She didn’t like it one bit.

It was the dead of winter in Maine and snowing like the second ice age was just beginning. Bursts of fluffy, white flakes fell haphazardly from a dismal gray sky, ready to be given over to the mercy of the harsh wind. As the minutes ticked by, the cold, unforgiving wind threw the snowflakes onto the window ledge, piling it up until nothing could be seen beyond the frosty window pane.

Though it was silent within the rest of the house, there was an eerie sound coming from outside that echoed through her room. It may have simply been the wind, but the sound was so clear and so sorrowful. Even the bane of a wolf that had lost its mate couldn’t compare to the anguish in this single sound. It made tears come to her soft, brown eyes.

A knock sounded on her door, and she quickly wiped away the impending tears before it opened. In the hall, standing hand in hand, were her mother and father, pity for her apparent in their eyes. Though she was mad at them for having pulled her away from the warmth of the South and the comfort of her childhood friends, she knew they would not have done it without a good reason; she just wish she knew what that reason was.

“Elizabeth,” her mother said, sitting next to her on the bed,” we know you must feel out of place here and are angry with us for having moved so suddenly, but it will all get better soon. I promise.”

She smiled sadly. Her mother was going through a typical parental speech that was no doubt in a handbook somewhere, but it didn’t make her feel any better. If anything, it made her feel bad because her parents didn’t know her any more than it seemed they did.

“Don’t worry about me, Mom, and I’m not mad at you,” she said, putting up a front for the benefit of her parents,” Just need a little sleep is all.”

Her mother smiled, satisfied with the response she had gotten out of her daughter. It had been an awfully long trip to Maine, over three days with delays at every airport. To top it all off, a snow storm and begun just as they arrived and had not stopped since. It should have been enough to stop anyone from continuing on, but her husband and she knew it was well worth it.

“Dear,” Elizabeth’s father said from the doorway,” We should get to bed as well. We haven’t slept a wink since getting here, and it wouldn’t do either of us any good to get sick now.”

Elizabeth’s saw the tired smile her mother gave to her father before getting up.

“Sweet dreams, Liz,” her mother said, kissing her on the forehead,” Dream only of the angels singing.”

Elizabeth nodded and watched her parents leave the room. They had always been so worried about her; it was almost as if they thought she was in danger of being snatched up in the unforgiving embrace of Fate then and there. Had that been the reason they had moved, to escape some danger she had yet to realize?

The woeful dirge of the wind began again, sending a chill down her spine.

“Again?” she whispered, walking over to the window,” What pains you so that you sound like this?”

“Slipping amongst the shadows,

flitting between dark places,

always quiet…”

The words slipped through her mind like silk over marble. There was no one else in her dimly lit room except herself, and yet she knew that she had heard those words. She had heard those words in the same woeful tone as that of the wind!

Elizabeth curled her fingers under the window and prepared to fling it open, but a strange sensation came over her. As the window went up and the snow fell away, she felt as if hands colder than even the ice that surrounded her home were wrapping around her wrists and pulling at her. She was so startled, so frightened, by this feeling that she pulled back quickly, nearly falling to the floor for the way she stumbled back.

“Please…” begged the voice, sad longing laced throughout each syllable.

Again the urge to cry came over her, and this time she let the tears come. They felt like tiny daggers being dragged across the cold skin of her cheeks until the chilling wind and snow blowing into her room seemed to freeze them in place. The anguish in the voice she heard, it made her very soul want to break.

“No,” the voice moaned, heart-wrenching pain taking over,” I’ve done it again haven’t I? You’re crying again when I promised I wouldn’t let it happen.”

At this, Elizabeth slowly came towards the window and placed her hands on the sill. It was growing steadily towards the record low for the winter season, but she didn’t care. She could feel nothing of her physical body, only her spirit and the pain there.

“‘I’ve done it again…’?” she asked, searching the snowy streets for some sign of life,” What do you mean? Who are you?”

The wind seemed to pick up, and the snow in front of her began to whirl. For one brief instant, she was caught in a childlike fascination, watching the snowflake waltzing with each other and seeming to form simple shapes before her eyes.

Before Elizabeth knew it had really happened, she had stopped crying and begun laughing. She laughed like she was once again five years old and playing in the only snowfall for the Southern winter. She couldn't stop herself and realized something she hadn't in days. She was happy, happier than she had been in a very long time.

“So I still have that little talent, eh?" the voice asked, a hint of amusement dancing across the words," I remember when you were just four years old. It was the only snow predicted to happen that season, and we were outside playing. You were having such a good time, but when I accidentally made snow fall on the last remaining flower in your yard, a potted orange blossom I believe, you began to cry. I didn’t know what to do so I resorted to making the falling snowflakes dance for you. It didn’t take much, but you stopped. I swear I have never heard a child laugh quite like that before, and, so, I vowed never to make you cry again, only to make you laugh.”

A look of curiosity crossed her face before surprise flashed in her eyes. “Ulric?” she whispered, reaching out to the snow before her.

The snow whirled around her, and she felt the slight pressure of another, larger hand taking hers and placing a kiss on it.

“It is you, Ulric!” she shouted, a smile and blush spreading across her pale face.

“Yes,” was the only word that flitted across the air before the faint image of a man formed in front of her.

With eyes as dark as the ocean on a moonlit night, and the build that would make any seasoned warrior envious, Ulric Hemming had been revered among his people, a group of forsaken Englishmen. His hair, though paled by his current state of being, still showed the rich brown it had been many years ago, but his skin, it was as white as the snow around him, not the golden tan of ages past.

He hated being this way, usually only being able to observe and never to touch, but at the same time, he didn‘t mind. In life he had never met anyone quite like the girl he now smiled at. All the women who wanted to be his companion and bear his children had been, to put it bluntly, gold-diggers. They had been after his money and status, not his love.

Elizabeth was different. Though she had been but a baby upon their first meeting, he could see she would grow up to be someone he could love and who would love him back. He cared so much for her and that was what kept him in the physical world, her. That was why it broke his heart to see her weep.

“It took me a while to find you, Ms. Vaughan,” Ulric said, coming into her room,” You moved so suddenly, and I became rather disoriented.”

“I’m sorry,” she said, bowing her head and feeling guilty.

Ulric mentally kicked himself. “It isn’t your fault,” he said taking her hand in his,” I already know why you moved. I’ve known for 16 years.”

“What?” Elizabeth asked, not really believing what she was hearing.

Ulric smiled sadly. “You use to be such a sickly creature, Elizabeth. When you were very little, maybe even a newborn for all I know, you contracted a rare disease that none of the doctors your parents took you to could figure out. They tried everything they could before finally turning to some more...forbidden means of curing you.”

Elizabeth sat on the edge of her bed, watching Ulric pace as he wove his tale. Her long, sandy-blond hair fell in loose curls about her shoulders and onto her bed, making a slight rustling sound as she turned her head from left to right. A worried frown made slight creases at the corners of her rosy pink lips.

“Necromancy. In some cases, it is a form divination where one who wishes to know the future summons the dead to gain knowledge of events yet to happen. In other cases, people simply summon the deceased to do their bidding, often with dire consequences,” he said, almost as if he were reading out of a book,” Your parents used Necromancy to summon the spirit of a dead being to save you. They summoned...me.”

Ulric held his arms out wide as he said this, turning to Elizabeth with a look of utter torment plastered across his face. It even seemed that there were tears shimmering in thin trails as they slid down his cheeks. Was he really upset that much about what he was telling her?

“Ulric...” Elizabeth whispered.

“Let me finish,” he said in a curt manner, cutting her off.

She frowned and looked at her hands as they formed fists in her lap, heated anger and guilt flashing in her eyes. Her parents had done this to him, caused him to be so distraught. He had been in a perfect, peaceful rest in the afterlife, no doubt, until they had mercilessly ripped him out of it and all to save what tiny bit of life that had been in her.

Ulric continued to speak, not seeing how angry Elizabeth was becoming. “One second I was standing there watching the living go about their business from the clouds, and the next I was in a small, pink nursery,” he said, stopping to look at her with his face blank and showing no emotion,” You mother sat in a white rocking chair before the spot I had landed on and your father to her right. You were in your mother’s arms, small, pale, and crying like a demon was burning you from the inside out, and I couldn’t help but melt with sympathy for you. I suppose that is the effect that all babies have on people, but you, Elizabeth Vaughan, were different. I could tell that you didn’t want to leave the world of the living so early. I could almost hear you screaming ‘Save me, Ulric. Please...‘.”

Elizabeth looked up at him. She wanted to cry for him and tell him she was sorry for having been the reason he had been pulled from his eternal life, but she knew Ulric wouldn’t have it. It would only make him more upset than he already was.

“Elizabeth,” he whispered, kneeling in front of her and taking her hands in his,” I answered the call I heard that night. I don’t know how I did it, but I managed to keep you from dieing from your ailment. I have been by your side ever since, playing with you and keeping you company when no one else would have anything to do with you.”

“Ulric,” Elizabeth said, choking back the tears that were forming at his words. In all the time she had known Ulric, she had never known him to break down like this, to tell her what was in his heart. It was both sweet and disturbing at the same time, but she took more heart in the feeling he was pouring out to her than anything else. He loved her, and some how, she loved him.

“Yes?” Ulric asked, getting to his feet and pulling her up with him.

“I’m sorry for all that has happened to you,” she said, looking away from him for a second and then back,” but I am glad that it happed too. I know you because of what my parents have done.”

“Because of what your parents did to save you,” Ulric said, wrapping his arms around Elizabeth,” I must take you away with me to the next world, to the afterlife. I said that for those who summoned the dead, there would be dire consequences, and for your parents, it will be losing you. That was why they moved, to keep you away from me.”

Elizabeth only smiled up at Ulric. “We must all pay the price for living in the end,” she said.

“Then let us depart, love,” he said.

The wind picked up, swirling around Ulric and Elizabeth until the flurry of snow hid them from view. Childish images formed in the curtain of snow, and the wind whistled almost happily as it weaved around them. After a moment, when everything had calmed down, no trace of what had once been could be seen. All that was left was the ghost of laughter floating on the wind.