Forever free

chapter 1

A tear for every drop of rain,

A thousand tears for you.



Three years to the day, and still my heart is fractured into a million pieces. You don't know how many times I have stood on the summit, hoping the wind will blow my sorrows away. Stood there and wondered what it would be like to fall, to jump into the abyss, to watch my life flash before me eyes, to watch the carrion crows mourn over me with sightless eyes.



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To finally be washed clean, blown into the rosy sunset to be with you. But death is uncertain, the wisest man ever to walk upon this lonely earth would never know what death truly is until he experienced it. If I fall, will I be brought back to you? Or will I be torn from the last thread that connects us.



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Death is uncertain, and I am a coward, therefore I still burden the Earth with my pathetic existence. My name is Talivana, it means happiness in the old language. How ironic that my life should be so wrought with sorrow when my name is so full of light.



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I am 28 years old, I have blond hear and chipped blue eyes. Three years ago I watched you die, watched you cough up your bright red lifeblood onto the unblemished snow. Watched you try to say my name, with your last breath. Held you to my breaking heart, kissed your cold lips. This who world could not contain the sorrow I felt that day.



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Even the universe trembled as I screamed your name into the darkness, and even the Northern lights danced a sad dirge for you. I took solace in our baby girl, Reina, then she took sick. Coughing, feverish, and scared she died in my arms. I didn't even cry, I think all my tears were dried up by then I buried her under a full moon.



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Everyone I have cared for has died, first Mother, then Father, my Sister, my beloved Brother, then you. Then the only thing I had left, Reina. I think I'm dead too, I'm not sure anymore. I pricked myself with a pin yesterday, it drew blood, but that might have just been my love for you shining like a bright red rose.

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I bring you sharp pieces of ice everyday, no flowers, for there are none in the cold everlasting winters of Finland. I sit by your grave and stare vacantly across the snowy landscape. "I love you." I whisper numbly through frozen lips. I bring ice to everyone, then I go home.

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I sit in the old rocking chair and watch the fire crackle and snap. Red and yellow fingers reaching up, groping for something that can never be found. I fall asleep, and the same images that haunt me every night return again.



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A wolf turning back to look at me, standing on a barren landscape of ice. The moonlight reflecting in it's eyes. It raises it's head and gives a long, mournful howl that sends shivers down my backbone. Then it turns and runs, toward me, faster and faster. It's about to run straight into me when I wake, gasping.

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The door is wide open, but I distinctively remember shutting it. Pale moonlight and...something else streams through the doorway. I stand and go to shut it, then I see her. A tall woman stands there, she beckons to me.

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Whether I want to or not my legs move of their own accord, and I find myself standing near her. She touches me on my forehead with one cool finger. She smiles softly, her smile is terrifying.

"Stop living a half life, you loved ones would not wish that for you." Her voice is like the wind, changing, gentle, fast, loud, quiet, a million shades of silver caressing me.

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"I know." My voice sounds cracked and hoarse.

"I just want to see them again, more then anything in the world, and I want to be...free. Free of this life, free of myself, free of everything."

She tilts her head, considering me I think.

"I can grant your wish to be free, and perhaps you will see them again one day. But there is much to be done, and your time is not over yet. Now is the time to live, now is the time to rejoice."

I stare at her desperately, can she make me free? Free from the despair? Free from the loneliness?

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She shakes her head, almost as if she heard my thoughts.

"Talivana, I cannot rid you of despair, nor of your loneliness, for your loneliness comes from within yourself. That is something you must achieve yourself." She says gently. "But I think that it is time you moved on." She gestures to my broken down hut.

"Take my hand." She whispers.

Our hands meet and there is a blinding flash of light. When I open my eyes again she is still there, but everything looks strange. "Stand up."

I try and stand, but my legs are wobbly. "You will get used to it." She says, patting me on the head.

I manage to stand, "Now run, and be free." She says, she points to the landscape that is now awash in the first light of dawn.

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I am ready. I incline my head to her, and I turn, and I run. I run, and I run, but my limbs are not sore, and my heart is not weary. I let loose a howl of triumph that echoes across the ice. Then I run toward a rosy sunrise, finally free.

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And in the distance they wait, shining fur and yellow eyes. The welcome me, and together we run, voices raised in unison.

~Finally free.~