"All alone, on a journey, I lost my way

As I stood still, my hear alone wandered

But now I can walk again, as far as I need to

Yes, ever since I met you in this road."

Tabi no Tochuu – Spice and Wolf OST.


4. A Name.

The Moon is shining bright in the cold night, like the time she died. It's always Full Moon here.

"Are you ready to listen now?"

Standing on the cliff, Hinata turns to the Snow Lioness, just when she pushes her, and before Hinata can react she is falling again.

"Who are you?"

"You need to hear me roar!"

Or die.

All these weeks since they met she was being too nice, Hinata had been happy to have her, but in this moment she is falling, and she is supposed to understand a lion's roar when all she can perceive is the sound of the storm.

The storm…

As if suddenly things became clear to her senses, the sound of the storm seems to whisper words to her ears. It is in the wind. It is in the shifting of ice. It is in the snow rain.

The Lioness roars.

"My name is…"

Hinata looks down. It seems like this time, there is indeed an end to the abyss, something that seemed like an ocean. In this inner world, everything is made of ice, snow and at the core, water. Hinata likes water, but the ocean would probably be as endless as the Snow Mountains above.

"I can hear you! I really do! Please come to me, Fuyu no Tsuki"

Listening to her command, Fuyu no Tsuki comes, picking her just before she touches the water. Fuyu no Tsuki's paws don't touch the surface of the ocean, instead seems to be floating just centimeters away, and like that she runs and jumps to the top of the Mountains again.

"Hmmm, thank you."

"I apologize for being so hard on you, but Hinata, it's the only way we can become stronger."

She nods. That this being so powerful is part of her still amazes her.

"I understand."

Then, the Snow Lioness changes into the form of a beautiful woman, dressed in rich silver and white clothes. Her hair has an unusual turquoise color. She looks like a Queen, Hinata observes.

"Now, you are finally ready to wield me, Hinata. You know how to call me…"

Stepping out of her inner world and opening her eyes, Hinata stands up and unfolds her tenssen fans,

"Cut through the air, Fuyu no Tsuki."

A cold freeze comes without warning. Though it would go unnoticed to the untrained eye, the five daggers in each fan seem to become larger with thin yet sharp threads of compressed air and ice. They are like unsheated lion's claws, beautiful and deadly.

She blows the fan once. The breeze becomes a strong wind. The trees standing in that direction are cut into pieces immediately.

A smile crosses her face, before she notices that the place around her is covered by snow. She has to learn to control that, too. There's a lot she has to learn about Fuyu no Tsuki.

Fans are an unusual shape for a zanpakutou. As Hinata learned after joining the academy, most zanpakutous are blades, and these would only manifest themselves after the shinigamis trained with a regular unnamed blade. However, she's had her lion's claws almost since the beginning.

She was beautiful, her zanpakutou.

"Hyuga."

Hinata turns around, and she sees him.

It's not really there, she knows, but in her eyes, her white snow has been colored by pink.