In the Winter (Kye)

[Runas]

Winter 5th, 506 AV, Early Evening

Runas exhaled in a cloud of frozen oxygen and water and laughed. Frost coated her long, white eyelashes and sparkled in the tear tracks that had caressed her pale cheeks. Black horns curled up from her temples, stroked with frost from the cold air and melted snow. Her pale cheeks held a tint of pink colouring, but they weren't yet ruddy with frost bite. She planned to be inside the Dragon by the time the temperature dropped enough to freeze her extremities.

She found childish delight in the puffs of air she exhaled. She still reacted that way to things that almost screamed the beauty of nature. Snow was like rain, and rain was water, and water was her deliverance onto Mizahar. She loved the scent of rain and the ocean and the chill burn of inhaling winter air. Thirteen years of being able to observe all seasons and all weather had given her a passion for the joy of change. The fact that she'd never truly change the way mortals did was an irrelevant idea that still caused her a flash of anger.

She chuckled, sending up even more frosted breath, and then settled in on the snowy ground. A shiver traveled the length of her spine, but she was indifferent. Like her personality, she was growing distant to the cares of mortal whims. Most of her friends were reaching their middle years. The Kelvic she'd bonded to as a Mistress was long dead and buried. Several mages she'd met were either insane or drastically altered by toying with personal magics to dangerous levels. If anyone was still close enough to notice, they'd realize her eyes were becoming distant and veiled, turned more towards inside instead of outside. She was closing off to the mortals around her, knowing she'd likely outlive them and be lonely anyway.

With that very saddening thought, Runas closed her silver eyes and focused inwardly to where her res resided within her djed. She began to exhale again, her breath lifting away immediately to give way for the silvery mist of res to rise past her lips. Slowly, the heavy lids rose so Runas could look at her small cloud of res. She never summoned too much, having watched as a mage's arms began to become ephemeral and gaseous with his over giving of wind res. Not as bad as the wizard with the flaming hair, and definitely not as bad as the man who's very eyes were rock. She didn't want any part of her to become watery. She was different enough without that.

Her silver eyes narrowed and her focus sharpened. A headache immediately blurred the edges of her focus, but she was used to that. She maintained her hold on the res before her, urging it to change. And it did.

With a sudden pop! of displaced air, the silvery res became a small, floating blob of curulean water. It floated just within a foot of her face, writhing like a living organism. Her focus was so pointed that she'd not have noticed even a Zith come crashing down until she'd been picked up.