very awesome rainpelt! ♥
Sakura --- Boreas
My petals fell like rain, as though I was crying, for in truth I would if I could. He is lost from me now, now when I am finally beautiful, he is gone. Two lovers walk below me dancing and laughing amongst my flowing petals and I laugh in spite of my own pain, wishing I could be like them. A cold wind rushs past and for a moment I feel him close once more.
~~~
It started in the late fall when it was my time to sleep. All the other trees had shed their leaves and settled down to sleep for one more winter. Being a rather large tree I had known of winter for many years but thought nothing of it...of him. This year was different though. The weather had been odd and I was restless, unable to sleep as the others did. As I watched the sun set and the street lamps come on a single white flake drifted down from the sky to land on my branch. Something I had not been awake for in my life, a single flake. Like a gift from the gods it had drifted down so gently it could have been a fallen feather.
"how beautiful you are" I said. "almost like my sweet cherry blossoms."
To my surprise it answered back to me.
"what is a cherry blossom?" a gentle voice said. The voice was not young but not old and it held an innocence that warmed my heart instantly.
"A cherry blossom is what I make. It is a flower of great beauty."
"Oh." said the small snow flake some how refusing to melt away. "Am I really as beautiful as that?"
As the words were said a cold wind whipped through my branches and suddenly many snow flakes fell all around me like I make my petals fall and whirl in the spring.
"Oh yes." I said in awe. "Yes, you are."
"Good, I wish to be beautiful for you. You are the only one to speak to me in this place. I am always very alone in the winter, no one really speaks to me here."
"Where do you go in the spring?" I said.
"In the spring I leave this earth and wait for the coming of my time once again. I am never alone then. There's always plenty to do to prepare for winter but once winter comes I am to do no more than tell the snow to fall or the winds to blow.
"You are not the snow?" I said in such innocence he laughed. A laugh so sweet and pure I had to laugh at his joy.
"No my dear tree, I am the spirit of winter. The flakes you see around you are no more then my embodyment, but tell me dear tree do you have a name with which I may remember you by?"
"My name is Sakura but what is your name?"
"My name is Boreas." As he spoke the words the winds suddenly whipped around me as though he was embracing me. "Will you be my friend Sakura?" his gentle voice seeming almost vulnerable.
"I would very much like that." I said gently "I will do my best to stay awake with you for as long as you're here Boreas." I meant every word never knowing the pain it would cause us both.
~~~
Weeks went by of the winter chill and I saw things I had never seen before, children making men of the snow, sometimes even throwing snow at one another. Through it all I stayed awake with him, loving every minute of this new white world I was being surrounded by. At times it was hard for me, I was not used to the cold like this, the burning cold. Once, a snow storm hit the town and one of my branches fell off and as I screamed in silent pain to the world around me the wind died and the snow suddenly stopped falling I could feel his gentle presence holding me.
"Are you alright?!" His voice was pained and frightened. "Oh my Sakura, what have I done to you?"
"I'll be fine Boreas don't fret so." I said with a pained laugh. "I'm a tree and this is certainly not my first lost branch."
My words seemed to put him at some ease and a mild wind wrapped about me in embrace. From then on there were no storms, none like that one anyway, only gentle snow falls or blustery days. We talked for hours in a day, laughter and joy in our words, as long as we could share our world together all was right, the world was right. I knew I was falling in love with him and I believed that he deserved more in his life than what he had, he was a beautiful soul destined to be alone but I could never believe that. Every night I'd wish upon the stars that I would be able to stay with him, that he would love me as I loved him.
~~~
"My bare branches must be so unappealing to you." I said, with an apparent pout to my voice.
"I don't know what you mean, I have only ever known you this way"
"But my branches are so rough and bare, I wish to be beautiful for you." My voice almost pleading and willing my flowers to bloom in the mid of winter.
"I simply don't understand' He paused for a moment a few gentle snowflakes falling around us "you are beautiful and I love you. I don't want or need you to be anything other than you are."
At a loss for words all I mumble out was a "thank you" even though my mind was screaming "I love you" at the top of my lungs. The days from then on were far too short and yet even more perfect now that we both knew we were in love. Several days later one morning I woke up to find myself covered in ice glowing in the light of the rising sun.
"Oh my word!" I said in complete awe.
"You said you wanted to be more beautiful, my love, this is the best I can do for you." He said with a slight laugh. "I still don't see how you could be more beautiful than you are though."
"Oh Boreas I love it! I'd dance if I only could." We laughed at this knowing a tree couldn't really dance.
"Well if you did I'd have to dance with you!" A sudden wind whipped through the icicles making them hum as he laughed his sweet musical laugh I had come to love so much.
Rather suddenly we realised there were people below us, two men. They were all bundled up in their coats and boots complaining about having to shovel the driveways in the morning and how Old Man Jenkin's pipes burst from the cold last week.
"Well atleast it's almost over, right?" one of the men asked the other and they both walked off laughing.
"Do they really mean it?" I asked with a sadness and a shiver in my voice.
"I'm afraid they do my lovely Sakura, I soon must leave this place so that I may work on creating winter next year."
We were silent for a long time. I felt like crying, screaming, and begging all at once but I knew it would do no good. He was needed to keep balance of the seasons of the whole world and I was just a tree. Our love was never meant to be forever and yet....and yet somehow I didn't believe that. How could it not be? Love like ours didn't happen between such odd pairings. We were unique, special and yet somehow not worthy of forever like so many normal human pairings? I could not believe an end to our love no matter how many times I told myself to let it go.
"I'll come back to you next year, I promise. Even if you're asleep I'll stay with you untill I must leave once more."
"Oh Boreas please don't go I don't want to live without you!" I blurted out. "I could never be like I used to be, not after all of this. I'll never be just a tree like them because I'll always be in love with you" I could feel a heat inside me as the ache of losing him welled inside of me.
"My sweet Sakura, I would throw all responsibility to the wind and give up all that I have ever been to stay here with you forever but my leaving is not of my choice. When the time comes I'll simply be wrenched from this plane and brought back home to begin again the work of this next winter." The sadness in his voice was overwhelming, his soft, almost whisper of a voice.
From then on we clung to eachother as though our lives depended on it. It would snow almost daily for that was his only way to cry. We always knew this time would come yet somehow knowing it was near created a sadness that hung over every word and thought we had even dampening our laughter which in that time was few and far between.
"I love you Sakura" his voice sounded faint and warped.
"Boreas what's wrong?" I said with a mild panic. Deep inside I knew what was happening but I didn't want it to be the truth.
"Never forget that I love you. I'll come back to you." His voice faded away into nothingness and suddenly the air was still. No wind whipped around my trunk, no snow fell from the heavens, all was nothing but silence.
"No...NO!" I screamed and cried. "Don't do this to me please! How can you do this to me, to us. HOW?!?"
~~~
In some ways I died that day. I don't speak to the other trees anymore, I have nothing to say to them. All they talk about is how their leaves look and whether or not it will rain. I mourned for a long time, I was the last to bloom when I finally decided I'd bloom for him, in hopes that he would see my beauty, the way I had always wanted him to. All the snow was gone and it had been weeks since then, it was nearing summer time and storm clouds were nearing the town. A low rumble could be heard from the clouds and the children in the park I was in started getting their things to go home to avoid the storm. The other trees around me started going to sleep to avoid the harshness of the storm.
"how weak." I thought. After spending all winter awake I stood in front of the ever nearing clouds with a newfound fearlessness and as they grew closer I saw the form of the clouds shape into an animal with glowing eyes and thundering paws. Static electricy flowed through his black mane and as he shook it, lightening sparked out.
He seemed to be targeting me, staring at me intently, his paws pounding ever closer. He let out a rumbling roar that seemed to echo out over the town and suddenly with a shake of his mane and a whip of his tail a giant lightening bolt shot down at me setting me ablaze. I could feel it spliting me in two, the water inside my trunk boiling off into the air. I looked up at this creature expecting a hateful laugh or a sadness but a small gentle smile was on his face.
"The pain will not be forever child and once it's all over you will have happiness in ways you never have before." his voice thundered and echoed through me.
Once he was sure that no water would save me he turned and pounded away allowing the rain to fall. The pain was searing and I was aware of my earhbound shell dying around me. The noise had awoken some of the trees around me, some were screaming others just glad they werent close enough to catch fire from me. I couldn't blame them I would never wish this pain on any of them. In reality it was only the shock that hurt as I had never stopped being in pain and as I heard my limbs fall around me I thought only of my Boreas, my love, who I would gladly die for, even if it only meant I was no longer alive to haunt his heart.
Eventually I became blind, deaf, and numb and everything went black for I don't know how long untill I found myself in a white hall with small white flowered trees growing out of the floor. I wandered around for a bit, realising I could move, when out of the corner of my eye a flash of pink caught my attention. I turned to see a pretty pink winged wolf creature looking back at me.
As I walked closer I realised the creature was mimicing my movements and after some careful examination I decided I was looking at my own self now free of my tree trunk.
"But what is going on?" I said, thinking myself alone.
"You have joined us in the land beyond." A womans voice echoed down the hall.
I looked down the hall to see a creature similar to me floating down to the floor and gently walking towards me. She was beautiful with gentle colors on a white pelt and a small golden halo suspended above her lightly shaded head. Her wings spread out around her in a feathered glory I had never seen before. I glanced back at the mirror for only a moment to find that my wings were very unlike hers and much more like the butterflys that would flutter around my cherry blossoms back when I was a tree, back in my old life.
"Are you an angel?" I asked having seen a parade of what the humans thought angels would appear to be.
"Oh goodness no!" She laughed a musical trill. "I am Hope."
"Why am I here, Hope?"
She gave a wise and gentle smile and turning to walk away she said "because this is where you belong."
With that she faded away and I was once again alone in the seemingly endless white hallways of trees and the occasional mirror. I walked for the longest time having nothing better to do. I used this time to explore my new body as I had never before had the ability to move. I walked and ran and I even tried to use my new wings but that seemed like it would be a challenge for another day. I heard a familiar pounding of paws and suddenly I was filled with fear knowing what was approaching me and yet, giving it a moment of thought, I suddenly had no fear but more a demanding question to deliver to this creature who had changed my whole world.
"Just what is going on here?" I turned suddenly with a stern look on my face.
My jaw dropped in awe as I turned to see two men looking at me, one being the lion that brought my demise and the other being...
"My lady, you look beautiful." He said with a wide grin and a laugh.
Before me stood a blue winged creature very similar to myself in varying shades of blue with shadowed snowflakes across his pelt. His dark lined wings had the lightest shading of blue upon them and my heart skipped a beat as he fluttered them. Regardless of his words I instantly knew who it was as I could feel his presence and I collapsed into him with my body shaking uncontrolably with my sobs of joy.
"Hush now my love, everything will be right in our world now." He said gently wrapping his arms around me.
"ahem." The sound of a clearing throat was heard and I looked at the lion who controlled thunder and lightening.
"Please forgive me, Miss Sakura. It was the only way we could bring you here to stay with us." He said with a pouting sadness.
"I could never be angry with the one who gave me back my love." I said and I threw myself at the vastly larger than myself lion in a giant hug. "Thank you." I whispered quietly in his ear.
"Now you are one of us." Boreas said cheerily. "You know me as the spirit of winter and this here is the spirit of storms, Set."
"It's a pleasure to meet you miss." Set gave a sheepish grin and sat with a thunderous thud.
"But what am I in all of this? How can I be here without a purpose?"
"You do have a purpose dear child." Hopes voice came from behind us and she appeared once again. "In the hearts of all should be a love for every season but the love for winter can be very lacking and this is what you have become. A love for winter what makes joy arise in the hearts of all when they witness the falling of a snowflake, smell the burning of wood in the crisp cold air. You have become the feeling of joy and happiness in winter, Winters Love." with that she disapeared quite like before.
"So it's all over?" I cuddled into Boreas once again.
"Our story has only begun my dearest love."
~~~
the end :3 theres probably errors n stuff but im tired XD ive been working on this all day and its 830 pm for me o.O
by Fluffmuffler » Wed Dec 29, 2010 11:20 am 
