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Most of those who were acquainted with Roderich would not think him at all inclined to physicality, let alone athleticism. And for the most part, they wouldn’t be too far off; he disliked being uncomfortable, and just the idea of running back and forth under the hot sun or risking life and limb scaling the Alps was enough to keep him satisfied with his music and books and desserts. But those who knew Roderich saw him come alive at the first sight of snowfall and ice, when he would get to unpack his skis and join the other Viennese on powdery slopes, his cheeks rosy and ice-stung.
As a child, he would lie in the field outside his home and watch kestrels swoop and glide above him, and he wondered what it might feel like to have the wind whip around his face and body as everything fell further and further away, and now, he felt the crisp air rush past as he sped down sparkling hillsides, the alpine trees blending together and blurring into smudged of whites and greens and greys, silver puffs escaping his lips as he breathed hard, hot from exertion, blood pounding through his veins, and he savoured the crisp scrape of blade against ice, the spray of icy crystals as he’d make a turn or jump; the weightlessness of those moments bringing him back those fields from lifetimes ago.