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Lucy Frostblade had been born during a snowstorm.
It was fitting, wasn’t it, for her to be born in snow? Her parents said that it meant she would be powerful. Lucy thought that it meant she would be cold her whole life. Her grandmother thought that being born to a dark sky, shrouded in dark, heavy clouds, was a bad omen. Lucy was not one of those people. Maybe she should have been one of those people, if she had known what lay ahead of her. But she did not know. No one knew. They knew that Lucy had a soft heart. They knew that Lucy was connected to Ruvina more than most. They knew that the snow called to her, the cold called to her, the light called to her. But they did not know her fate. They did not know what lay ahead of her. No one knew what lay ahead of her. Not even herself. Lucy Frostblade didn’t know what was coming. Lucy Frostblade did not knpw0
Lucy Frostblade had been doomed from the beginning.
It would have been a very different life, if Lucy had known that she had been doomed. Or maybe she would have changed nothing at all. She did not know what she would have done, if she had known what was to come. Because she had not known. She did not know what was to come. No. Lucy had been completely obvious to it. She hadn’t seen the sword, dangling above her head, held only by the weakest of strings. She hadn’t seen the scissors, next to her thread, ready to cut. She hadn’t seen any of the signs, the omens, the portents- Lucy Frostblade had been oblivious to it all. She had thought that she was normal. She had thought that she was just going to live a normal life. She thought that she would get to live a life at all. She just didn’t know.
Lucy Frostblade had been doomed from the beginning.
That first day of school at Aguefort’s Adventuring Academy, she had walked through the doors full of hope. Hopeful. Hopeful to learn to serve her goddess better. Hopeful to find an adventuring party that suited her. Hopeful to make new friends, learn new things, and become the best Lucy that she could possibly be. And when she found the High 5 Heroes, she hoped that that would be true. It had seemed that it would be true. They had- they had gotten along well, was the thing. Maybe they weren’t the most perfect of adventuring parties, a bit rag tag, a bit awkward, not anyone’s first choice- But they had gotten along well. They had worked well together. They hung out between classes, they ate lunch together. Everything had been- it seemed like it would be good, was the thing. It was good.
Lucy Frostblade had been doomed from the beginning.
Or maybe Lucy had just been naive to the fact that she was doomed. Not just oblivious, but naive. She had seen the signs. Seen that her adventuring party was falling down a slippery slope- Kipperlily growing obsessive, all of them growing angry, the adults around them, doing- doing things that Lucy knew that adults shouldn’t have been doing, even under the guise of mentorship. She knew that killing rats, again and again, behind the school wasn’t how they were meant to be learning. They were- they were meant to fighting threats as a group, training in class, doing homework assignments- Not, not what they were doing. Lucy knew that, deep down, even if she didn’t want to see it. She wasn’t oblivious. She knew that something was wrong, even if all she could bring herself to do about it was heal some rats.
Lucy Frostblade had been doomed from the beginning.
She had to do something, didn’t she? She had to do something. This wasn’t okay. It- it wasn’t okay. Lucy knew that it wasn’t okay. The- No. It wasn’t okay. This whole thing wasn’t okay. And maybe Lucy was in over her head, this was more than killing rats, but Lucy needed to do something. She needed to do something more than just healing rats. It- It wasn’t okay, was the thing, and it was all moving so fast. Too fast. They were only in their sophomore year, okay? They were still young. And they were still so- so naive. So oblivious. And things were just moving too fast, too dangerous, too- too much. It was all too much. But Lucy had to say something. She had to do something. She had to. Lucy didn’t know everything, didn’t know that she was doomed, didn’t know what her adventuring party would come to, didn’t know the whole picture- but she knew one thing. She knew- she knew one thing, at the very least. She knew that she had to do something. She had to.
Lucy Frostblade had been doomed from the beginning.
She saw that now. Now, standing at Lake Shimmerstone- she saw it. She saw that she was doomed. Doomed to her friends, killing her, all at once. Doomed to her friends, succumbing to their rage, the rage that Lucy herself just couldn’t hold. She saw the way that her friends weren’t really her friends, anymore. They were different. Changed. Wouldn’t listen to reason. Wouldn’t listen to compassion. Wouldn’t listen to her. All they would listen to was the rage, that was yelling at them. The rage that was poisoning them. The rage that was hurting them- all of them. The rage that was dooming Lucy. She should have seen it sooner. Why hadn’t she seen it sooner? She had seen- she had seen something, though. She had seen something, and she had tried to do something. And now, Lucy knew, as she stood at that lake. Now she was doomed. She had always been doomed.
Lucy Frostblade had been doomed to die.
She hadn’t thought she would die at a lake. She hadn’t thought she would die by the hands of her friends. She hadn’t thought she would be attacked by all of them, all at once, a surprise party of the worst kind. She hadn’t thought she would die so young. Quite frankly, Lucy hadn’t thought much about her death at all. It would have been peaceful, though. Of old age. Somewhere in the mountains, somewhere cold, somewhere close to her goddess. Not by a lake, by an old tree, surrounded by people that were supposed to protect her, failing to. Not just failing to protect her but- but being the people to kill her. Lucy hadn’t imagined that. How was she supposed to have imagined that? But maybe- maybe she should have. Maybe she shouldn’t have been so naive. Maybe she should have been protecting herself, and not just the rats. Maybe, maybe, maybe.
Lucy Frostblade had been doomed to die.
And she was dead. Lucy knew that. She was dead. Dead, and unable to come back. Dead, and somewhere where she wasn’t meant to be. Dead, and reliving the memory of dying, again and again. It was as if time had looped itself. It was as if it was all a nightmare. It was as if- Lucy didn’t quite know what it was as if, really. But she knew that she was dead. And she knew that she was dying, again and again and again. Killed by her friends. Killed by friends so close she had almost considered them family. Killed by people that she had trusted, and cared about, and loved. She had loved them. She still loved them. Even when they killed her, she had loved them. Even as she stood there, dead- not really standing at all, because she had no body, because she was dead- watching them kill her, over and over and over again, she still loved them. Lucy still loved them. Even after everything, even after it all, even after what they had done to them- Lucy still loved her heroes.
Lucy Frostblade had been doomed to die.
How could she not love them? The High 5 Heroes had been Lucy’s friends. The only friends she had ever really had, once she had gotten old enough that ‘playing in the same snowbank’ hadn’t been enough to be friends, anymore. Maybe they weren’t the best friends, all of the time- they talked over her, they ignored her when she said she didn’t want to kill rats. But they were her friends. They pushed too far, got caught up in something they shouldn’t have, fell into their anger. But they were her friends. They hurt her. But they were her friends. They had killed her, all of them, together, not by some accident, they killed her. But they were her friends. And Lucy still loved them. She couldn’t help but love them. It was impossible for her not to love them.
Lucy Frostblade had been doomed to die.
How could she love them? They had killed her. And now, stuck- wherever she was, she watched them kill her, again and again and again, powerless to do anything differently. She couldn’t fight back. She just watched them attack her. Overpower her. Kill her. And then do it all again. And again. And again. They hadn’t even bothered to let her get to the afterlife she knew was waiting for her, the afterlife Ruvina promised all of her followers. Lucy knew, deep down, that they had done- done something to her, to prevent her from rising to her afterlife, high in the mountains. Instead, she was trapped, watching- feeling, experiencing- her own death, over and over again. Prevented from going to her afterlife by her friends. Prevented from living her life by her friends. Attacked and killed and buried cruelly by her friends. And yet- she couldn’t help but love them still. She couldn’t help but ache for them still. Just like she ached for the rats.
Lucy Frostblade had been doomed to die.
The rats had been doomed to die, too. The rats and the spiders and everything else that had committed the crime of living near the school. Doomed to be killed, slaughtered, when all they wanted to do was exist. They just wanted to be rats. Run around, steal food, sit in alleys. Why couldn’t her friends have just let them be? Lucy didn’t know. She still didn’t know. But she had tried to save them- healed them, whenever she could. As often as she could. She healed them, again and again. Lucy hadn’t saved all of them, though. She had never been able to save all of them. But- she had tried to save as many of the rats as she could. She had tried her best. It all seemed so futile, now. After all, who would save the rats, now that she was dead? Who would save the High 5 Heroes, now that she was dead? Who would save her? Lucy didn’t think anyone would save her. She was doomed. She had always been doomed.
Lucy Frostblade was not doomed anymore.
It had felt like a tug, at first. A soft tug, like her little sister pulling at the sleeve of her sweater, excited to show her something. And then a little bit firmer of a tug- sharper. Like Kipperlily, dragging her excitedly to the library to show her something. Not that Kipperlily would ever show her anything again. Anything except pain. She was still watching herself die. Again and again and again. She was still feeling herself die. And yet- she also felt the tugs. Again and again and again, she felt the tugs. Tugs on her sweater. Tugs on her hair. Tugs on her hand. It caught her attention. It changed her focus from her death, happening again and again, to something else. It was nice to have something to focus on other than her own death. It was nice to have the tugs, to remind her that she was not dying- she was already dead. She was already dead, and she was being tugged by something- by someone. Someone familiar. Was it Ruvina? Could it really be Ruvina? Was Lucy Frostblade finally coming home?
Lucy Frostblade was not doomed anymore.
There was a bright light. A bright, soft, light. Soft and white, like the sun bouncing off the snow. Dangerous, if you looked too long, snowblindness was a thing afterall, but soft all the same. Familiar. The tugs had come first. And then finally, after endless tug and tug and tug- There was the light. The light. The light drowned out all of the pain. The light drowned out all of the darkness. The light drowned out all the memories. The light- the light was what Lucy had always thought- had always hoped for- when she died. She thought that Ruvina’s light would come for her, and she would be greeted by the warmth and the brightness and carried off to the afterlife. The light was what Lucy thought would never come, once she had been killed by her friends. She felt it. The darkness. The way that she had been cut off from life, both present and the afterlife. It had chained her there, locked her there, watching herself be killed again and again and again- And then the light had finally been let in, and it carried her away from the dark.
Lucy Frostblade was not doomed anymore.
She was in a cabin. A cabin in the mountains. There was a fire roaring, and a blanket draped over her shoulders. The snow was visible through the windows, floating down in picture perfect flurries. There was no lake, no High Five Heroes, no rage, in sight. For the first time in- well, time didn’t quite exist, when you were dead, but for the first time in a long time- Lucy felt alive. She was not alive, of course. She knew that. She was still dead. But she felt alive. Or, no, that wasn’t quite right, either. Lucy felt life. She felt it all around her. At the lake, being killed over and over and over again, she hadn’t felt any life at all. She had just felt death. Anger. Darkness. Surrounding her, swirling over her, trying to get in. She hadn’t let it in. But now, all of it was gone. Now all that was left was life. Life, and light, and sorrow- But sorrow was a part of life, wasn’t it? Like the rain cycle. The earth needed the water to evaporate, in order for it to rain again. Life needed sorrow, in order to bring joy. It needed anger, too, of course, but not just anger. Just anger was a drought. A drought that poisoned and twisted and hurt. But Lucy was not surrounded by anger anymore.
Lucy Frostblade was not doomed anymore.
Instead, she was drinking hot cocoa that she could not taste, in a cabin that she thinks she might have dreamed of, once. The snow was falling heavier, now. The blanket fuzzy across her shoulders. It was hard to keep track of time, when you were dead. Lucy did not know if she even needed to keep track of time. But- she wanted to. She wanted to know what was happening, outside of the cabin. Outside of the light. Wanted to know why the darkness had suddenly parted, how she had ended up in the cabin. Wanted to know what the tugs had been. Wanted to know what was happening in the living world. Wanted to know what how her friends were doing. Wanted to know if they mourned her- if they missed her- if they were okay, after what they had done. Wanted to know if they were still killing the rats. Wanted to know if the rats she had saved were okay. She wanted to know. She wanted- she wanted- she wanted-
Lucy Frostblade was not doomed anymore.
That much was true. Lucy Frostblade was not doomed. She was not doomed. But- were the rats still doomed? Were her friends still doomed? Who else was doomed, because of what they were doing? Was the school doomed? Lucy wanted to know. Did she want to know? It was easy, to sit in the cabin, with her hot chocolate and her blanket and her roaring fire and the snowfall out the window and the light surrounding her. It was easy, to let time wash over her, and ignore what was happening in the land of the living. It was easy, to ignore what her friends were. It had been hard, to heal the rats. It had been hard, to listen to her compassion and try to do what was right. It was hard, to look right in the face of the terrible things her friends had been doing. It had been hard, but Lucy had done it. And, despite the light, despite the fire, despite the snow- Lucy wanted to be able to do it again. She wanted to save the rats, her friends, anyone, again.
Lucy Frostblade was not doomed to die. In fact, she was not even dead.
It was a strange thing, to wake up gasping, when a second ago you did not need to breathe. She thought, for a second, she had been dreaming. But no. She hadn’t been dreaming. It had happened. It had all happened. The rats. The lake. The betrayal. The darkness. The light. The cabin. It had all happened. Lucy had died. Lucy had come back. Lucy had been doomed. Lucy was not doomed anymore. Lucy had been betrayed. Betrayed by the very people that she had been convinced would protect her. Lucy had been saved. Saved by the very people that her friends were convinced would end up hurting them all. It was a strange thing, wasn’t it- To be killed by your friends, and saved by your enemies? But that was not the strangest thing. No, Lucy thought.
The strangest thing was that Lucy Frostblade was alive, once again.