Breadcrumbs - Anne Ursu [72]
She reached flat land and picked her way forward, through snow that rose and fell like frozen waves. The wind did not let the snow settle on the ground for long—it blew it up to the sky as fast as the sky could pour it down, and all Hazel could do was push through.
She could not see more than a few feet in front of her, so she did not look. She knew what was out there because it was all a part of her now—the endless churning darkness, the shadowy snowdrifts that collected in the wind and blew apart again.
She huddled her shoulders together, as if trying to make herself as inconsequential as possible, and still trudged forward. One step. Another. Another.
It should have been determination pulling her forward, the surety of her quest, the nobility of her heart. It should have been love, it should have been faith, or at least hope. But she had nothing like that inside of her. She had nothing inside her at all.
And still she went forward.
Somewhere ahead there was a boy who had been her best friend. She had known so many versions of him, she carried all of them with her. Here, he waggled his eyebrows through a classroom window; here, he sent her best superhero pitch sailing through the sky; here, they sat in the shrieking shack oblivious to the world’s crushed-up beer cans; here, he appeared wearing an eye patch and six-year-old Hazel felt the pieces click into place.
But snowdrifts and night were overtaking her, and Hazel only had room for so much. The Jacks left her, one at a time. The wind embraced them eagerly.
The snowflakes had turned to ice, and the pellets whipped against her face. The wind seemed like it might tear off her skin. The snow was nearly at her waist, and still she could see nothing ahead. One step. Another. It was not survivable, the cold and the tumult and the endless sickening sky. So she hardened her skin against the wind, her blood against the cold, her heart against the despairing sky.
I feel nothing, she whispered, as the ice hit her skin, as the wind beat against her, as the snow menaced around her. I feel nothing. I feel nothing.
She was as pointless and gray as the world.
And she moved on—muscle, bone, and blankness.
And then. There. A breath. The wind released her. The snow settled itself. The cold eased. Hazel stumbled forward, and then stopped.
She could feel nothing at first but stillness. Her body did not know what to do with it. The tick tock of the clock was gone, and Hazel missed it like her own heartbeat.
Hazel shuddered as the wind danced around her gently, as if this was all there had ever been between them. She wiped the snow from her eyes, and it fell agreeably away. And she looked up.
She was standing in the middle of a vast plain in the snow-shimmer night. All around her was still. There was an eternity of sky above her. There was no sign of anything else—the woods, the hills, the storm. The horizon stretched on around her.
But she was not alone. There was a palace just ahead, sitting in the middle of the plain like a gift. It was simple—a small square with a dome framed by four minarets. It looked like it had been sculpted out of snow.
Hazel stared at the palace. It was not the same. It was longer and a little more elegant and more feminine. But it reminded her of the fortress in Jack’s sketchbook, of the place where no one could ever find him. It was like this plain had birthed it, just for Jack, and now it presided proudly over this kingdom of nothing.
The glimmering palace tugged at her, and Hazel gave herself to it, even though she was nothing. She was a lamentable splotch, her black hair and brown skin and green shirt and blue jeans and purple backpack a speck in this eternal whiteness.
Inside the palace was the white witch. Hazel was supposed to defeat her, though she could not even manage fifth grade. Still. She dragged her shivering, breaking body