My Heart (Yearns For You)

It started as all things did: a small, wriggling thing, gasping for air in the new world.

Pascal was smiling down at Lars beside the fireplace — he had insisted on making it, but she always seemed to be so much better at collecting firewood, though he claimed her wood magic abilities gave her an unfair advantage. It was a chilly night; the cold wind bit its way down the back of Lars’ neck, his sawblades icy to the touch. Pascal settled down at his side, her legs folding in on each other in a way that was all too inexplicably graceful for a creature of her size, and she began to unbraid her hair.

Lars often found himself staring at her at the most odd times. After years of nothing but frozen tundra and crystal-sharp beasts, seeing something so warm and full of life was new to him. Pascal was a painting of green and blue brushstrokes, a smudge of the earth that lived beneath the snow. It was just this unfamiliarity that caused his fascination, of course, and not the gentleness of her touch or the way flowers and leaves tangled in her hair like they belonged there. It wasn’t anything to do with how she sang softly beneath the waning moon, crooning a lullaby to send the forests to sleep in preparation for the winter, and it certainly had nothing to do with the way her bright smile creased pearlescent eyes into crescent moons, stirring a warmth some place deep in Lars’ chest that he couldn’t quite explain.

“It’ll be Frostfall soon,” she hummed, and it was only then that Lars snapped his gaze from where her fingers were plucking petals from her hair to meet her sleep-gentled eyes. His chest was doing that warm, twisty thing again — a side effect of his blighting, he told himself.

His stare flickered to the spitting fire. “What’s that?”

“Oh, it’s— well. I should have known you wouldn’t remember,” Pascal mused, shaking her hair out behind her like a mane. Not that Lars would know, of course, because he was very, very busy looking at the fire with the intensity of a thousand suns.

The reminder of what could have been ached like an old wound, and he supposed it was, in a way. As he gazed into the amber flames, he could have sworn he saw a reflection of his shattered farce of a face staring back at him, the set of his mouth grim against the background of auburn leaves. Dying, just like a piece of him had died all those years ago, never to be returned. He resisted the urge to raise a hand to touch the place where his second eye would have been; it was an old habit and one he was in the process of breaking. The desire to cover it was something born of shame, Pascal had told him once, and he had nothing to be ashamed of. He wished it was as easy to believe it as it was to say it.

“I’m sorry,” he murmured quietly, the light from the fire scorching its afterimage onto the back of his eyelid.

He felt more than saw Pascal still beside him. “For what?” she said eventually, her tone unreadable.

What wasn’t he sorry for? He was all wrong, down to his core; his withering mask was evidence enough of that. Whether or not it was his fault, he couldn’t say — Pascal had certainly turned out fine and the two of them had been forged by the same hand. And it was his birth that had shattered Pascal’s life, sending the only family she had scrambling from his obscene creation. He didn’t know a thing about the closest thing he had to a father other than the look of unadulterated horror that marred the expression of the mask maker as he gazed upon what was supposed to be the face of his old friend.

Not that Lars had known that at the time. No, Pascal had recounted the story over their meagre rations of bread and soup one sticky summer’s night with the creatures of the forest coiled around her legs: an emerald crabbit sniffing at the crumbs she left behind, an ornery kitlike herding its young into the undergrowth whenever one worked up the courage to draw closer to the travellers. She had been especially vibrant on that day, her swampy green tones blending into the undergrowth like she was born from the earth itself. Her eyes, two moondrops set in a delicately carved face, had seemed far away, as if she was reliving the memories she recounted to him.

“For not remembering.” His fists curled at his side, nails digging into his palms.

Pascal’s sigh was as gentle as the light breeze filtering through the paper-thin leaves. “That’s nothing to be sorry for. You didn’t choose any of this,” she said, the corners of her lips pulling up in the slightest of smiles. “And forgetting Frostfall definitely isn’t worth beating yourself up over. It’s just a holiday, after all.”

“What’s a holiday?” The word rolled off his tongue like it was familiar to him, but the meaning was just out of reach.

“It’s like… a celebration! A time when people come together to meet with the people important to them,” she replied, weaving her fingers through the air like she was plucking the strings of some invisible instrument. She was a visual storyteller, Lars had noticed, and the way she swayed to the tune of her words was almost like dancing.

Lars had never seen dancing before.

“What are they celebrating?”

Pascal frowned, just slightly. The light wrinkle of her brow was carved into the window of Lars’ mind — sometimes, he woke up from a night of fitful sleep with the distinct sense memory of touch, as if he had just reached out with his fingertips and rubbed the crease out from between her eyes. The light warmth of her dream-skin only lingered at his fingertips for scarcely a few seconds before the wicked cold nipped it from his bones.

“Well, that depends on the holiday,” she replied eventually. “Candleblight is a celebration of the triumph of light over evil. An ancient hero sacrificed himself to protect Candletown from an onslaught of demons and the citizens of the town have commemorated the event every vernal equinox since.” Her hands wove through the air, tapered fingers interlocking like jawbones snapping shut. Lars flexed his own fingers by his side, resolutely not wondering what it would be like to slip them into the crevices between hers, if only for a moment.

“I don’t understand it,” he said after a slight pause, the barest hint of frustration seeping into his voice. “Why would they celebrate someone’s death? There must have been people who mourned him.”

Pascal’s face lit up. “Right. Right! And that’s part of why they celebrate it. They pay respect to his great sacrifice,” she continued, a soft smile creeping along her lips. “His light is in all of us now.”

Lars wrinkled his nose. “What does that mean? His light magic?”

She laughed lightly like the first birdsong of springtime. “No, I mean his light. Like his soul, or his love for his people.” Then, slowly but not tentatively, she reached out and placed one warm palm against Lars’ chest, mirrored by her other hand pressed to her own. “It’s in here.”

He froze. Could she feel his heartbeat thrumming within his ribcage like a caged bird? Could she feel the way he tensed beneath her touch, a livewire ready to explode? Her fingers were only lightly resting in his fur, but it felt like she was reaching right into his chest and holding everything that he was in the palm of her hand. He held his breath — whether it was out of trepidation or some desire to preserve this fragile little moment, he wasn’t sure, but the brisk autumn air caught in his throat nonetheless. As quickly as it began, it was over, her fingertips tracing a line of fire down his chest as she drew back. Lars tried to suppress the shudder tingling down his spine. He wasn’t sure if he succeeded.

He swallowed heavily. “And what about Frostfall? Which ancient battle does that commemorate?”

“No battle,” she said through peals of laughter. “It’s a lot more… abstract.” She hummed for a moment, fingers running through her hair in an absentminded display of grooming. “Have you felt your frost magic growing stronger recently?” Two round, milky eyes turned on Lars, pinning him to the spot.

Had he? He thought back to his last hunt and how his sawblades had almost leapt at his command like second limbs. He hadn’t noticed the light sheet of ice creeping down from the hilt until after he had dispatched the roaring ice beast, but he’d assumed that it was just from the beast’s magic. He hadn’t even considered the idea that it could have been his own errant magic leaking from the crevices of his soul the same way shadows bled from his mask.

“Maybe,” Lars ventured softly. “It’s hard to say. It’s always been a natural part of me. The boundaries between me and my magic are—” He fumbled for the right word. “Blurred.”

Pascal only nodded earnestly, hair spilling over her shoulders like waterfalls pooling in her clavicles. “It might be too early to tell, but Frostfall is when frost magic is at its most powerful. It’s something to do with the seasons or the planets or the ley lines themselves; everything just falls into place and suddenly, the call of frost magic is louder than ever before. Like a song, or maybe an old friend.” She turned her gaze to the distant darkness between embracing trees, her voice shedding layers until it settled into a misty and dreamy cadence. “At least, that’s what I’ve been told. You’d probably understand it better than I ever could.”

He couldn’t understand anything better than Pascal could. She was so smart in her own quiet way, and she had this deep sense of empathy cultivated in the root of her heart like an old seed that had now blossomed into a beautiful flowering tree. The passion she had for storytelling was rivalled only by the most wizened elders of the tribal communities Lars had sometimes crossed paths with on the ice floes; on the nights when blizzards unleashed stormy fury upon the world, he had found himself taking shelter with them. He remembered curling up in woven blankets and listening to the stories of the tribe across generations: their heroic tales of clashes with the ice beasts and their gentle stories of warming children by the hearth.

He couldn’t say any of that, though, so he just rubbed his hands together and waited.

“Different aspects are strongest at different times of the year. Most have their own celebrations, but none are so widely known as Frostfall. I used to— we used to—” She shook her head slightly. “It’s common to decorate your home with bright lights, share festive delicacies, and,” she inhaled deeply, “exchange gifts.”

Lars may not have been the most socially aware of satyrs, but even he could tell that there was more to this holiday than Pascal wanted to admit. He could fill in the gaps where she sighed and stumbled over her words: Frostfall had been a part of her past, one spent with her beloved mask maker. She probably hadn’t celebrated it in years, alone as she wandered the plains in search of the ghost of her creator’s old friend.

Later, as she curled up beside the fire and snored softly — something that Lars would never admit he found endearing — he tucked his battered and worn cloak over her back and resolved that this year, things would be different. There would be Frostfall for Pascal again.

---

“I still don’t understand what suddenly prompted you to want to visit a market,” Pascal said curiously, their bags strapped to her sides. Lars hated it; it felt like reducing her to nothing more than a pack mule, but Pascal loved to help in any way that she could and she was far too stubborn to convince otherwise.

“Is it so hard to believe that I’ve had a change of heart?” Lars harrumphed. “Maybe I’m a staunch cannibalist now.”

Pascal shook with laughter. “Capitalist, you mean,” she barely forced out through choked gasps. “And I don’t think you are! You used to eat all the stargold you were paid for your kills.”

Lars frowned, feeling a little put upon. “Well, food was hard to come by on the ice flats, and I didn’t realise I could exchange it for other things.” He reached instinctively for the purse tied to his waist, cursing his past foolishness. Perhaps he would have more to spend on a gift for Pascal now if he had thought for a moment why he was being paid in useless sugar to begin with.

She suddenly sobered and though a wide smile remained plastered on her face, it softened with fondness. “It’s okay. You’ve got plenty of stargold that you can spend now.” An impish glint lit up her eyes. “That is, if you don’t eat it all on the way to the market.”

Lars groaned good-naturedly, picking up the pace so she wouldn’t see the way he flushed at her light teasing. A walk turned to a run and soon he was dashing across the settling snowfall, the thundering sound of Pascal’s hoofbeats and her twinkling laughter hot on his heels. He’d never known fun until he met her and it still felt strangely foreign to run simply for the sake of running; now that he wasn’t roughing it on the ice plains of the north, he didn’t need to conserve the energy that he had in order to stay warm on the lonely nights. No, now he could run just to feel the wind streaming through his hair or conjure up snowflakes for the amusement of his giggling travelling companion. He could be more than a hunter.

He was yanked out of his thoughts by the sound of what he quickly realised was music. He’d only ever heard the tribal drumbeats of the north or the winding melodies of Pascal’s lullabies — this was completely different. A chorus of voices rose up in harmony, the lyrics weaving in and out of each other like a tapestry of sound, and the instruments — oh, the instruments! — layered over each other like a warm embrace, surging into crescendo with the voices.

It wasn’t just music, though: the bustling sound of people filled Lars’ ears. Voices, so many voices, and all filled with so much cheer. Was this what a holiday was? A collective sense of happiness blanketing a community, warming you through down to your bones? If it was, Lars couldn’t even begin to understand why anyone would go without it.

And then he saw the lights, and then the stalls. Piece by piece, the market came into view, and his steps slowed to an eventual stop as he paused to take in the sight before him. It was like something out of a painting. He had never seen one, but Pascal had spent countless nights describing the art that the mask maker used to create, from defiant brushstrokes of thick paint to soft watercolours. Looking at the market, he could almost imagine it himself: warm amber tones glowing from the candlelight; sparkling murals crafted by the finest illusion mages that danced for your amusement; homey wooden stalls etched into the canvas, each selling their own special fineries.

“It’s beautiful, isn’t it?”

Lars turned to face Pascal, a small smile stretching across his face. He hadn’t even heard her approach, too lost in the sights of his first Frostfall. “I’ve never seen anything like it.”

“Well, we can spend all day staring at it from the outside, or we could go in and explore,” she said with a cheeky smile.

Suddenly, Lars was bombarded with images of them wandering through the winding market together. They’d listen to the carols together, warm mugs full of spiced wine nestled close to their chests. Pascal would run ahead to try on all the scarves and then the embroidered cloaks, but would ultimately decide that their travels would just ruin anything she’d buy. And then Lars would step up for his moment of glory, winking at the shop owner and declaring that he’d buy it all.

Maybe not that last part. Lars shook his head as if to dispel the fantasy, reminding himself why he was here. It was crucial that whatever he acquired as a gift for Pascal be a surprise, and that unfortunately meant parting ways with his friend for the rest of the day.

“Shall we?” Pascal lifted a hoof from where it lay stamped in the snow, ready to trot the rest of the way towards the market.

Instead of replying, however, Lars chewed on his lip in thought. He didn’t want her to think that he was unwilling to spend time with her, but he had to find some time to peruse the shops’ wares on his own.

Sensing his hesitation, Pascal made the decision for him. “Or if you’re not ready, I can go ahead and we can meet up later. You’ve got everything you need, right?”

She was always so intuitive when it came to these things. It felt like sometimes, he didn’t even have to talk for her to know what he was thinking. Maybe she was thinking of him in the same way he thought of her. In this case, however, he hoped that she hadn’t seen all the way through to his secret plans.

He nodded gratefully, trying not to mourn the loss of her company as she made her way towards the bustling Frostfall market. And then, once enough time had passed that she had disappeared into the crowd, he followed in her footsteps.

If he thought it was pretty from the outside, it was even more so once he became part of the intricate machine that was the market. Each person was a small piece of the larger picture, working together in the tiniest of ways to build something that almost threatened to overwhelm Lars with emotion. In all his years of wandering, he had never felt such community. He watched in awe as browlets ran through the crowd, casting frost spells that ordinarily wouldn’t be possible for such young mages. He reached for his own well of magic experimentally and found it jumping to attention, threatening to burst out from his fingertips in a shimmering cloud of frost.

There was no use getting distracted, though. He made his way to the closest stall, eyeing up a collection of strange objects. One in particular caught his interest; a mysterious box with runes painted all over it. As if noticing an interested customer on pure instinct alone, the browbird running the stall skidded into view.

“That’s a camera,” the seller said matter-of-factly. “The perfect gift for anyone who loves to document their important memories visually.”

Lars tilted his head to one side. He wasn’t sure how a box could hold visual memories, but perhaps it was some magical contraption that drew the pictures from the very mind of the holder. However it worked, it seemed too fragile and finicky for Pascal to carry with her on their travels — besides, he could hardly give her something that he didn’t even understand.

Thanking the owner of the booth for his time, Lars stumbled along to the next stall. This time, it was adorned with the purest of crystals, each imbued with powerful and unique magic. A useful gift, certainly, but then again, Pascal had never struggled with generating her own wells of magic. In fact, now that Lars thought about it, he had never seen her rely on a crystal for anything in the time that they had been travelling together.

A cloak? No, Pascal already had one that she was very attached to. Lars suspected she’d had it since her creation, even. A flask? Pascal had her own beaded canteen that she used to store water from the ravines that they passed on their travels. It hardly seemed necessary to replace it with a new one if it was working perfectly fine. All the clothes were tailored to fit bipedal satyrs, not taurs, and Lars found himself running away from a particularly excited seamstress who was determined to peddle her wares to him. No garments, then.

It seemed impossible to find something perfect for Pascal — and he wouldn’t settle for anything less than perfect. It was what she deserved, especially after years of missed Frostfalls, and yet he found himself struggling to consider even one option. Perhaps he’d go back and buy one of the enchanted woven cloaks; there had been a vibrant blue one that matched Pascal’s patches quite prettily.

Just as he began to give up hope, however, a small stall in the corner of the square caught his eye. It twinkled softly with prismatic light, no doubt conjured by a light mage. As he drew closer, he realised that the wooden tables were draped with colourful cloth and, seated primly on top of that, delicate jewellery of all different kinds. A wispy satyr was leaned against the table sipping an aromatic brew from a bejewelled flask. She seemed to be lost in thought, but the second Lars made the decision to investigate the stall further, glowing yellow eyes snapped to meet his own. Then, as if overcome with glee, a catlike smile stretched across her face, revealing two glittering rows of fangs.

“Are you looking for a gift?” she asked, her voice soft and rumbly like the purr of a big cat. “For family?” Then, her eyes narrowed. “A lover?”

Lars immediately began to splutter, waving his hands around in an approximation of denial. The words seemed to be staunchly refusing to leave his mouth.

“A friend, then,” the shop owner concluded, her catlike grin carving dimples into her striped cheeks. “Shame. I was going to offer you a pair of bracelets that I just finished, but it’s a gift with more… romantic undertones, don’t you think?”

“I’d like to see them,” Lars replied, the picture of nonchalance.

“Perfect.” The satyr took one last swig of her flask before strapping it to her waist and reaching beneath the table. Lars spent the following few seconds of silence examining her wares. They ranged from exorbitantly detailed rings and bangles forged from rare metals down to simple beaded bracelets.

Then, the satyr rose from her crouch, presenting an intricately carved cherrywood box. Lars traced his fingers down the engravings reverently, swallowing a gasp when he pressed some hidden button and it popped open with a light click. Inside, nestled in beds of red velvet, were two bracelets. The first, delicately moulded from silver, featured blue and green beads. Upon closer inspection, Lars realised that the beads were more like marbles; preserved within their depths were the faintly glinting images of plants and flowers. The second, constructed from warm, yellow gold, held ice blue and white beads. Again, the beads held suspended images, but this time they were those of ice and frost.

“Each bracelet is to be worn by a different person. When both are worn, they’ll light up at the wearer’s thought of their other half. Not blindingly, mind you — it’s more of a gentle glow.” The shopkeeper leaned back with a sigh. “I had to outsource the enchantments, but the rest is all handmade by me. You won’t find a gift like this anywhere else.”

“I’ll take them.”

The shopkeeper let out a sharp bark of laughter. “You sure? They’re not the most affordable of my wares.”

Lars didn’t even have to think about it. “Take everything that I have.” He reached for the purse by his waist and emptied its contents on the table, sending stargold scattering across the surface.

The satyr’s eyes widened exponentially, her slit pupils dilating to dark circles. “Ah, it’s not that much,” she said, though she looked to be almost drooling at the sight of money. “I’ll just take what it costs, you can keep the rest.”

Staring at the two bracelets nestled in their velvet cushion, he reached over and gently closed the box, stroking over the wood gently. The deal was done, but it still didn’t feel quite real yet. Once Frostfall truly arrived, Lars would press this box into Pascal’s hand — or maybe he’d slide her bracelet onto her wrist, taking care to brush her arm with his hand. Or, most likely, he’d be too shy to give it to her at all and would instead leave it by her sleeping form for her to wake up to.

No, that would be a waste. He needed to give her the full experience, after all. And later, as he watched her dancing in the square, her shoulders shaking from jubilant laughter, he found himself for the first time in his life, wanting.