to their hut and lifted the branches of the door. She was awake. "Asty...!" she cried, slumping tirelessly back onto the floor, tears streaming down her flushed, sweaty cheeks as she looked at him with those blue, unfocused eyes of hers. "Oh, t-thank the gods... When I woke up-p, and you weren't here, I thought... I thought..." she murmured, choking on her own words, her hands reaching out to him, beckoning him closer.
— "I... I'm here, Mom. It's okay..." Aster's voice was barely more than a breath as he hurried to her side, shutting the door behind him. The hug that followed was crushing, her slender arms locking around him as if she'd never let go, her body shaking with each ragged sob. He pressed his lips to her hair, murmuring the exact words over and over, "I'm here, it's alright, I'm here," but it did little to ease her crushing hug or calm the frantic beating of her heart.
It took a good few minutes before Nivalis could finally pull herself together enough to loosen her grip, her breath still coming in ragged gasps, but at least her sobs had subsided. Before she could mutter a single word, though, Aster whispered, "Let's get you warm, okay? I brought us some wood," his head motioning towards the pile of branches he dropped on the floor.
She nodded, wiping her running nose with the back of her hand before letting her boy take her back to the bed. Despite barely being able to crawl himself, he did just that, finding enough strength in his trembling arms and legs to drag the two of them back to the fireplace. "Don't worry, Mom... I'll take care of you, of everything. You just rest, okay?" the boy said in that childish voice of his, his golden eyes burning with feverish determination, never leaving her blue ones as he helped her lie down next to his sister. Nivalis nodded again, tears welling in her eyes before she closed them.
Oh, how much he wished to do just that, curl up next to his family and rest, sleep, forget all the pain and misery that came with being awake. Sleep until he had enough energy to do all the things he had to do. But he didn't, he couldn't; he had to take care of his family. There was still so much that needed to be done. Forcing himself to turn away from the sleeping girls, Aster let out a quiet, miserable sigh and began yet another grueling crawl.