Winter

700 AD

For many years, the little boy had heard the sound of the wind howling outside the walls of his hut. He did not know how many times the winter had come; only that he was afraid of its ferocity.

His mother encouraged this attitude. During the long, cold days, she told him stories about Father Winter and the Snow Queen, both of whom would have liked nothing more than to swoop down on a defenseless child and turn him into a statue of ice. It was no wonder he always stayed inside.

But this year was different. This year, Ivan knew he was special. A month earlier, he'd asked Mother why he couldn't play with the children in the nearby village, and her answer had surprised him.

"Because you're not like them," she had said. "Their lives are as short as mayflies', while we can live forever."

Ivan screwed up his face in thought. He had always known there was something strange about him, and he accepted everything his mother said as truth. It had never occurred to him to wonder how long the villagers lived. Now that he thought of it, they did seem to age awfully fast.

"So does that mean I'm immortal, like Koschei the Deathless? Or are we all some kind of spirits?"

Mother nodded yes and no, respectively. The full truth was much more complicated, but she decided not to burden the boy with the explanation.

This omission was a serious mistake. The idea grew in Ivan's head and swelled his ego to enormous proportions. Outwardly, he acted the way he usually did. He picked sunflowers, played with his sisters, and when the time came, he helped Mother with the wheat harvest.

Several times he used the sickle to nick his hand on purpose, just so he could watch it heal. The blood always stopped within seconds, and the skin would pull itself together right before his eyes.

He had never really noticed this before, thinking that everyone's body worked the same way. But after what his mother had said, he paid attention to every detail about himself that might be out of the ordinary.

Ivan constantly tried to compare himself to the villagers. Once, he even made the hour-long trek to the village so he could watch their lives from the outskirts. When one of the children ran from a snake, Ivan sprang from his hiding place and crushed it with a rock. When he heard that a girl had drowned in the river Volga, he held his head in a bucket of water for ten minutes straight. He felt indestructible, and it began to show.

"What's the big deal?" asked his older sister Katya one day. "I've known for years, and you don't see me strutting around like I own the world!"

"It's different for me," said Ivan, looking down on her from his perch on an unstable rock. "I can become a great warrior one day, and join the tribes of horsemen on their adventures. And I'll never, ever die."

Katya snorted and turned her back on him, gesturing to the smaller girl who sat in the dirt beside her. "Natalia!" she called. "It's getting dark; let's go back home."

Natalia casually stepped on the insect she had been playing with and took her sister's hand. Together, they walked back to the hut, leaving their sibling to his delusions of grandeur.

This had all happened weeks ago, before the true cold began. Now, winter was preparing to spawn the first blizzard of the season. The children and their mother slept on a shelf over the stove, huddling together for warmth. But Ivan was still awake.

He had another idea, another way to test himself. What if I went out into the storm? That would definitely prove I'm special. I'll laugh into Father Winter's face!"

It took Ivan a few more minutes to gather his courage. Some part of him, the small worldly part that had grown over the decades he had been alive, told him what a stupid thing he was going to do. But Ivan ignored that little voice inside his head and tried to pretend it didn't exist at all.

He carefully extricated himself from the tangle of arms and legs that was his family. He jumped off the sleeping shelf, trying to land silently on the dirt floor. He didn't quite manage it, and Mother turned over in her sleep.

Ivan froze, perfectly still, and waited until he was sure no one had been woken. Outside, he could hear the wind whistling over the steppe, but even that forsaken sound couldn't dissuade him.

Before he could convince himself not to, Ivan walked over and opened the door.

He was nearly blown backward by a gust of icy wind. He panicked a bit, knowing how much trouble he would be in if Mother knew what he was planning. But instead of slamming the door shut and forgetting the whole thing, Ivan jumped through it and found himself on the other side.

It was an entirely different world out there. The snow, of course, was nothing new. Ivan had seen that carpet of white cover the earth many times before. But never at night. And never in the middle of a blizzard.

He crouched in the doorway, shivering. Bits of ice stung his exposed face, and he couldn't see more than a few feet in any direction. Though Ivan lived in a northern area, he had never been this cold in his life.

Already, his teeth were chattering. Within a minute, the tips of his ears and fingers were so frigid they burned. Ivan wanted nothing more than to turn around and go back inside, but he had sworn to stay out there until the sun rose.

Ivan forced himself to stand up and start walking. He wasn't quite sure where he meant to go, but he had to get away from the warm temptation of that door. He had to prove his immortality once and for all.

He trudged through the snowdrifts with his head down. He hadn't thought to bring his hat or even the fox-hide coat. All that covered his body was a thin sleeping shirt and a pair of breeches pulled up a little past his waist. This was going to be a very long night.

For the first time, Ivan began to acknowledge the stupidity of what he had done, but it was too late to go back. What if he actually died out there?

Ivan pushed against the force of the blizzard. He pushed against the winter itself. Icicles began to form on his eyelashes, and his fingers had gone numb. A tear rolled down his cheek and froze almost instantly.

He had to go home. He had to return to his family and his place in front of the warm stove.

Ivan used his last reserves of strength to start running in the direction he thought was home. He staggered forward, tripping into ditches and scrambling over snow-covered rocks.

Familiar landmarks were obscured by the blowing snow, and he had already given up on trying to see through the gale. With each step, Ivan became less sure that he would be able to find his way back.

Half an hour later, Ivan knew that he was well and truly lost. Somehow, he had ended up in the forest to the south of the village, but he didn't know which way he was facing or how to get out.

A normal child would have been dead by then, but Ivan was far from normal. Still, the cold was taking its toll on the boy. His running steps faltered, then slowed to a walk. Minutes later, he stopped moving altogether and sat down in a snowdrift.

He was beyond shivering, almost beyond caring about his plight. He did make an effort to stand once, but the wind pushed him down with particular ferocity. After that, he didn't try again.

Ivan lay in the snow, watching the world through slowly dimming eyes. He thought he saw some sort of spirit floating in front of him, a thing pieced from shards of ice and held together by the wind.

It offered a hand to Ivan, but he couldn't have lifted his own to take it, even if he had wanted to.

"I am Winter," the spirit seemed to say. Its voice was the howling and whistling of the storm itself. "Become one with me, and I will look after my own."

So this was what Mother had warned him about. This was what Ivan should have feared all along.

He didn't know what to do, but it didn't seem very important for him to respond at all. Anyway, he was powerless to raise himself. He couldn't nod or even shake his head.

The whole scene was like something out of a dream, or maybe a nightmare. In a dream, anything could happen. The snow could feel warm, and the spirit of Winter itself could be reaching down to close Ivan's eyes. In a dream…

Ivan woke slowly, painfully. He was outside. The sun was shining and someone was pouring scalding water all over his body. He wanted it to stop, but he couldn't move to save himself. All Ivan could do was moan through his teeth and try to unclench his stiffened jaw.

The water stopped, and Ivan found that he could open his eyes. Mother's face came into view.

"Ivan," she called. "Can you hear me?"

Once again, he could not respond, but Mother seemed satisfied. Out of the corner of his eye, Ivan noticed Katya and Natalia hovering behind her. The older girl looked nervous, and little Natalia was sucking her thumb.

"Mama?" asked Katya. "Is Ivan alive again?"

Mother nodded and went back to what she had been doing. The water still felt too hot to bathe in, but it didn't hurt quite as much anymore.

Slowly, Ivan realized that he was lying in the meadow beside his family's hut. A small campfire crackled beside him.

Ivan was glad to be back. That blizzard had been a very close call… Too close. He didn't even remember who had saved him or how he had managed to get home the night before.

With every passing minute, his awareness grew. He realized that he was still wearing the same clothes he had taken into the forest, but they were stiff and faded.

Mother began talking softly, almost to herself. "I know this was your best pair of breeches, but I just couldn't get them off. You were so stiff, so cold. It was like handling a figure of wood. Oh Ivan!" she nearly sobbed. "I thought I would never get you back."

Ivan's eyes widened in horror as he realized what his mother was implying. Katya was the first to notice his reaction.

"Yeah," she smirked. Now that Ivan was out of danger, Katya teased him to her heart's content. "You really did it that time!"

Mother gave her a sharp look, but Katya continued.

"Mother was so angry, she said she'd whip you with birch branches. But then we couldn't find you in that awful storm. No one even knew where you were until the snow melted!"

Then Natalia chimed in. "Brother!" she chirped. "You were asleep all winter, but now it's spring. Do you want to play?"

Ivan managed to crack a smile. It seemed he was immortal after all.