Her mouth was a hollow cavern, a dark space pinned between two wrinkled, worm-like lips that seemed to move in a perpetual, wet dance. Every time she spoke, the lips met with a soft smack, birthing a glob of spit that, by the grace of the Five, usually hissed into the embers rather than onto his boots.

Her hair was as white as mountain snow and looked as dead as his father’s eyes were.

She held out a gnarled, trembling hand, the palm up-turned in the universal gesture of the hollow-bellied.

"I have some salted meat," Vilon muttered, reaching for the small, grease-stained pouch at his belt.

The woman cackled, a dry, rattling sound. She used two skeletal fingers to pull back her lips. "Wasted on me, I fear. Have but three teeth left to my name, see?"

Vilon looked, and promptly wished he hadn’t. The dark gaps in her gums looked like a row of neglected headstones.

"Nothing else for a poor woman who doesn’t remember the last time she tasted the world?" she wheezed.

Vilon’s hand went instinctively to a small bundle wrapped in a scrap of linen. Figs. There were four of them, the first of the season, a rare bit of luck he’d stumbled upon at a roadside stall.

He probably used all of his luck for that tree....

He had meant for them to be his breakfast, a small sweetness to chase away the bitterness of the road. He wanted them. He wanted the burst of sweetness on his tongue.

But one look at the bandaged eyes of the old crone rattled his resolve. His father always said it was the armor and the horse that separated a knight from the stinking peasants, but shouldn’t a knight protect the weak?His father never maintained those oaths.And neither had he even spoke them.

But knights weren’t supposed to protect the weak and the innocent maidens.

Provided of course this maiden was neither fair nor particularly maidenly, she was undeniably weak.Innocent?Perhaps.

"I have figs," he said, his voice trailing off. Regretting as soon as they came out.But they had gone. "If you could stomach them?"

He offered the fruits on his open palm. She snatched them with a speed that startled him; for a blind woman, her aim was unerring. Hunger must have given her eyes, he mused, watching his sweet breakfast disappear into her tattered shawl. He resigned himself then to the thought of chewing on the leathery, salt-choked meat at dawn.

He regretted his kindness almost immediately. He was truly dumb.

"Perhaps I may yet be proven wrong about you," she muttered, her voice softening as she worked a fig against her lone teeth.

"You’d do well to relish them," Vilon grumbled, huddling closer to the heat. "T’was my only breakfast."

"Perhaps that is why they are so sweet, Not-a-Ser." She gave him a smile that was mercifully devoid of anything white or solid.

He ignored the jab and turned his attention to the fire.That was what he got for showing kindness, being taken a fool of.

Beside them the flames were guttering, losing their fight against the damp air. He poked at the glowing charcoal with his last sturdy stick, watching the sparks fly up and vanish. Soon, he would have to throw the stick itself in to keep the chill at bay for some minutes.

"The fire is dying," he sighed.

"I thought you were blind," she cackled. "Was that a lie to mooch my fruit?"

"Do not be sour, Not-a-Ser. Fire is what gives warmth and light; without it, all men are blind in the night. But I am just an old woman, so all I can feel is the warmth. And I feel it perishing."

A sudden, unnatural chill crept over Vilon’s skin, unrelated to the wind.Why was she so eerie?

"Still, I may have a remedy for that," she said. She reached into a fold of her rags and pulled out a clutch of small, vibrant orange flowers.

"What are those?" Vilon asked, his brow furrowing.

"For the fire, Not-a-Ser." She tossed the blossoms into the dying embers.

As if fed by the breath of a dragon, the fire roared upward. Great streaks of brilliant orange light tore through the darkness, casting long shadows against the trunk of the oak. The heat intensified instantly, turning the damp hollow into a pocket of summer.

He could not have made that fire with twenty trees...

"What... what were those?" Vilon asked, his eyes wide with the raw curiosity of a child.

"A gift. For the food, if you like. Do not ask more, Not-a-Ser. Unless you are willing to offer something else, still, you will find me rich in wonders if you do."

Vilon felt a surge of boldness. "I offered you fire first. You still owe me for that."

The comment pricked her. "The fire is not yours," she snapped angry. "It has never belonged to anyone. It belongs more to the wood you burnt than the hands that threw it. Do not claim the elements, boy."

"Fine," Vilon said, thinking of his dwindling resources. "I could share some bronzii if you showed me something... something nice."

"And what would a blind woman do with copper? You’d think we invite pity with our plague, yet for every hand lent in help, five more are poised in treachery. I know better than all how dark their souls is.

I would be swindled before I reached the next village."

Vilon thought of his father’s old rug, now long gone. "Well then. I could offer you my cloak for the night. To keep the damp out of your bones."

"And what gift would I give for a treasure I can only own until sunrise?"

Vilon snorted. "You are a pedantic old crow, aren’t you? I suppose that’s fair."

He unbuckled his heavy, dirt-stained cloak and draped it over her thin shoulders. She pulled it tight, and Vilon watched with a start as the night itself seemed to retreat from her. The shadows didn’t just move; they seemed to shy away from the fabric where it touched her skin.

"And my gift?" Vilon asked, hugging his knees to his chest to stay warm.

"My gift," she whispered, "is the touch and the few words of an old woman who has seen the end of more roads than you have walked."

Vilon let out a long, frustrated breath. "You’ve swindled me. A cloak and my breakfast for a handful of flowers and a bit of talk?"

"Would you like it back, then?" she asked, her sightless head tilting toward him. "I can leave it here and walk out into the cold night. I can leave you to your lonely fire."

Vilon stared at her for a long time. He thought of his father’s face, the way the old man would have laughed at him for being such a mark. He sighed, a heavy sound that carried the weight of his seven remaining bronze coins.

"Keep it," he muttered. "My father always said I was dumb. I suppose I’m just proving him right."

The old woman let out a soft, melodic hum that vibrated in the air. "Perhaps," she said, her voice sounding younger, smoother for a fleeting second. "Or perhaps you may yet prove me wrong."

She rose from the mud with an ease that belied her withered frame, stepping toward him as if the darkness were a map she had memorized. Her hands found his face with an unerring precision, and Vilon froze.

Her touch was cold, colder than the autumn rain, colder than the skin of his father’s hand when he had whispered his final farewell.

Yet, as she drew closer, the stench of the marsh and the woodsmoke vanished. In its place came a scent that made Vilon’s heart ache: the sudden, impossible fragrance of crushed clover and sun-warmed jasmine.

It was the smell of a spring that hadn’t yet arrived.

Where could a beggar-woman find such a scent? he wondered, his breath hitching.

A small, wet whimper escaped her worm-like lips. To Vilon’s shock, he saw a single, glittering tear track down the weathered map of her cheek.

"Yours is not the story of the oak," she whispered, her voice rough, tired and sad. "But that of the fallen leaf. Each has its story, and each must find its end in the dirt."

"What... what are you—"

Her hand moved in a slow, phantom caress against his brow. Vilon wanted to flinch, to pull back into, but he found he could not move. A strange, radiant warmth began to spread from her fingertips, seeping through his skin and into his very marrow, staving off the shivering cold.

The touch was cold, the fingers bony, and yet warmth spread.

"Where towers crumble and birds take wing, the sun shall rise," she intoned, her sightless head tilting toward the dark sky. "To one man it shall bring warmth; to the other chill.

Stone shall weep beneath the weight of iron, and the birds shall fall from a sky of ash.

Worms and flowers shall birth from that dark wing, both in hands of he who follows.

Sons shall curse the names of their fathers, and brother shall murder brother in the shadow of a crown.

Warmth you shall sow in your youth, boy, but cold is all the harvest you shall reap.

An oak you shall be, standing tall against the storm, until the season of the fallen leaves claims your branches, your leaves and your tree.

Kings and princes shall come to you with open hands.

One you shall spurn in sorrow and guilt, one you shall love in folly, and one you shall curse by your final breath. Light shall pave the road beneath your boots, only for the darkness to swallow the path behind you.

Service you will give to the child birthed of the deep shadows.

A dark sun is rising, oh my sweet summer child, stopped only by the dance birthed from a stolen father.

He shall come for all in the end, and service to him you shall beget. Two more shall come to offer aid: one shall die in place, and the other shall cry for the world that was lost.

He who was promised comes to fight the fire that brings the cold, and the cold that brings the fire. Sorrow shall be his only bride. Fire he shall wield, and his glory may yet burn the world to a cinder.

But you... you will be for the fallen leaves, my sweet summer child. Worry not for the cold that is coming,worry not for the plagues that shall befell on that cursed and blessed promise, for there is naught you can do to turn the tide.

To you, I can offer no shield against the fate of men,only sweet dreams to warm the long night ahead."

Her hands dropped away, and the warmth began to fade, leaving Vilon feeling hollow and small beneath the giant oak. The fire flared one last time, a brilliant, blinding orange, before dying down to a low, steady throe under the shadow of that old woman.

And then under the eyes of the gods...he slept.