The girl who called herself Wind, with hair a fiery auburn and skin almost bleached of colour, faltered in her flight. She had been on her usual route, just about to cross over a familiar clearing nestled amongst a forest of tall, snow-sprinkled trees. It wasn't the clearing itself that made her pause on this particular night. Rather, what she saw in the middle of it.

It was a ghost.

He was dead. She knew it, his body rotting in the bottom of that very pond and his family grieving. She had seen it happen, had seen it tear a hole in his family, had seen his funeral.

Wind still visited them sometimes, on the nights she didn't want to be alone with her own thoughts. She'd sit at their small dinner table with his mother who would spend hours just sitting there, staring at the wall with tears in her eyes. His father carried a shadow with him everyday, one that lingered in his eyes and his stooped shoulders, as if carrying a weight. Wind would try to play with his beloved sister who had distanced herself from others and was too quiet. Their joy had died with him that cold day.

But there he was, his limp, pale body rising from the frozen water. Sure, his hair was different; as white as the world around them, but it was undoubtedly him. With the same ragged clothes, his bare feet, his everything, it was like barely anything had changed since that day.

"No," Wind breathed shakily and felt herself waver in the air. She forced herself to land on the snow-covered ground at the edge of the pond, before her power gave out. "But...How? Jack-"

FROST something in her mind spoke up, too insistent for her to immediately dismiss it as simply her imagination.

And then he was gasping for breath, his chest heaving, and his eyes flew open and-

They were blue. Blue and cold and unfamiliar, not brown and warm and friendly like she knew.

Wind swallowed hard and didn't have to think too hard as to who was responsible. Who was always responsible.

She dragged her searching gaze away from the boy and turned to the Moon shining so brightly, big in the dark sky before them. He looked far too smug for a hunk of space rock and Wind suddenly wanted to punch him in his big powdery face.

'Why did you do this?' she wanted to yell.

'What about this is okay?' she wanted to cry.

But she didn't, not ready to draw attention to herself and risk not being recognised by those strange eyes. If he treated her like a stranger, Wind was sure her heart would break all over again.

JACK FROST echoed loudly in her mind once more.

Wind frowned and glanced back at the boy floating behind her, eyes narrowing further when she saw the silver line stretching from Jack to her at a rapid pace. Before she could flinch away, it struck her in the chest, right where her heart would be and she felt a fuzzy sensation wash over her, like her body was shifting.

She also noticed an odd weight settling over her heart and suddenly a gentle tug compelled her to move.

In an instant, Jack was released from his floating position and suddenly she was there to catch him, carefully guiding him down to rest on the ice below which somehow melded together under his touch.

Wind couldn't explain how she had known where she had to go and when, but it was like an order, like something or someone had wanted her to. Was it the string…?

When she looked down, the string was gone but she could still feel it, that peculiar weight in her chest and the anticipation that thrummed through her body, as if expecting another tug.

But Jack was stumbling to his feet and shocking her once more when frost danced at his fingertips and he sent to curling in beautiful patterns in burst of bright blue light.

As blue as his eyes.

What was this? This part of him that was foreign to her? How had he changed so much? Was he really the Jack she knew, this Jack Frost?

All of a sudden, Wind couldn't take it anymore. Jack hadn't noticed her yet for some reason but now she was done being silent. She had so much to ask him. And if he didn't recognise her, then…

Then he wouldn't be her Jack after all.

"Jack!" Wind called out and Jack chuckled as he danced around excitedly, sending off experimental bursts with a stick he had found. His smile sent warmth shooting through her like nothing ever did, and in that moment she was certain he was-

As he glided around the ice, he looked right at her and ran through her.

Wind stood there, frozen, while Jack continued to experiment gleefully with his newfound power. What…?

No.

No.

No.

She had spent so long- it wasn't enough- she couldn't go back. Not to how she was before. Not after seeing him again.

No. How could he…?

A tear slipped down Wind's face and she screwed her eyes shut tight.

Raising a hand to rub at her eyes shakily, she turned to glare at Moon who remained where he was, smug as ever. He just loved playing with her, didn't he? Couldn't he leave her alone for one century without plotting up some scheme for her to be mixed up in?

Anger flooded through her. No.

Spinning around, Wind flew at Jack and suddenly they were up, up in the air, spiralling higher and higher and-

Stop! A voice shouted in the back of her head, different this time. Notus. Aeolus, put him down.

The voice was quiet and low yet it caused Wind to stop suddenly, holding them both mid-air.

What was she doing?

When she came back to her senses, her anger gone, she realised she had accidentally let go of Jack, his cry echoing as he fell through the trees, luckily landing on a branch.

Wind heard a snicker at the back of her mind. Most likely Eurus.

An exhilarated laugh and whoop from somewhere in the trees told Wind he was alright.

Sighing and running a hand through her untameable hair, she flew down to the thick branch Jack had landed on, unable to bring herself to just leave him alone in the forest just yet.

He was undoubtedly her Jack, but changed.

Moon, she had never wanted that to happen. She had been devastated when he had died but she would never wish immortality on anyone, much less under the beck and call of the Moon.

Briefly, she wondered what his family would say when they saw him, saw his odd new powers. As Wind landed on the branch next to the grinning boy, she found him staring at his home village which could barely be seen over the trees in the distance. A pocket of light breaking the dark sea of trees.

Wait, what would they...

Before she could continue that train of thought, another tug pointed her in exactly that direction and she followed it, lifting Jack with her once more and flying towards the familiar village.

But flying with another, as she now realised, wasn't exactly easy. now that she had a long way to go and she wasn't fuelled by intense emotion, she found it was a lot harder than she would have thought.

Jack was inexperienced with flying and didn't know how to balance himself in the air, tensing himself too much and sending them both toppling over too many times to count. She could hear a chorus of groans and unhelpful advice with every close-call and fall, but she determinedly ignored the ansty winds in favour of concentrating.

Eventually they got there, Jack falling the last meter when Wind accidentally let go of him a little too early. Oops.

He stumbled back to his feet with an embarrassed grin as he got his bearings and gazed around at his surroundings. He began greeting the villagers, curiously getting little reaction from them.

Wind floated slowly to the ground, confused as she watched Jack persist cheerfully with little success.

What was going on?

Oh no, a sweet voice sighed sadly. Zephyrus.

Aeolus, I think you better get out of there now, a grim voice warned. Boreas.

Something clicked in her head and Wind realised. But before she could grab Jack and leave, a small kid chasing after a dog ran towards them, right through Jack. Jack was left gasping, eyes wide as he stumbled back in shock.

Wind sighed, chest aching in sympathy as she watched him try to understand, flinching away from the other villagers when they walked through him as well. Soon, they found themselves at the edge of the village.

Everything made sense now. His powers, the circumstances, Moon's obvious involvement and his ability to bounce back from an almost fatal fall.

He was one of them now.

He had died, and now Moon had some twisted plan cooked up and who knows how long he would make Jack wait for it

Moon knows, Wind was still waiting.

As Jack turned his back to her, his shoulders hunched and his staff gripped tightly in one fist, Wind swore she could see the string again briefly, a reminder.

So this was what the space rock wanted. Her time had come, after all.

Wind considered her options.

She could let him disappear into the forest alone and then she could carry on with life as painlessly as she would be able to after she recovered from the encounter.

Or she could stay with him and suffer the old wounds seeing his face every day would open constantly, a shattering reminder of what she had lost and would never be able to have again.

In the end, Wind realised she had never really had much to decide, her mind was already made up. She would never have been able to bring herself to leave his side.

Mentally cursing herself for always choosing the hard way, Wind hurried after Jack before she lost him.

He wasn't her Jack anymore, she would have to remember.

This was someone else, someone called Jack Frost.

'Alright,' Wind thought as she glanced over her shoulder, scowling slightly. The Moon shone innocently behind her. 'You win this time.'

As the two disappeared into the trees, leaving the light far behind them, Jack was a storm of emotions, and Wind forced herself to organise her anemoi now that she wouldn't be able to be everywhere at all times.

She finally had a purpose. It was a shame it only came now, after centuries of aimless wandering.