As I looked out the castle window, I longed to feel the cold wetness of the flakes on my face, in my hair. I could still remember times, long ago, when I would tilt my head back and twirl, letting the flakes become mingled in my hair, kissing my cheeks. I wish I were back there still, along with my innocence.

Maybe, just maybe, I could become that carefree again. Turn back time, just for this one night. Back to before I betrayed her, before my jealousy ran away with me.

I went outside, to give it one last try, to forget the past that had haunted me for what seems like forever. To remember lighter days in the snow, maybe it would purify me.

As the moon bore witness, I cast my face to the sky and threw my arms wide, as if in boastful prayer, begging the gods to look at me. They would not. As I held my hands out in front of me, cupped to catch the delicate crystals, the gods mocked me. The flakes passed right through my skin, untouched, and gathered on the blanket of snow already there.

If I could have cried I would have, but I knew I couldn't, just as I knew the snow would go untouched. But still I tried, as I had every snowfall since my death.