The coldness begirds you, almost seeming to ooze and slither through the air as it ensnares you within a hold that almost threatened to chill the air from your very lungs. Yet all of this contrasted with the gentle tickling heat that came from below you, from the soft feathers that twitch and ruffle beneath you. Their every motion that seems to hug you as much as the frosty air sends a shiver of reassurance up your spine, telling you that you should not fear what you do not understand, that that unknown is not always a vicious beast hoping to devour you whole. And yet, beneath this sensation of calming, there was also a feeling of anxiety and realization what was around you was unnatural, alien, and not what it remotely appeared. You gazed at every feather, and your gut told you that it was not one. It was something that simply wasn't, yet somehow was. It made your head ache a little as you tried to contemplate that paradox, so you decided to allow the deception of images thought process slide out of your mind, for the sake of your sanity.

And then the world was moving with a small yet jolting quake that sent you flat against the portion of plumage upon which you had found yourself seated. Before you was a vast monolith of feathers that stood like the forgotten pillar of some decayed ruin in a vast forest of...things that looked somewhat like trees. Looked being the key word, they had trunks and branches upon them. But their purple coloring and wreathing tentacle like growths in place of leaves suggested you were far from what could be considered normal and natural flora. Then the black feathers before you gave way to a mixture of blue that seemed to shift and twinkle with white star sparks like the arm of the Milky Way in the midnight sky on a moonless evening. You could even swear the bits of blue that stuck to the end of these strange feathers gently drifted ever so slightly, like clouds before the stars, but you assumed it was merely a trick of your movement. And then you pulled back, away from the pillar, so that you could stare up at what sat atop this mountain of plumage. It was, perhaps not quite unexpectedly, the head of a bird. But also, not the head of a bird.

There was a black beak, off which the light seemed to only barely reflect, that somehow became a head midway through. There was no seam, no point where hardened flesh became feather and skin beneath it. It just was. There was no line across it, no way for it to open either. No sign of nostrils, no way to breath. It was alive, you could feel it living in its unnatural way beneath you, shifting and pulsing gently...perhaps it only mimicked the feelings of a living body. Its eyes, pupil less and white, glowed like the stars on its chest in that anomalous black sea of a face. The eyes followed your every moment, only diverting from them to study your form closely and trace across every feature of your body as if each one was to be committed to memory, or judged. Under you, the feathered flesh ground shifts and suddenly your feel something solid press into the top of your head. It was smooth, feeling not unlike a polished stone. It held some of the chill from the coldness that was around you, yet lacking in its stifling quality. The solid object ran across the top of your head over and over. Your gaze remained locked at first on the gaze of the strange avian creature before you at first, which remained unchanged despite this object’s intrusion, but eventually curiosity overtook you. Turning your head up, you were greeted by the end of a large talon that dwarfed your miniscule body. It was stroking your head, simply and gently, and only paused briefly as you gazed at it before returning to what it had been doing. Your vision returned to the face of the strange bird-like being, still staring at you ever so intently.

“Don’t worry, I don’t want to hurt you, little one.”

That was what you heard, or what you thought you had heard. The beak of the beast did not move an inch. The eyes had twitched, but nothing more. And the voice, if you could call the strange string of melodic yet unnatural sounds could be considered a voice, did not seem to come from the creature so much as, well, everywhere. In front of you, to your sides and back, as well as above and below you...the words simply lacked any particular origin point. The sheer eldritch quality of the whole situation, a quality that was growing more and more prominent with each new detail, served only to bring a tenseness to your stomach as the anxiety about these unnatural surroundings took a greater hold on you. Your eyes turned away from the beast, trying to locate from where this all-encompassing speech had come from, but beyond the quivering ‘trees,’ there was only the creature on whose hand you were perched, whose odd warmth now failed to provide comfort and reassurance. The patting of your head likewise had lost its charm, and almost as soon as you thought that, the talon was gone from atop your head.

“Really, I swear. Not gonna hurt you, really.” The ariose voice paused a moment before adding. “If you’re wondering how I know you’re kinda afraid, I can read it on your face. The first encounter is always the worst, trust me.”

All you could do was look back to the bird. Again, its beak had moved not an inch. Its eyes watched you as before without the slightest change. If they held any emotion at all, you could not read it. There was only one last logical source, but it was far from a possible source. Short of the creature speaking through some means that was vastly different from your own, perhaps. Which, given your surroundings, was far from outside the realm of imagination. You started to open your mouth, to give some sort of reply, to ask this creature what it was and what you were doing there, but your voice failed you and the words escaped merely as a slight wheeze as your throat closed ever so slightly. The fear and the cold had gotten to your vocal cords. So all that was to be done was to sit in silence, trying to breath, trying to calm yourself to speak your simple words.
“It’s the voice without the beak moving thing, is it? Gets ‘em every time. Yes, hi. Big birdie in front of you. I am making with the colloquy and stuff. The voice you hear, it’s mine,” there is the briefest pause in the voice where the head of the bird nods as if to confirm what is being said before it continues, “I have no ill intent, I swear. ...You’re not from here, that much I can tell. Can you speak? How’d you get here?”

For a moment, your breath catches like your words within your throat, and you choke on it. Gag and attempt to force your esophagus to open just enough that some of that precious air could make it through. The bird was patient, it said nothing as you composed yourself before you gasped out what few words your body would allow, “I-I...ca...c-can. I...I da...d-don...don’t na...know...” The words shook with as much unsteady, hoarse breath as they did with fear. They hung in the air a moment as the bird eyed you, before you felt the talon shift back into place and return to its gentle caressing.

“Stranger in a strange land, then. Well, don’t worry...I’m not going just leave you here. I can find you somewhere safe to stay until we can find a way to get you home, okay?” The eyes blink for the as it finishes the sentence. It took a moment for your mind to come to the realization that was the first time they had the whole time you had been looking upon this creature. A second realization dawns as silence falls that the avian was truly waiting for a reply, and not just asking a rhetorical question. You bobbed your head in silent acknowledgement, and in turn the creature bobbed its head back. “Excellent. I’m gonna keep you in my hand for now, safest place for you. My name is Neyath’Faelest, by the way,” the name made you wince with the strange way the sounds merged as the voice spoke it, “but...going by that wince, it’s better if you just called me ‘Nightfrost.’ Most people do. Now then...let’s find you somewhere nice and warm...” And with that, the ground beneath you began to gently quake as the strange avian began to walk off into the twitching woods. The chill continued to choke you, but as you rested within those feathers and felt the gentle stroke of that giant talon...you felt strangely assured that, despite all that happened, everything was going to be okay.

---

So...um....still working on my big commission story. Slowly. Just hit a wall in it, and decided to try to relax by finishing up a description for one of the pieces I've commissioned. Something short and sweet and gentle, as befitting Nightfrost. This was inspired by a picture I saw on Tumblr, but for the life of me I cannot remember who did it anymore. Who drew this specific picture was, of course, the fantastic, the phenominal, the wonderful  CorrieZodori , who deserves endless praise for her amazing talent at even the simpliest sketch. The amount fo detail in the feathers is wonderful, and the perspective is delightful. Anyway...I'll get back to working on the big story now. Fifteen pages, and counting. I went overboard on this commissions...never again will I allow I do that. Ten pages, max...hopefully. It's my fault anyway...oh well. Anyway, enjoy!