The Warmth of Winter

Snow had settled thick across Helgabyr. The fires burned steady. The meat was rich. The warriors were content.

The Quiet Pull

But something—something—stirred in Jón's chest.

A quiet pull.

Not longing. Not sorrow.

Something like... gratitude. But colder. Older. Quieter.

The Riddle of Fire

He walked to the shrine of Helga Fire-Eye, bearing no question—only a sense that something waited.

And the flame offered no words, no image.

Only a riddle:

"What grows in the deepest frost, yet feeds on no sun?" "What roots take hold in earth not warmed, but cherished?" "What warmth lingers not from the fire above, but from the hearts that remain?"

The Sacred Grove

Jón understood.

He climbed into the hills, into the land where even the pines bowed low and the sky held its breath. He walked not by trail, but by feeling—drawn toward something that felt familiar, though he had never been.

The Fruit of Memory

And in a narrow hollow between frost-slicked stones, he found it.

The fruit was pale blue. Tiny. Shivering. And yet, beneath the snow, the soil was warm.

Not with flame. With something older. Softer. Something that remembered.

The Ancient Love

He reached down, and the warmth passed into his hand like a sigh.

For this grove had been a grave once. A place where a soul so deeply cherished had been laid to rest— and the regard of those left behind had not all followed.

Too much love. Too much laughter. Too much legacy.

And so some of that warmth stayed.

It fed the earth.

And from it, grew this fruit.

The Evening Meal

He took only one. Dried it carefully. Powdered it gently.

That night, he served it in a broth so simple, no one noticed—until the first taste.

No heat. Just warmth. Deep and strange. A comfort that felt earned.

One warrior smiled and whispered, "She would have loved this."

Another laughed through tears. "That's the warmth that never left."

For The Warmth of Winter is not a fire. It is the echo of a life lived well enough to linger.

It is the privilege of having known them. And the quiet oath to be the kind of soul who leaves behind the same.