What remains

Footsteps made the floor creak behind her. Maea spun around, a painful hope bright in her eyes as she raked her gaze across the shadow in the doorway. Maybe it was all a bad joke, maybe the clawmarks belonged to a bear and they were all returning from a hunt, maybe, maybe maybe... But the man that stood behind her was not Noah, and the life in her expression wilted with the dying light. Too tall, was the first thought that crossed her mind. Noah was short, only half a head taller than herself. Almost as pale, but blonde and golden skinned with gray eyes that always smiled... The opposite of this looming shadow so black that he could have been a product of the Long Night itself. Maea could have hated Nathaniel for not being her brother at that moment. Had hated him once, when she was very young and sick and he was a restless kid with too much pent up emotions and nothing good to do with himself. Things had not... been good between them. But time had a way of changing things, and though he was not really a friend, she couldn't muster any resentment at all as she stared up at him from her spot on the floor, eyes dry and blank from the inability to understand this new reality. "Oh. It's you." He had made it then. Unlike... unlike her family... The thought cut as if she'd stepped on glass, and tears slowly pooled in her eyes. Hot, unbidden, far more in tune with the situation than Maea was. The girl clapped her hands over her face and turned away, shoulders quivering under the strain of holding back the sobs. MAEA Sometimes darkness can show you the light