CLARA
The whole town smells like cider and pine sap, sweet and sharp, the kind of scent that gets into your clothes and stays there for days. Silverpine has a way of making something out of nothing, and tonight is no different.
The farewell-to-winter party was Dee’s idea, though she tried to pass it off on Pippa when everyone asked who started the rumor. Truth is, it has Pippa written all over it. The fae has been fluttering through the square since noon, tying blue ribbons to every post, hanging lanterns shaped like snowflakes, and charming icicles so they sparkle without dripping.
By the time the fiddles start, half the ridge has crammed into the square. Bonfires crackle, benches overflow with food, and someone spiked the cocoa because I can taste cinnamon and something stronger when I sip mine.
I should be nervous, standing in the middle of a crowd that remembers me mostly as the girl who left town for a bigger life, but instead my chest feels light. It’s the first time in months I’m not looking over my shoulder, not bracing for someone to snatch the lodge away.
“Clara!” Dee waves me over, cheeks flushed from the fire and the cider both. “Come stand here, you’ve got the best view of the stage.”
“What stage?” I ask, but when I look, I see it: Pippa has declared one of the cider barrels a pulpit, and she’s already hovering above it with a wreath of frosted pine needles perched crookedly on her head. The crowd’s egging her on, laughing and clapping.
“This is trouble,” I mutter, but Dee only grins and tugs me closer.
Dralgor arrives just as Pippa clears her throat. He looks unfairly good for a man who has been splitting wood all afternoon, his coat collar turned up, snow still clinging to his shoulders, hair damp from the melt. When his eyes find mine, the noise of the crowd blurs for a moment. There’s something in the way he looks at me now: steady, sure, not the guarded watchfulness of before. Like he’s decided he doesn’t have to brace for me to shove him away anymore.
“Ladies, gentlemen, elves, orcs, and whoever else snuck in from the ridge tonight!” Pippa calls, wings flaring wide. “Winter is ending, spring is sniffing around the edges, and tradition demands a ceremony. Lucky for you, I’m an ordained officiant in six realms and a self-proclaimed priestess in three more, which makes me more than qualified to oversee tonight’s snow vows.”
The crowd roars with approval. I choke on my cocoa.
“Oh no,” I say. “Absolutely not.”
“Absolutely yes,” Pippa sings, pointing her little frost-tipped wand at me and Dralgor both. “Step forward, lovebirds. The ridge demands entertainment, and you’re the main event.”
The cheering doubles. Dee shoves me from behind, and before I can plant my boots, Dralgor is beside me, his large hand warm against the small of my back as if steadying me is the most natural thing in the world.
“You’re enjoying this,” I hiss up at him.
“I am,” he says without apology. His voice is low, steady, carrying enough warmth that my stomach does a strange little flip. “It’s harmless.”
“It’s humiliating.”
His mouth twitches like he’s fighting a smile. “Not to me.”
We stand before Pippa’s barrel stage, the bonfire painting the snow orange and gold. She hovers higher, raising her wand like she’s commanding an army.
“Snow vows are sacred in Silverpine, even if we make them up every year. They’re about family, about warmth, about choosing to stand together when the cold wants to swallow you whole. Tonight, Clara and Dralgor will show us how it’s done.”
The crowd whistles, stomps, claps. Someone shouts, “Kiss her already!” which earns another round of laughter. My cheeks burn, but there’s no malice in it. They’re happy, tipsy, celebrating not just us but themselves, their survival of another winter.
“Repeat after me!” Pippa trills. “‘I vow to share firewood when the blizzard steals our heat.’”
The crowd echoes her. I roll my eyes but mumble the words anyway. Dralgor’s voice rumbles beside me, deep enough that it vibrates through the soles of my boots.
“‘I vow to share cocoa even if the marshmallows run out.’”
I can’t help but snort. “That’s not a vow, that’s torture.”
“You heard the priestess,” Dralgor says, completely serious, though his eyes glint with amusement.
Pippa smirks and flutters closer, tapping each of us on the forehead with her wand. “‘I vow to share blankets, even if one of us hogs them.’”
The crowd howls. Dee shouts, “That’s for you, Clara!” and I flip her a very dignified gesture that makes her laugh harder.
Pippa lifts her hands like she’s calling down the stars themselves. “‘And I vow that even when the snow melts, the bond will hold.’”
Silence settles for a breath, soft and almost reverent, the weight of the words catching even though everyone knows it’s pretend.
