Chapter One

Thirteen years later

As Citali stepped outside, the cold wind swept over to meet her, stinging her face and making her grateful for all the warm layers Aunt Beccah had bundled her up in.

The rainbow of fallen leaves swirling around Citali's layered brown skirt reminded her that as cold as it was, it was still Autumn and the Cold Season was yet to come. The girl set up along the side of the town by the edge of the woods, passing many boys and girls playing together in the leaves.

Citali carried two baskets; a larger, empty one, and a smaller, full one that she shifted now, freeing one arm so that she could adjust the position of her hat and scarf and push her two, shoulder-length braids of thick, straight, black hair out of the way. She put a mittened hand over her face, not obscuring her vision, attempting to warm it up a bit. It didn't work, so she lowered her hand and repositioned her baskets, and continued trudging through the leaves.

She was a sweet-looking, pretty girl, turned fourteen only recently, slightly below if not average height, slim but not skinny, with pale skin, dark eyes, and rosy cheeks. Though her nose was also quite rosy, at the moment, for the wind was unrelenting.

Now she could see them, a group of older boys on the very edge of the woods, all with hatchets, hacking away at logs to make firewood. She scanned them with her eyes and soon saw who she was looking for among them.

He was tall, grey-eyed, and curly-haired unlike his sister, but his curls were black and his skin was pale, though without her rosiness. They also had the same nose and eyebrows, and if not by looks, anyone could tell they were siblings at least by looking at the way they interacted with each other.

Some of the children in the town called Citali's brother 'Frosty,' 'Sir Snow,' 'Uncle Ice,' and other such names because his name was pronounced exactly like the official name for what most of them called the Cold Season.

Citali called out to him now, "Wyntair, Wyntair!"

Wyntair took his hatchet and left the boys to come over to where Citali stood.

"Citali," he greeted her cheerfully, "it's nice to see you."

She smiled and held the full basket out to him, "here's your supper. Sorry it's late."

"Oh that's all right, thank you," he said, taking the basket and giving his sister a hug. "But you'd better hurry and get your foraging done before it gets dark."

She nodded, "you're right. I'll see you later."

Citali left Wyntair and headed back in the direction she'd come from with her remaining basket. When she came to the place where the children played in the leaves, she turned and walked in their direction.

But she was not coming to play. She walked through the children to the woods behind them, nodding to those who acknowledged her. Citali was not the only girl entering the forest with a basket at this time. Many girls were, most of them around her age. They were doing their daily foraging, gathering things from the woods.

Citali was there for several greatly enjoyed hours.

She pushed aside leaves to gather handfuls of the small red berries on the ground and reached high to gather thin twigs from the lower branches of dead trees with which she would start the next morning's breakfast fire.She gathered all sorts of wild edibles and medicinal herbs and pine needles for tea. And she made sure to always gather a little extra of everything to put in storage in preparation for being stuck inside for days that winter because of the snowstorms.

It happened every year.

When she was satisfied, Citali hurried for her home with her full basket so that she would be able to do all that was needed to be done at home while there was still daylight and not have to waste candles.

The door was opened for Citali by a tall woman with an oval face and greying dark-brown hair tied in a braid and twisted into a cheerful knot on the back of her head. She was neither thin, nor fat, and she wore a scarf around her neck and a warm sweater over a long, layered skirt.

"Oh thank you Aunt Beccah, I am so glad to be out of the wind," said Citali, giving the woman a quick hug and then placing her basket carefully on the floor and hurrying to the fire.

"I'm glad to see you're back," said the woman, closing the door behind Citali as the latter began taking off her mittens and other outer layers by the warmth of the fire.

"The days are getting colder and shorter but they'll be colder and shorter still when the Cold Season comes around." Aunt Beccah began taking the things Citali had gathered out of the basket and laying them out on the table, sorting them into neat piles.

Citali went to the shared bedroom to put away the warm clothes she had shed to wear the following day.

She could hear Aunt Beccah working in the other room, hurrying around and doing all the things that couldn't be done by the fire while there was daylight. She would join her soon, and it was her job to prepare the table for dinner.

Soon Wyntair would be home, and Uncle Delzcen would follow.

Aunt Beccah and Uncle Delzcen were not Citali and Wyntair's aunt and uncle, nor were they their parents, godparents, grandparents, or connected to Citali and Wyntair's family in any way.

But they had looked after the two children for a very long time, and Citali had lived happily with them for as long as she could remember.

She went back into the main room and assisted Aunt Beccah in dinner preparations and other things.

But she happily abandoned her work when she heard the two loud knocks near the bottom of the door which she knew were the sounds of Wyntair kicking the door with one foot because his hands must be full.

She opened the door and saw that indeed, there was her brother with an armful of firewood. She held the door open for him and he came in and added the wood to the already quite large stack in the corner near the fireplace. Then he turned around "there's more," and went back out the door.

After several trips back and forth, Wyntair finally ran out of firewood to carry. He greeted Citali and Aunt Beccah and then rushed around and helped them finish their chores before dark.

The sun was setting when they heard the knock that they knew must be Uncle Delzcen returning from the butcher's.