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winter's
edge
When
your crown of ice is bitter death
and the white snow around you
becomes your grave,
all that is left is tears.
The woman who waits at the edge of the world is
very pale. Her white hands are dry and cracked with
age, silvery white against the greying rags of her dress.
(The dress is made of lace and the finest silk; it bears
the makings of what was once a gown fit for royalty.)
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If one
looks further, it may be discerned that there is a small smile
hovering at the edge of her lips. Indeed, were her eyes not
narrowed against the bitter cold, one might also notice the
slight twinkle (or was it simply the wind?) in her eye, and
call it amusement.
There is
a large, broken crown cradled on her lap, with white diamonds
set into the crusted silver frame. It spirals around and around
in small hoops and loops, and would continue onward still
had it not lay in glittering pieces in her hands. (The diamonds
are very bright, and it is only these pieces that do not yet
look withered with age.)
Her feet are clad in silk again, dark ribbons coiled about
her ankles like sleeping snakes. They are wet with snow and
tears, and from dark blood that seeped from a once-open wound.
(She bled for a thousand thousand years and all her life drained
crimson from that open cut, until finally she could bleed
no more.)
She does not speak, blink, or move. She does not cry, shout,
or laugh. She is the Snow Queen of all legend, and defeated
and alone she waits in the snow and the bitter cold. (Kay
and Gerda have long faded away into the earth, and the memory
of her frozen shard and the palace of ice is all but forgotten.)
In the edge of the world where winter is made, the Snow Queen
waits.
Waits for the end of time.
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