Winter Study
The sound of a stylus tapping on a wax tablet was getting annoying. Unfortunately, Malkonia was the one annoying herself.
The tablet had been an initial gift from High Marshal Celino Guitirre, a member of the Legion of Dusk who was missing an arm like she now was and who had taken her under his remaining wing. She had been relearning how to write from her lessons with her aunt and was beginning to learn the Torrezone script and native languages from either the High Marshal or from Glorifier Abano. Glorifier Abano was a nervous-looking man who was just as tired as every other medic and healer that Malkonia had met, including her aunt.
Right now, she was curled up on the cot, using her own coils to help keep the tablet steady while she figured out how to string the words that she wanted together. She was making a solo attempt to put her feelings to wax just to get them out of her head. But nothing that she wrote put all of her feelings into words; the relief she felt knowing she was not alone and didn’t have to learn everything again all alone, the fear she felt that she’d never figure it out again, the ache of the cold seeping through her scales and into her bones, the renewed feeling of loneliness of being somewhere she didn’t know too well, even with people she did know... It went on and on. The longer she thought about it, the more overwhelmed all of her feelings became.
Finally defeated, Malkonia tossed the wax tablet (very gently) onto her cot, crossed her arms, and quietly pouted.
Her mother looked up from the book she had been reading. Hythonia the Cruel was no healer, but she had listened to Glorifier Abano’s instructions on how to help Malkonia with adapting to her disability. “Finally offended by the wax?” she asked in Therosian, raising a brow.
Malkonia smiled sheepishly and retrieved the tablet. “No, Mother. Just frustrated.”
Hythonia flipped to a new page in her book. Malkonia could read a bit of the title, something about love and lampades. She had once snuck into a different part of the cave and found it full of written poetry expounding on the virtues of love between women. She had read a page of one and grown so embarrassed about it that she put it back and didn’t ask her mother about why Hythonia even had those. “Perhaps you should go outside for a bit,” her mother finally recommended. “Put on your layers and go clear your head instead of glaring at the wax until you melt it.”
That was probably the best idea. And it let Malkonia uncurl for a little while. “Will do, Mother,” she said as she slithered off of the cot and went to retrieve another two layers. Getting dressed was thankfully rather easy thanks to the fact that most of it was just cloth. She couldn’t imagine trying to put on armor like the Legionnaires wore one-handed. The High Marshal had a puppy trained to help him with his, but he also knew how to actually put them on to begin with. The closest Malkonia had figured out so far was that there were buckles and straps.
Once her layers were in order, Malkonia dismissed herself and escaped out to the streets of Alta Torrezon. She was getting more used to the baffled looks that everyone gave her, but she had been lucky enough to not receive any threats so far. It helped that she had been out a few times with the High Marshal to test her new balance while slithering at a higher speed. She still couldn’t keep up with his exultation, but she at least wasn’t sliding directly into walls anymore.
The ground was cold, wet, and covered in a slush of what used to be snow. Water had melted and then refrozen into icicles and icy puddles among the stone of the streets. But in theory, spring was on its way, when it would grow warmer again and the snow would return to rain. People spoke around Malkonia, their voices melding into one another until it was just noise. She pulled the hood further down over her face and serpents. She slithered until she happened to look up at a nearby wall and realized that she recognized the woman sitting there.
Lily of Thyrsus was perched almost like a bird on top of a snow-covered half-wall, writing in a fairly large tome and occasionally looking up at a nearby building with a furrowed brow before she went back to writing. Malkonia listened to the scratching of the pen across the paper and was surprised to find a song. More hesitant strokes broke up the longer and smoother ones. Despite the weather, the goddess still wore the same blend of robes and armor as she had when she was called to help Malkonia.
Malkonia was surprised that the goddess was still there. She had seen glances of Lily over the past few weeks, but the young goddess seemed to slip through the streets of the capital like a shadow. When Malkonia finally bothered her aunt into agreeing to let her see one of the dawn services that the Church of Dusk held, Lily was present in the back of the room, writing notes in that ever-present tome. It seemed like everyone who needed to know that a foreign goddess was present was aware yet didn’t take issue with it, and Lily was merely observing things open to the public with a furrowed brow and a pen that never seemed to run dry. But she was always gone before Malkonia could talk to her.
But there the goddess sat, unbothered by the cold, writing away like a poet deep in thought. Malkonia hesitated for a moment before she slithered closer and made sure that Lily could hear her.
Lily looked up for a moment when she heard Malkonia approach. She offered a smile that made Malkonia forget how to speak for a moment. “Hello Malkonia.” She slid down from the wall and landed lightly on her feet. “How are you feeling?”
She was quietly thankful that Lily had given her a question. She could answer that, at least. “The pain’s not as sharp as it was before, but it’s still present.” She tilted her head. “Are...you not cold, Lily?”
“Ke veveia ochi, of course not,” Lily said, waving a little dismissively. She had spoken in Thyrsian first and then reflexively translated it. Malkonia assumed that this was a habit she had built up over time. “Snow and I are made of the same thing, and I don’t have the whole freezing of the blood thing to worry about.”
“Made of the same thing?” Malkonia repeated. She looked at the icicles and the slush and the snow. “Water? Even if you are, that doesn’t mean you can’t get frostbite or something worse. That targets the skin and muscle, not the blood.” Glorifier Abano had taught her a lot about cold-based injuries once he heard that Theros had no such winter and no such training. Before she realized what she was doing, Malkonia reached out and took one of Lily’s bare hands in her own, turning it over to check for discoloration. She did not see any indication of frostnip having set in yet, but better safe than sorry. “Come on, let’s get inside.”
Lily blinked a few times, then nodded her assent. “As you wish.” As she fell in step with Malkonia’s slithering, she asked another question. “Are they treating you well here?”
Malkonia nodded. “Of course! I’m...a little surprised by that, but I think Aunt Menea is doing enough that people are accepting that we’ll be here for a little while.” Menea was also representing the interests of Theros overall when it came to speaking with important Torrezone people like the Saint. She was the most likely person to pull it off, after all.
Malkonia herself had gotten to see Saint Elenda exactly once since arriving in Alta Torrezon. The Saint had been speaking with Mavren once when Hythonia brought Malkonia with her to speak with Mavren. Malkonia had been stricken by the Saint’s beauty. Everything about her, from the soft gold of her eyes to the wisps of grey among her dark hair, spoke not just of the divinity that she bore but also of her years of life and experience. She knew who she was and what she sought to teach the mortals who followed her, exactly as Malkonia’s mother and aunt did. The Saint was more than just beautiful; she was radiant, awe-inspiring, elegant. Malkonia had stayed silent out of worry that she might say something foolish.
Looking at Lily, Malkonia did not see that same certainty, but she saw a similar kind of divinity. Lily was a goddess closer to Malkonia’s age than to her mother and aunt’s. It was hard to tell if she was powerful, but it was clear to see that she was beautiful and inquisitive.
Malkonia realized that she had been staring. She shook her head slightly to try and get her mind back under control. “What brought you back to Alta Torrezon?” she asked. It had turned into a back-and-forth between them, one question for another.
Lily shifted her tome and pen into one arm to carry them more comfortably. She looked sheepish, like how Malkonia so often felt. “I find the architecture here to be very nice, but I don’t think my artistic abilities are good enough to copy what I see in them.”
“Can I see?” Malkonia asked, slithering a little closer to try and peek even though the book was closed.
Lily readjusted her grip again and opened the book. “Please don’t laugh.” She flipped past pages of writing in a script that looked like an older version of the Therosian script that Malkonia was learning and a bunch of strange symbols across the pages until she got to the last one she had been working on.
Malkonia studied the page. There were...certainly drawings on the page. One of those scribbles was probably meant to be the roses that were depicted across every building. Which meant that the lines around it were supposed to be the bricks of the wall.
“It’s...closer to an attempt than I can do right now,” she finally settled on. It was the most diplomatic way she could have put it.
Lily sucked in air between her teeth and closed the tome. “Yeah, that’s what I thought. Like I said, I am no artist.”
“At least you’re making an attempt,” Malkonia offered. She didn’t laugh at Lily’s attempt to try something new. Apparently even goddesses struggled with picking up new skills.
“An attempt that I will not be sharing with the mortals back home, that’s for sure. My skills and hobbies tend more towards studying, adventuring, and antagonizing my mortal friends than towards architecture and drawing.” Lily studied Malkonia for a moment. Malkonia tried not to grow flustered. “What about you?”
Malkonia’s cheeks remained warm. “I help tend to the plants and bees in my aunt’s garden. And I’m studying to become a healer like she is. And just...generally studying to learn more of how worship of the pantheon goes now.” She reached up and tugged her hood down more as a cold wind came through. Lily didn’t shiver even though Malkonia herself did. “Seeing the different clothes across different planes is really cool. And...one time a trader came to Skathos and left behind a drawing for some kind of race across some other planes. The chariots they used were fascinating, there weren’t any animals drawing them but they still seemed like they were moving quickly in the image.”
“Chariots without animals drawing them...” Lily trailed off for a moment. Malkonia saw the exact moment when her description clicked. “Oh! The vehicles in that Ghirapur Grand Prix, right. I don’t yet know much about how they function, but I quite enjoyed the Amonkhet team’s work during the race.”
“Amonkhet?” Malkonia repeated. She got the door to the hospital-cathedral open and slithered in alongside Lily.
“It’s a desert plane. Sand and undead as far as the eye can see. Beautiful place,” Lily said, her voice lowering out of respect for the place they were now in. “I keep intending to head back, but I still have other work I need to do in the short term.”
Malkonia couldn’t help it. “Like drawing ‘buildings’?” she teased.
Lily laughed softly. Malkonia was slightly overwhelmed by how beautiful the goddess’s laugh was. “Or just making a valiant attempt to.”
Hythonia looked up from her book as Malkonia returned. She sized up Lily just like she had when Lily brought Malkonia back to her. “Lily of Thyrsus,” the elder gorgon finally greeted. “A pleasure to see you again.”
Lily bowed at the waist, keeping her tome pulled against her chest. “Lady Hythonia of Skathos. Likewise. How are you faring in this Torrezone winter?”
“Not particularly well. Theros has not been this cold in a very long time,” Hythonia grumbled as she returned to reading her book. “What of your plane, Thyrsus?”
“My mother’s plane,” Lily corrected, almost automatically. She shook her head. “We get winters like this one, but that depends on the year. This year we just have a ‘nippy’ cold rather than an overwhelming freeze.”
“A far more preferable type of weather to this one,” Hythonia agreed. Malkonia was surprised that her mother was getting along so well with someone, considering...well, it had been at least Malkonia’s entire life since Hythonia last received a guest, based on the fact that the statues had been in place from the day Malkonia hatched to now. “Though I suppose I would complain less were I home. Traveling is not something I enjoy. You seem like you have no such qualms.”
Lily smiled. Malkonia tried not to grow flustered upon seeing that smile again. “I consider myself an adventurer,” the goddess said with a small nod. “I have a certain restlessness that contributes to it.”
A certain restlessness. That was certainly a way to describe the emotions that Malkonia had been feeling ever since she followed Mavren on his pilgrimage. She wanted to keep traveling, to experience the lands and oceans of not just Theros but other planes as well. She knew that she was supposed to be training to become Skathos’s steward like her mother, but... “What’s it like?” she asked Lily before she could stop herself.
Lily considered her answer. “Do you want the realistic answer or the poetic one?”
“The realistic one.” Malkonia had gotten used to sleeping outside during her first trip.
“You get very used to uncomfortable sleeping and non-regular bathing. And eating trail rations, whatever you can hunt or gather, or whatever you can steal. Or just starving. That happened quite a bit before I started working with an adventuring party. You have to think ahead and plan a lot more than people imagine. It is not as simple as just grabbing a weapon and walking down the road. Especially if you are traveling alone or with people you don’t know very well.” Despite this, Lily smiled and Malkonia’s heart skipped a beat. “But when you are traveling with people that you trust, people who have proven themselves reliable both in combat and in adventuring, people who want to travel and to travel with you specifically? That is the greatest part, in my not-so-humble opinion.”
At this, the yearning in Malkonia’s heart only grew.
