Jack spent some more time with Ombric in Santoff Claussen, but soon felt the pull to return to work. One day, while he was helping Ombric expand a villager's hut, he stopped working and stared unblinkingly at the sky. "What is it Jack?" Ombric enquired.
"I feel this sort of tug," Jack replied, still staring at the sky, barely moving his mouth, "like I need to go somewhere."
"Ah yes, it is the pull of your season telling you to return to your work."
"The winds are telling me to follow." He turned his head to look at Ombric, looking slightly remorseful. Ombric shuffled by and embraced Jack warmly and then said, "It is okay, my friend. You can go. Santoff Clausen will be here whenever you wish to return."
Jack shot into the sky, propelled by the winds, and made his way to where he was needed. The winds fed him information urgently, showing him that there was irregular storm activity in North America. He landed in the middle of a huge blizzard, way bigger than anything he'd seen before. He yelled up at the storm system. "Hey! You guys are pushing this storm down way too hard!" There were too many whirling clouds involved in some sort of argument about who produced more snow. His yelling ineffective, he decided to use more forceful methods. He closed his eyes and breathed deeply before slamming his power upwards all at once, holding the snow up and forcing the clouds to disperse. The forcefulness of the impact blew snow in all directions, creating a wide circle of uncovered ground and crater in the shape of his feet in the hard packed earth at the epicenter. The clouds moved away still bickering with each other, leaving the sky clear as if the storm had never happened. Shaking out his jarred limbs, Jack whooped triumphantly before looking around at where he was. Sudden recognition dawned on him. His village was the same as it had been when he died. There were a few more buildings, but it still felt so familiar to him.
People had begun to peak out of their homes, seeking the source of the thunderclap that resulted from Jack's display of power. They gathered around where Jack stood, marveling at the apparent footprints in the center of town. Though Jack stood at the center of the throng of people, none of them saw him. It was strange, but it hurt him less now that more time had passed. He saw many faces that he remembered from his childhood in the crowd, older now, but people he knew who looked scared and worried that some spectral figure had left strange footprints on the ground. Instinctually, he called forth a gentle snowfall that seemed to ease their fears somewhat and some of them thought that maybe there was a friendly ghost who stopped the violent storm for them. Giggling, Jack hopped around poking peoples' noses, amusing the children, but cautioning some of the adults to go back inside. As the villagers retreated to their homes, Jack was left alone chuckling to himself, still giddy from his small victory. At least, he thought he was alone. A soft gasp sounded behind him and he whirled around to see a familiar face looking straight at him.
"Emily," he whispered. She was older and bore a striking resemblance to his mother, but retained the same deep brown eyes and kind expression from his memory.
"Who said that? How do you know my name?" Emily looked searchingly at the spot where Jack stood. So she couldn't see him, but hearing him was a start.
"Follow my footsteps," Jack implored. He knew exactly where to take her. Perhaps against her better judgment, Emily obeyed and followed the footsteps that appeared in the snow all the way up to the pond that she visited only once a year.
"Why did you bring me here? Who are you?" Her voice was unafraid, but her expression was openly curious. Jack stood in the center of the iced over pond and cleared the snow from the spot he fell through all those years ago. Emily's eyes widened and she stepped forward, uncaring as her boots slid on the ice. She stopped where Jack stood and knelt to touch the ice as the tears fell from her cheeks. Jack squatted so that he was eye level with her and looked curiously at her face reflected in the mirror smooth ice. Up close, her face still looked quite youthful, though there were the beginnings of laugh lines on her cheeks. He smiled and said, "You've grown so much, sis. When did you get so pretty?"
Suddenly Emily could see a familiar face appear beside hers in the ice and she looked up to find herself face to face with her brother. She lifted her hands to slowly touch his cheek, almost afraid that none of it was real. "It can't be...Jack?:
"It's me, sis," he said, tentatively covering the hand on his cheek with his own, "I'm sorry I died on you." With a broken sob, Emily threw herself into Jack's arms and cried into his shirt. "You're sorry? I'm the one who should be thanking you! I never got the chance to say goodbye to you!" She shouted these half-incoherently between sobs. "We couldn't bury you because we had no body! I-I thought I'd never see you again!" He held her close as she rode out her grief. At length, her tears subsided and she pulled away to look at him, still touching his face to make sure he was still there. As she examined him, her expression turned quizzical and she asked, "How is this happening? Why haven't you aged at all? You look so different."
"What do you mean by different?"
"Your eyes are blue and you have white hair. Are you a ghost or something?" She grabbed his head and turned it this way and that, as if trying to shake the white out of his hair.
"Whoa, whoa, seriously? My hair and my eyes are what now? Oh my god!"
"Ten years you've been gone and you haven't seen yourself?"
"Well, no! It's not like I carry around a mirror!" This was true for many. Mirrors were expensive because glass and silver were expensive. Most folks could see their reflections occasionally in bodies of water or polished metal, but in his life so far as a spirit, he'd spent too much time zipping around the world to even notice his own reflection. She pointed down at the shiny, dark mirror Jack had made in the ice. It was true, his features had changed and it completely freaked him out. He spent some time ogling himself before they heard someone shouting from down the hill.
"Oh goodness, that would be my husband," Emily said as she stood, brushing the snow from her skirts.
"Whoa wait husband?! Who? Who did my baby sister marry?" Jack jumped up with wide eyes, grabbing Emily by the shoulders to stare down at her. Even after all these years, he was still taller than her.
"Thomas Bennett," Emily replied, looking away, "The wedding was last Spring." Alarmed again, she gasped and said, "What am I going to tell him about you? He's going to think I'm touched in the head!"
Thinking, Jack scratched his head and looked Emily straight in the eyes. "Do you trust me?"
Something in Emily's expression changed and she nodded her head determinedly. Jack smiled and said, "Just tell him about me and I'll do the rest."
Tom Bennett was the son of the village blacksmith and was a burly man who, despite his appearance, was exceedingly gentle hearted and loved his wife dearly. When the blizzard was mysteriously stopped, he'd gone to fire up the forge to get started on work that had built up in the past few weeks due to the snow. The fire of the forge was his lifeblood and the cold kept it from staying hot enough to work with. When Emily didn't come back to the house, he'd gotten worried. The first place he could think to look for her was the pond up the hill. It was, after all, the anniversary of her brother's death.
"Emily, thank God I found you. I thought you'd gotten caught in the snow somewhere," he breathed as he saw his wife safe and sound at the pond.
"Oh you silly goose, I can take care of myself." Emily giggled and offered him her cheek to kiss. Tom looked her over and noticed her tear stained face.
"I know it's a hard day for you, love. I'm glad the storm eased up so you could come here. I'm sure Jack helped clear away the storm from heaven."
"Actually, Tom. He really did. He's here with us right now" She said it with blunt frankness and crossed her arms, looking expectantly at him. Tom stared quizzically at his wife.
"Now who's being silly," he said as he tweaked her nose, "Are you trying to pull my leg?"
"No, he's really here. I'm being perfectly serious"
Tom's voice softened and he said, "Honey, I know you took his death hard, but you know the dead can't come back. He's been gone ten years now."
"Tom, will you trust me and just hear me out? I know Jack died, but he is here." Tom looked at his wife's pleading eyes and nodded in agreement. As if on cue, all the snow cleared away from the pond, leaving a shiny, level sheet of black ice covering the entirety of the pond. Tom's mouth fell open as he stood, flabbergasted, on the clear ice. Emily hooked her arms reassuringly around his bicep and giggled. Frosty footprints with perfectly articulated toes interrupted the deep blackness, appearing white and then melting black as someone made his way towards them. At length, Tom could hear the slap, slap of bare flesh on ice and then, when the footprints stopped a few feet away, he picked up a voice, one he remembered from his childhood.
"Thanks for that, Tom," Jack said, finally.
"Who was that? That's Jack's voice. I know it! Why can't I see anything?" Tom looked wildly around him. Tentatively, Jack reached out and spread his fingers over Tom's forehead and hit him in the face with a puff of snow. Tom spluttered and blinked. As the snow cleared, he could see Jack, plain as day, mere inches away from his face.
"Gah!" Tom yelped and fell backwards, one hand on his heart and the other supporting his weight under his back.
"Hehe let me help you up, big guy," Jack said as a gust of wind picked Tom up and set him on his feet again.
"What-I-uh-h-h-how? Emily?" Tom stuttered as his head whirled around, looking between Emily and Jack.
"Shhh it's okay, dear. I just found out myself. Jack has a lot of explaining to do."
Jack followed them down to their house on the outskirts of the village. From behind, he could tell that Tom was asking her questions in a quiet baritone, occasionally flailing his arms around in disbelief. Emily took it all in stride and answered him calmly, reigning in his distress. Jack liked what he saw in their relationship. Tom Bennett had always been a quiet boy, the same age as Emily. Jack vaguely remembered teaching him how to set up small animal traps once when Tom was eight or nine. He was a blacksmith, so she would want for nothing. Really, he was an ideal match for Emily. Still, knowing that his baby sister was married and would probably have children soon unnerved him and reminded him how much time he'd missed. It didn't feel like ten years at all. It was as if he stood still while time moved past him and it honestly scared him worse than anything. Emily would grow old and die and everything would change quickly. If the decades moved as fast for him as this one did, he wouldn't notice until it was too late. If he wasn't careful, he'd miss everything.
"Jack? Jack! You in there?" Emily's voice roused him from his thoughts. He was in their house sitting at their square, wooden table, scrubbed clean with coarse salt and vinegar.
"Yeah, sorry. This is a nice house," he looked around appreciatively at the sturdy walls of the spacious house.
"You haven't told us how it is that you're alive again," Tom said gently, "I'm really happy you're here, but you've got to admit this is very unusual for us."
"Yeah, Jack," Emily cut in, "Please, I'm dying to know."
"Well, I'm still technically dead, I mean, my body is. I was brought back by someone called the Man in the Moon in order to be the embodiment of Winter. I help to regulate the weather in conjunction with the other seasons." Jack started his long explanation and told them everything from the day he died and brought them up to speed. When he finished talking, night had fallen. Emily and Tom sat hand in hand across from him and seemed frozen in their seats, processing what he'd just said.
"Did you really try to kill yourself?" Emily asked in a quiet voice, "Is that even possible for you now? You're immortal."
"I did. I think it was around last year, actually. It almost worked. If Anyan hadn't found me, I think I really would have perished for good."
"Jack if you-"
"No, don't worry I won't try again. I'm okay now, really." Emily looked at him distrustfully, but dropped the subject.
"My recovery probably made the weather all wonky," he continued, "I'm really sorry about that storm, Tom. I know you can't run the forge when it's too cold."
"What? No, it's fine, Jack," Tom said, "You fixed it after all."
Jack pressed his lips into a thin line and said, "Actually, I only temporarily diverted the storm's energy. There will be a couple of heavy storms in the next month, spaced out by at least a few days. Don't worry, they won't be anything like that blizzard. I had the weather down to a system up here," he said tapping his temples, "I started controlling things remotely by tapping into the winds' energy to herd the cold air and storm clouds around, but I'm still getting a hang of it and I couldn't keep it up while I was sick. It's going to take at least a few months to get everything back to normal again. This part of the continent's got it the worst right now because you're so close to the sea. The sea makes everything change much faster."
Tom looked worried. "The harvest wasn't the greatest this year, we'll need to get ready for those storms."
Jack nodded in agreement, "How are you going to warn people? I know we got Tom to believe I existed, but the whole village isn't going to be so easy to convince."
"Well, Tom's the town blacksmith," Emily said, "I'm sure if we told people at the next town meeting to prepare for bad weather, they'd listen to him."
"There's been a meeting called for tomorrow to discuss the weather. I could try to steer the conversation." Tom said this as he stood up to bring supper to the table. He set out a few bowls and filled them with pottage that had been boiling away on the fire. When Jack was offered the food, he politely declined.
"Sorry, I don't mean to be rude," Jack said, folding his legs on the chair, "My body doesn't really run on food these days."
"Really?" Emily asked, amazed.
"Yes, immortality does have its benefits."
They stayed up and talked for hours discussing all that Jack had missed. After a while, Jack asked something Emily had been dreading.
"Where are mother and father?"
Emily took both of his hands in hers and said, "Jack, father got really sick and died about a year after you. He just couldn't survive the famine as well as the rest of us. Mother died last year, just after our wedding. It was her time."
Jack pressed his eyes closed and took a few shuddering breaths. "Hey, hey. None of that now," Emily said, circling the table to throw an arm across his shoulders, "They were both happy when they passed. The famine passed and mum lived a good few years without hardship."
"I'm just sorry I missed so many things, Em."
"You died, Jack. I thought you were gone forever. You're here now and that's all that matters to me. You still have me and now you have Tom."
"Don't forget the child you're expecting!" Tom chimed in.
"Tom!" Emily socked him in the shoulder, red faced, "I was getting there!"
The next morning came too quickly for Tom. He woke at the break of dawn as a sliver of sunlight reached his eyes. Careful not to wake Emily, he crept out of the room that they shared and outside to draw some water. When he returned from the well with his bucket, he spotted Jack sitting cross legged atop the roof, hands at his sides and his staff balanced neatly across his knees. His eyes were closed and his brow was furrowed slightly. He was covered in a light dusting of snow gathered at the top of his head and shoulders.
"Jack!" Tom yelled, setting his bucket down. Jack opened his eyes and directed his attention to Tom. Dazedly he shook himself and jumped off of the roof to land lightly in front of Tom.
Yelping in surprise, Tom recoiled slightly and asked, "Have you been up there all night?"
"What, it's morning? I guess I spent more time up there than I thought. I was dealing with stubborn blizzards up near the French colonies."
"Let me guess, you don't sleep?"
"Not a wink," Jack said, winking cheekily.
Crossing his burly forearms, Tom laughed gruffly and said, "You really haven't changed despite all of this, Jack. You're still as childish as ever."
"Me? Childish? Where would you get that idea?"
"You always made me and the other children laugh, even when the crops failed and we were starving."
"Yeah," Jack said quietly, "Well, I figured someone had to keep folks from moping around all day. Kids need to have fun while they're kids, you know?"
Tom bowed his head a little. "You know, when you and your father died, Emily and your mum came to live at our house. They were grieving for a long time. I remember it took me ages to get Emily to smile again."
"Thank you, Tom. You're a good husband to her."
"I can't tell you how much it means to me that you think so, Jack. You were like an older brother to me." Tom stared gravely at him. "I will take care of her."
Emily woke later on in the morning to see Tom off to the town meeting. He was dressed smartly his cap and thick coat and kissed his wife goodbye.
"So how long do you think you can stay?" Emily asked Jack after Tom left.
"Well, Winter here is going to last through the end of January, so I think I can stay a while longer than that before I have to leave."
"Do you have to go? Can't you just do everything from here?"
"No. I can do basic things, but I have to do a lot of things personally. Staying too far away from Winter can also do pretty bad things to my body." He closed his eyes briefly and sighed. "Sorry Em, I have to go up to the French colonies to fix the blizzards. They're being very stubborn."
"You're going to New France? That will take ages!"
"No, the winds can take me there and back in no time at all. It'll take me at most half an hour each way. Be back soon!" With that he shot up into the air, blowing wind into Emily's astonished face.
"You didn't tell me you could fly!" Her words were lost to Jack as he flew at breakneck speed to Canada.