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It had been dark for far too many days and nights; even now, with the return of the starlight and the pale glow of the moon, the world held a bitter chill disconnected from Frostfall, a pall that felt unhealthy, malnourished. It didn’t help the heaviness in Circe’s heart, or assist in the dying glow of the fireflies that kept vigil in her mane, on her croup, all around her in silent clusters of golden pricks of life-giving light. She welcomed them for their company—and it seemed they welcomed her in return. She would miss their companionship when the warmth of springtime came.
However, the shadowmere did not think about these things as she trudged away from her home, the mare’s destination not guided by the constellations but by the rumble of a call she didn’t know she had needed. So much thought and anguish had been given to her fallen young, to the ruined state of things and the death of the world’s vigor; the sorceress didn’t even consider that some part of her ached for the stallion that had sired her dear Callisto, didn’t even imagine that his voice might prove to be a tonic she had been desperate for. He had called her though, and Circe felt something much too warm and confused gush from underneath thick layers of resolve and forced forgetfulness; her gait was eager, her pace level even through the curtains of exhaustion she felt. Pushing herself day and night with assignments that weren’t even her responsibility, Circe left them all in a heartbeat, let them scatter behind her this one time, this one everlasting night. Her General needed her. He was home.
The height of the snow began to grow against her leg just as the forest began thinning, and Circe both scented and saw the malamute bitch she had known belonged to Archibald. Slowing her pace to a careful walk, Circe stopped in front of the red-hued companion, dipping her head in acknowledgment; a firefly broke from her mane, lazily drifting dangerously close the nose of the bitch. Circe lifted her gaze, looking to and fro for any sign of the hulking midnight frame, and called out in a mild tone of her rasping voice, “I am here, General. Why do you call so shrilly?”
The playful lilt was a completely unexpected and unintentional twist to her speech; Circe had no idea where it came from. In fact, the shadowmere had much difficulty in assessing how she felt; though Archibald had been gone for almost the entirety of a season, she did not feel betrayed, nor did she believe him to betray their family of warriors. No, there was just this overpowering need for him that Circe didn’t even know she had, this heart wrenching ache that had everything and nothing to do with the flesh she had left buried in the heart of her homeland. She was…glad, that he had chosen to meet her away from that place. There was too much there, hidden in the earth and rock of her land, that needled her with nightmares and a sickness that had never entirely abated.
Stray thoughts roamed in the pits of her mind as she awaited the Dauntless’s revelation of himself, worries of a trifling sort that nonetheless set her mind careening; would he notice the shagginess of her coat that sat heavier than it needed to in the season of frost? Would he notice the lump that had begun to grow in the center of her loins, the way her hips had shrunken somewhat? Would he see the weariness in her eyes, the heaviness in her face that even the firefly’s touch couldn’t mend? She built as a warrior still, even if she were a neglected one; with a surge of defiant inspiration, Circe decided she would remind him of this. Standing somewhat straighter, her gaze becoming much more resolute, Circe called out to Dauntless again with a tone that bespoke neutrality and duty. Whatever her girlish fancy for him, Circe was his Executioner. “You called for me, General?”
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