Desreal: and learn, too late, they grieved on its way; --

The woods were silent, she thought, as the cold set it, reasserted itself, and coated the trees with frost.

There was no snow this morning, not because she couldn’t but because she wove something else: before her patient, slightly glazed eyes, a wolf made entirely of ice began to form from the moisture and the air, taking particles of dust and plantlife into its body. It wasn’t necessary, but in this mood she felt like doing it; to create something beautiful, as she did so often in the past, when fancy struck her.

It danced before her, her wolf, a mere ghost of a shell of a living creature. It was not solid, neither was it alive, but there was lifelike quality to its translucent fur and even the in and out of its ribs; she smiled at it, a bit sadly, as she watched it saunter and nip at its haunches.

Carry a message for me, friend, she said in the wind’s voice, and the wolf became instantly alert. Tell Hypatia to come to me, so that we can talk.

The wolf nodded its understanding, turning gracefully as it loped through the woods and into the crags and dunes of the desert, bearing her voice in its throat.

She watched it go, and sighed.

*
grave men, near death, who see with blinding sight
blind eyes could blaze like meteors and be gay,
rage, rage against the dying of the light.