Her footsteps crunched the wayward snow as it delicately traced around her in the dancing wind. A pile woven wool cloak hugged her close in its corned arms to keep her from the frost that nipped eagerly along the exposed flesh of her face. Still, though her body was accustomed to the cold, she couldn't help but but shiver when the tiny maws of harsh white nature bit at her nose and fingers from time to time.
Still she moved with as much haste as she could.
This was a matter of life or death!
At this time, in the dead of winter in Japan, the trees were bare, if not nearly barren of life. They stretched out from the earth like cracked rib cages and frozen fingers that dared to reach for the sun only to be buried beneath the screaming of the earth by the cold, apathetic winters.
She traced from tree to tree as there was no path to follow, no guide to get her on her way, only the knowledge that she must travel north and as high as humanly possible. If any mortal made this journey, they would not be any mere mortal.
Only then will she be saved.
Crunch!
Crunch!
Howl!
She stopped. The woman turned left, right, even behind where only a wall of white formed as a storm flowed past the mountain base.
Wolves?
No, there are no wolves here.
She couldn't stop any longer. To plant her roots in this thick grave of snow would be a death sentence, even for someone with her lineage.
She moved on, harder even as the mounds began to grow like the plants in spring, but faster, angrier, and more welcomed to the flesh that piles upon it with each step.
She could still only see snow, trees and the ever high mountain. This was no Mt. Fuji, but it needed to be high to keep those that dwelled within safe from prying eyes.
For a moment as her eyes stared at the near blank expanse of white and dark scraps of bark, she swore she saw movement. Not the wind, not the snow, and the fauna that had hidden far beneath.
She couldn't stop. Not again.
The woman, who looked no more than in her early thirties, dark of hair and of Japanese descent, tugged on that long wool cloak and pressed faster, even at the snail pace she was forced to go in.
Even as the movement of the dead forest shifted again and she knew with certainty that something was out there, she pressed on.
The further she went on, the more mounds of moving earth appeared around her. Subtle, but they became far more present and alarmed as she drove higher up the mountain. At some point, she swore that black eyes stared back at her from between the crags of trees, but still, as she was stalked she moved on as fast as she could.
Her heart grew weaker. Her memory dimmed like a glass case slowly suffocated the flame until all that remained was her knowledge that she must press forward.
Her life was in his hands now.
Even for her body, as accustomed as she was to the cold, she felt it wrap around her. First, her rib cage was tightened and squeezed her heart like a finger pressed to her lips to quell her breathing, to stop the loud thump of life.
Secondly, her chill rattled like a snake from finger tips to toes. Adorned in wool, linen, and wrapped snug from head to toe, somewhere, someway the creeping cold slithered its fingers on in and embraced her bare flesh with its claws and callous intentions.
Now the mounds revealed themselves. She could barely make them out anyway, but she knew now these were giant beasts, not the natural fauna of this forest.
Melted into the snow their fur kept them well hidden, and the black eyes no different than the scraps of bark that peered through the winter turn of the century.
You cannot go back.
Let me pass!
One of the great beasts charged.
It was the last thing she remembered as a mass of heat and thick fur collapsed upon her with a growl as loud to her frozen ears as a jet engine.
The darkness became her.
Are you so cold to me, even now brother that the only warmth I feel is in death?