Summer's snow--that’s what we called it when we were children. Towards the end of spring, when everything got gloriously soggy and the world was teeming with new life, the fields took on a new blanket of white coldness, but the only chill it carried was on the tongue. It was another world for us children, to see the hundreds and thousands of mint plants blooming a creamy white. Dem and I would pluck the incongruously fuzzy leaves-ranging from pale lavender to a dark, stormy green-and chew on them like bright, freezing cold gum. We grew up on those fields, tasting and smelling and breathing the essence of mint.

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It was late summer when Dem left. I remember the withered, tired leaves still clinging obstinately to a thousand bare stalks clattering in the wind, all rotting on the ground. I remember Dem standing among those sharp, spiky fields, and my first warning of what was to come was in her eyes as empty as the rattling stalks.

“Min,” she said. That was my name, or an approximation of it, but until then I had never thought of it being as hollow as it was said right then. “Min, we’re leaving.”

"Why?"

"Uncle Cobweb said so." Nothing to explain further after that. Dem's uncle was a former guard to Her Highness the Rightful Queen, Ruler of the Seelie Kingdom, and was extremely forceful in an extremely quiet way; his sister respected him, and his brother-in-law was terrified of him.

"Do you know where?" Maybe, just maybe, it would not be too far away...

"Somewhere in the outskirts of the Red City, I think. Where my Great Parents live." The Red City. The sole nexus of civilization in all the Desert of Scales. Modern civilization, anyway.

"Don't that place got savages, though? You know, humans?" Disease-ridden vermin, my own mam always told me-glorified apes. Sometimes, I thought my mam could be quite silly. From my school, I learned that mostly they just lived in funny wooden houses in the plains, but some of them managed to live in the desert, for a given value of what it means to 'live'. Survive, perhaps, is a better word.

"My uncle says we should live in peace with one another," said Dem, looking to one side. Dem's uncle had Modern Ideas, which was why he was no longer a guard at the Royal Palace.

"Send letters when you get there, all right?" I said.

"Yeah. I promise." Dem bit her lip. After a moment's hesitation, she wrapped her arms in a hug, and I squeezed back. When she stepped back, her eyes were no longer empty. They were full to the brim with tears. "You take care of yourself, Min. Don't let that old man Hephaestus push you around. You're gonna be a great blacksmith, and I'm gonna be a great healer, and when we grow up, we're gonna be famous."

"Yeah, famous," I said weakly. I really did try to smile, but the tears kept on getting in the way, and when I finally dried my eyes, she was a spot in the sky, suspended on skeleton-leaf wings. I watched her fly away, and walked home, dragging my feet in the leaf-clogged streets. With a heart this heavy, I doubted my wings could lift me a smidgeon above the ground.

That was seven years ago, back when Titania still wore the crown and Mab was an unpleasant nightmare rotting in her kingdom of goblins. Now Mab sits on the High Throne, and I don't know what became of Dem and her modern-thinking family. If they are still alive, they won't be anywhere near the Red City, or indeed, anywhere in the Desert of Scales, because the Desert of Scales, once home to the largest population of land-dragons in the world, is now a vast pane of glass. That is what happens to places that sympathize with humans.

I never got a letter back from Dem, so it's sort of like she and her family never existed, and right now it's better that way. I have been training as a smithing apprentice for the past six years, and any week now, I am going to receive my letter of acceptance to the White City Academy of Thaumaturgical Arts. With a Major in Enchanted Weaponry under my belt, I’ll be fit for life. In this country, especially with Queen Mab at its helm, there is always a need for more weapons.

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At the point where I guess the story begins, I was in the forge beside Mr. Monocle’s place, hammering out a chain that would find itself attached to a flail in its future, or perhaps a swinging scythe-hook, those were popular among showoffs these days…

There was an intruder in the forge. It had to be an intruder. Hephaestus had a limp leg and went about wheezing over his staff, and Mr. Monocles was a descendant of the giants, and so was quite large and stupid. No. Someone was here who shouldn’t be.

Without faltering in the rhythm of the clanging hammer against chain, I closed the link and causally put the whole thing into the trough of cold water that existed for this purpose. As an afterthought, I drew a cup of the water and tossed it onto the fire. In the blinding fog that exploded forthwith, I armed myself with an ornamental chakram I had been working on as a project -- ornamental, yes but not entirely useless; it had quite a lot of sharp edges, after all. In the rapidly disintegrating fog, I saw a figure, tall and gaunt, with ragged wings like tattered threads. It was coughing and waving the steam away-on one of its arms, the twisting blue lines of wode. Wode! A rebel!

"Who's there," I shouted. I hefted my favorite hammer in my other hand, just in case. “If you’re looking for Mr. Monocles, he’s out of town.”

“Monocles? He’s an idiot,” replied the intruder. “No, I’m looking for you, Minerva Tolliver.” The steam finally cleared, and revealed my ‘intruder’. There were a few more lines on his long sad face, and the silver blue hair that used to fall in his eyes was swept back over a balding crown, but there was no mistaking the man.

“Mister Cobweb?” It was Dem’s uncle. He smiled, a kinder and softer one than the bitter grimace I remembered, and he opened his arms.

“Little old Minerva. You’ve grown up. Give me a hug?” I ran into his arms, feeling like a little girl again.

“Is Dem with you?” I asked, and he laughed. It was a marvelous, novel sound.

“Barely here thirty seconds and you’re already tired of me,” he chortled. I blushed. Whoops. “No, she couldn’t come, but she’s waiting for you. Minerva, do you know what this means?” He held up his bare arm, showing the blue marks that seemed to shift across the skin.

“Wode: the decorative armor primarily used by Anglo humans in the Icene tribe, currently the most active collection of united fighters against the Sylvan Monarchy, specifically antagonistic against Queen Mab,” I recited. “I knew there was a reason why Mam never like you,” I added, smiling slightly.

“Exactly right,” said Cobweb. “And now, we need your help.”

“To make your people weapons, right?”

“Indeed, I had forgotten just how quick-witted you are,” he said, and ruffled my hair. “Will you come?”

“Sure, just let me talk to my pop, see if he can get Master Hephaestus to pause my apprenticeship for a few months, and--”

“No, Minerva. Now.” Suddenly, the jolliness I thought he had collected over the years fell off, and he was the same hard man I’d grown up with. “Either come with me now, or stay here in your cozy life making weapons for the madwoman who will kill us all. Remember,” he said, and he pulled out a small bag from his person and put it in my hand. “Demeter is waiting for you.” I opened the tiny pouch, which spilled a few dried leaves of purple and green into my hand. With the leaves came a scent that exploded in my head, filling it with pictures of summer and Dem and childhood. I breathed in the cool fragrance, holding the memories while they were still crystal sharp in my mind’s eye, then looked up.

“Give me ten minutes, I said. “I’ll need my tools, and Hephaestus’ lesson book, and food, and clothes--do try not to touch anything,” I added, and I began to pack up what little I’d need of my old life to start a new one.

Travel was slow, because Mister Cobweb couldn’t fly; not that he’d ever admit it, but besides the whispers in the village, I could see for myself the tatterd membranes, the broken and unset bones that would never carry any more wieght than their own. Besides of which, there were patrols airborne these days: spies to the Castle. So we walked, swam, hitchhiked, and did whatever it took to get to the secret base of Cobweb’s rebellion camp.

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The compound was empty when we finally got there. Buildings stood with their doors wide open, scorched fire pits indicated flames left too long untended, and the boats in the harbor bore a distinctly slimy green veneer.

I looked up at Cobweb for an explanation, but his long face was blank.
“Hello? Is anyone here?” I called. The last thing I saw before the blunt object impacting my skull knocked me into unconsciousness was a sprig of mint growing between the cobbles. In this way, my idiocy led Cobweb and me to being captured by Mab’s forces.

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For a tyrannical despot, the cell was awfully hygienic. There was a ceramic toilet that led to running water below the floors, a sink placed low for ease of doubling as a sponge bath, and the cots’ sheets were merely threadbare instead of the vermin infested horrors I imagined such places to have. There were two cots, for the cell’s two occupants: one for myself, just waking from violence-induced slumber, and one for a young woman sitting cross-legged in the middle of her cot’s unforgiving mattress. The girl was slim, a touch angular about the edges, and had wings of translucent blue gossamer that shimmered faintly in the artificial light.

“Hello, Dem,” I said. Or tried to, anyway. What really came out was a series of unladylike coughs and hacks. Dem looked up at the sudden wretched sound, and unfolded herself in a single motion that carried her across the cell’s tiny floor and to my side, where she conjured a small jug of water. I seized the jug and gulped at it, the goal being to relieving my throat of the sandpaper that seemed to have appeared sometime between now and the compound. When my throat was properly assuaged, and I felt as bloated as a puffer fish, I put the jug down and sat up in the bed.

“Hello, Dem.”

She smiled, a shape as familiar to me as my own face. “Hi, Min. My apologies for not being able to hold our reunion at the compound. Mab might be insane, but she’s smart.”

“Not at all,” I replied. “I’m sorry for being so stupid as to get me in here.”

“I’m more sorry, because I left you alone back at the village.”

“No way, I’m sorrier than you, because I didn’t chase after you!”

“Oh yeah? Well, I’m sorry that we spent our first conversation in seven years apologizing for stuff that isn’t our fault!”

“Could you please be sorry in a quieter manner,” shouted someone outside of the cell. “Some of us are trying to sleep!”

“Who’s that?” I asked in an exaggerated whisper.

“That’s Mr. Barker,” she replied. “He’s the representative of another rebel group who wants to put our forces together. He says he knows a way out of here, but he can’t get out of his cell. Uncle Cobweb doesn’t like him, because he snores.”

“Cobweb is here?”

“Yeah, in Mr. Barker’s cell. They’re all two occupants now, because Mab never threw out Titania’s old prisoners, and she keeps on adding new ones. What are you doing?” While she was talking, I had been inspecting the door frame. She peered over my shoulder. “Am I really that boring?”

“Naw, of course not. I would absolutely love to spend hours listening to jail cell gossip. But before we resort to that, I would just like to see whether we have to spend that much time on that particular subject.” Crouching on my knees to get a better look at the warding spells, I absentmindedly began to tear apart the leather apron they forgot to remove from my person. Ah, these are just Mediocris runes—very recently invented, only a century old. No wonder these cells were so clean. “Dem, do you know where we are?”

“This is the White City Castle dungeon. Why?”

“No reason.” I hummed, and selected a tool from the little roll of handy implements concealed in the apron.

“What’s that? A bottle of perfume?”

“Well, it could be,” I said doubtfully. “But only if you love the smell of rotten eggs, and don’t mind having your skin turned violently into soap.”

“Soap?”

“Soap. Bad smelling stuff, too. That’s what alkaline does. Turns fats into soap.” I aimed the nozzle. “And metal into goo, too.” A puff of atomized alkaline (Hephaestus’ recipe, he refused to tell me how to make it) and the carved sigils guarding the door from unmagical means of penetration melted away.

“So what did that just do?” It was odd hearing all of these questions from Dem, when from what I could remember, she was always the talkative one.

“I just removed the magical barriers on this door that prevent me from doing something like this.” I picked up a lockpick and began poking at the lock’s inner works, to get a sense of what was going on in there.

“Demeter, what’s going on in there?” It was Cobweb.

“Minnie’s breaking us out,” replied Dem. “We’ll get to you guys next.” I bristled at the deconstruction of my nickname: ‘Min’ was simple, yet distinguished. ‘Minnie’ sounded like the name of a young girl who still played dressup with dolls.

“What? How?” called the grumpy voice identified as the mysterious Mr. Barker.

“With a bottle of soapy perfume and a tiny scrap of metal,” informed Dem, peering at the lockpick jostling within the lock. “And now she’s sticking the bit of metal into the keyhole. You know, Min, I’m not sure that’ll work—it needs to be keyshaped, and that just looks like an ‘L’ with a very short foot.”

“Trust me,” I grunted, trying to get a good position for keeping the lockpick perpendicular to the lock. “I know what I’m doing. Once we get out of here, then you can tell me what to do.”

“Wait,” said Mr. Barker. “Until tomorrow, at least. You break us out now, and we’ll have the guards on our backs in no time.”

“And why would tomorrow be any different from today?” I asked. It was unusual, and rather annoying to be reprimanded by a person I couldn’t see.

“Trust me,” was all he said. If I had been a little less exhausted, I might have gone ahead, but with the remains of the incapacitating blow to my skull still merrily hammering a migraine into my head, I decided to let it go. The lock pick, atomizer, and tool kit went into hiding under my cot, and I sank into blissful oblivion.

The next morning started off with a bang. Literally. I was woken up by being jolted out of my bed and onto the floor, which was slightly softer than the actual mattress. Dem helped me up off the floor, saying, “It’s time. This is why Mr. Barker told you to wait. Can you get us out?”

Another crash sent the floor trembling and my feet stumbling. I nodded, a bit unsteadily, and reached under the mattress for my tools. It was a miracle that with all the explosions rocking the foundations, the tiny scrap of metal didn’t break off in the lock, but eventually the mechanism conceded to my ministrations and clicked open. The door eased open with little fuss, and I walked out, adjusting to the rock floor as if it were a ship on stormy waters.

The jail cell of Cobweb and Barker was right next to us, and I knelt down on my knees to inspect the frame. Yes, it was the same as our own-a series of Mediocris runes, and a simple lock. I erased the runes, tempted the lock to open, and out stepped the occupants.

Cobweb wasn’t too bad off, only a slight bruise on his temples, and I got my first look at Mr. Barker. He was a human, which didn’t surprise me all that much, and of the same body type as Cobweb: tall, lanky, with a serious and long face.

“This way,” he said, and began running off down the hallway. We followed him, trying to ignore the pleas from the other prisoners to be let out as well as keeping our balance on the dancing floor.

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The next hour was a blur to me, I’m not at all sorry to say. Barker’s exit was a vertical tunnel that led straight up to the outside. It was barely five feet wide, and almost impossible to fly up, but somehow we managed it.

There were some children involved, a girl and a boy, and we tried to bring them out with us. The exit was just too small to carry them in our arms. The little girl ended up being left behind, crying fearfully, but the boy had wings, and could get out himself. We had to force him to leave, because he wanted to stay with the girl.

I’m still not sure how Barker got out, as there were a set of guards that we had to fight as soon as we got out, but he joined up towards the end of the fight to incapacitate them both.

Oh yes, and Cobweb couldn’t come. Like I thought, his wings were no longer capable of carrying his weight. He smiled a little bit, saying that at least the little girl would have someone to take care of her. He looked happy.

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That was three months ago. I still wonder how those two are doing, but I think they’re not in any real danger. Mab has too much on her hands dealing with Barker’s team to think about a couple of stragglers in the bowels of the castle.

As for Dem and me, we entered the community that Barker had built up, of childless parents and orphaned children: the people who wanted to end the war the most. All species were recognized. Everyone here has lost someone precious to them.

I went into the provisions quarter, forging not just weapons, but things useful for a life out of war: farm tools, ovens, and suchlike items of humble use. It was a signal of hope to me, that fighting wouldn’t last forever and that life goes on.

Dem, of course, went into the fighting quarter: once upon a time she wanted to heal people, but over the years she learned that she was better at creating wounds than stopping them. I didn’t blame her, though it meant that we no longer talk all that much anymore.

When we do get together, we reminisce about the old days, about warm suns and blue skies and the smell of snow growing in summer.

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A last note: I was commissioned to compose a shield that would represent the group as a whole. I thought about it for a week or so, and drew some sketches, but what it came down to was two hands holding each other, a wreath of mint leaves joining them together.

Bumping so more people notice this beautiful story!