Winter was long and dark, as winter always was, but this time, it didn't seem quite so dark. The snow, which had often enough appeared like a shroud to her, now glittered and gleamed enchantedly, as it had in her childhood, reminding her only of the elf, and how much he liked her hair. The elf. Why had he never told her his name?
Granted, she had never asked. Now, however, she would have liked to know.
In the evenings, she often laid aside the spindle and took out the silver snowflake. The work of an apprentice – fancy, now, for a human it would be a masterpiece, more than that, even. It seemed strange that the elf should have made it...he was like a child, after all. Not so much when he had been here last time, however...then, he had seemed quite mature...but he could be a couple of hundreds of years old, for all she knew. They didn't age, those elves.
The tales she had heard...not only where there those about elvish jests that weren't quite so funny, there also were the tales about the Lady of the Golden Wood, who was not a playful elf. Splendid, and terrible, but not ridiculous.
The elf might be a child, or rather a young man, whose parents were too lenient with him, and maybe would, in time, change into someone as serious and terrible as this lady.
Those elves sure were strange...would he come again?
Winter was long, and she was a rather boring old woman. The elf would find something else to set his mind on.
On a day in the middle of winter, there was a knock on the door, but again, it was just her brother. "You segregate yourself", he reproached her. "You should have come to visit us. People are talking already. You need to come tomorrow, at the latest."
"Well, if you absolutely want me to...we don't want people to talk, do we?"
The house of her brother had been decorated beautifully by his much younger wife; with green branches, and brazen decorations that glittered like gold, or at least so she thought, for real gold she had never seen.
The children looked around with shining eyes, wearing their best clothes, their faces had been scrubbed until they had become a little red. The whole family was gathered around the big table.
The old woman started to feel sorry for not having come earlier. It had been very kind of her brother to invite her, after all. And the house was decorated so nicely, the food on the table looked so delicious, that she could not imagine anymore that he could just have invited her to silence the gossip.
"Now, don't you want to move in with us, after all, dear sister?"
She smiled. She knew his coaxing tone of voice, very well she knew it, for he had talked just like that when they had both been children, every time he wanted something from her. The elf had reminded her of that...yes, now she remembered. The elf, however, was much better at it.
„Well, now…"
„It's all getting too much for me", her sister-in-law interjected. "I could use some help..."
„Mama", asked the youngest child, a girl of about five years. "Is she the aunt to whom Daddy always gives money instead of buying new toys for us?"
The old woman felt her blood rise into her face. So that was what they talked like about her! Because of some few copper coins...the hand in which she held the knife was shaking so much that a piece of meat fell to the ground.
"Watch out!" her brother said.
"Yes, that's the aunt, but don't talk about that now", her sister-in-law whispered.
She got up, using the edge of the table as a handle, took a little step to the side, then bowed down slowly, and finally managed to seize the piece of meat.
Only when she had sat up again she noticed that the silver snowflake, which she wore on a string around her neck, hidden under her dress, had fallen out.
„What's that?" asked her youngest niece. "Oh, how it glitters!"
"Where did you get that?" demanded her brother. "Why didn't you tell me about it."
"Stolen", her sister-in-law accused her.
She swallowed hard as tears welled up in her eyes. So that was what they took her to be? A thief? "It...I got it as a present."
"That must be quite some fool, who makes a present out of something like this. Do you even know how much that is worth?"
„Why, it sure is priceless"
"It is! You should have told me right away. What a life we shall have when it is sold!"
„No", she replied and closed her hand fast around the delicate snowflake. "No, we won't. It is mine, and it is not to be sold."
Her sister-in-law was about to say something, but her brother seemed to remember what it had meant if she had talked like this when they both were children.
"Let her be, it is hers, after all", he said.