To Long for Soot in Snow

Vinh Long x Tuyet Thuan

Gray pointed ears flickered behind the light film of snow atop branches, luminous against the almost-black pinewood. The snowflakes were caught in the deep, knotted crevices of ancient trunks, lasting but a brief lifetime before melting away. More twirling snow piled atop the high, drooping branches and then tumbled down in heaping thuds.

Thin, icy pine needles crunched under barefoot soles—the thin surface of the snow broke like a stiff, caramelized sheet and revealed powdered snow beneath.

Tuyet Thuan traced the notched bumps of the passing trunks with a feather-light touch. The trees crowded so thick and dense that his hand never fell away, instead leaping from one to the other. Dark matted moss jumped off the trunks in the path of his hand before he finally moved it away. He rubbed warmth back into his gray, frosted fingertips.

Flakes of snow trembled atop his clear lashes before being blinked away into oblivion. His hair was devoid of color and as translucent as reflecting ice, cut sharp at his rounded chin in order to slip through crooked, wooden nooks. His robes were made of varying shades of gray wolf pelts he'd collected with every passing decade, all bound eloquently together with twine, before clasping the side of his neck with an asymmetric finish. They flowed down his body like an icy river.

He moved freely—and the forest parted around him, welcoming him home. The sweet, crystal chimes of the wind blew up from the jagged ice ravine deep north, where the gusts swept snow through the forest. Trailing along, however, was a deep, ashen scent. Tuyet Thuan's ears flicked up and down. His thin brows and short, flattened nose scrunched together.

There was fire.

Tuyet Thuan held a draping sleeve up to his mouth and contemplated the source of the fire as he stepped in the scent's direction. It could be a human fire that caught wind from a settlement. Or perhaps a rebellious youngling had messed around with magic, away from the high elves' watch. Or, though rare, an old withered tree had caught the passing eye of the sun and collapsed into ashes.

Still, it was worthy of investigation.

Like a curtain pulled open to reveal a window's endless sight, Tuyet Thuan stepped past the last crowded line of trees before they gave way to a large clearing. Dense pine trunks, thicker than his body a few times over, littered the ground. Deteriorating bark peeked out of the decades of untouched snow. The brittle bark crumbled, dusting the pale snow with an ashen coat.

And at the center of the scorched earth, littered with patchy snow, was a goliath dragon. The hot-spike mane was slender like a feline's, tapering down the serpentine torso to its scaled tail. Large wings furled tight against the dragon's sides. Sword-like fins followed underneath, then backfins. It lay coiled into a tight knot—only the long snout and curly twine whiskers peeked out. The golden crest crowning the dragon's snout and neck betrayed a gleam of the creature's original color beneath the charcoal soot.

Snow piled atop the dragon like an untouched grave. A large chunk slid down its tail after precariously towering too high. Tuyet Thuan circled the dragon, careful to avoid being downwind wherever the ash blew. It took over a few minutes to fully circle the behemoth. He rubbed his throat out of habit.

A dragon—it was unheard of to see such creatures near this realm of frost.

Yet, this dragon could only be dead. No dragon would allow the winter chill to touch their scales, let alone etch their bones. It was the reason no dragons chose to settle here.

...Was it dead?

Tuyet Thuan leaned in while wincing inwardly at the inevitable specks graying his pristine robes. His fingers, manicured and bony, pressed beneath against the side of the dragon's maw. A low, faint magic glimmered—the dull, lukewarm spark caged in bars of ice. The slow, lurching thumps of a dragon's heartbeat vibrated against his fingertips, imprinting warmth onto his hand.