"Excuse me, Mademoiselle, but are you sure you're headed in the right direction?"
      Charlotte stopped. She peered up at the man who had just addressed her, brushing the hood of her bearskin cloak away from her frozen face and frost-encrusted eyelashes. Several carriages had stopped along the ice-laden road to offer her a ride and question her choice of directions already, so she was not surprised to be stopped again.
      He was a large, burly man, but his eyes were kind. His plump wife looked down at Charlotte with curiosity from where she sat next to her husband on the horse-drawn wagon. Two children, both young boys, smiled shyly at her from underneath a heavy blanket; Charlotte returned their smiles.
      "Yes, Monsieur, I am on the correct path."
      "Are you sure? Our fair town of Brustoke, for which you're headed, is surely deserted by now. Perhaps you have not heard of the grand Christmas Eve party Master Tribideau throws every year at his manor then? Everybody from the surrounding countryside attends. Everybody."
      Yes, she had heard of it. All of the travelers who had stopped her spoke quite highly of it. To be brutally honest, she was growing quite tired of hearing about the celebration.
      Charlotte bristled a bit at the tone of his "everybody" as well. The man had spoken the word as though it implied that she was not one of them if she chose not to attend this prestigious event.
      Careful, Charlotte, she admonished herself; he means no harm. He only wonders why you would choose to wander alone about the wilderness of France in a snowstorm when you could be making merry like everybody else.
      "I am quite certain, Monsieur, really. But I thank you for your concern. Now, if you will excuse me, I must hurry if I am to make Brustoke by nightfall."
      "As you will, Mademoiselle, but you're missing out on the best party of the year. Fare thee well."
      The man turned to his wife, shrugged his shoulders, and shook the reins tethered to his two mares.
      "Hee-yah!!!"
      The animals kicked up a storm of white powder with their hooves, and then they were off again, bells and tackle jingling, leaving Charlotte alone again by the roadside.
      She watched them for a moment as they receded into the distance, the two boys still peering back at her, and then Charlotte turned and continued on her way, pulling her warm cloak more tightly around her body.
      The thick bearskin garment should have been adequate, but it was not. Charlotte wore heavy battle armor underneath, and the metal sucked in the cold greedily, chilling her warm flesh. She should take it off, but if was a habit she couldn't break; armor you weren't wearing couldn't protect you.
      She was a mercenary, a fighter. Once, Charlotte had been a part of the upper crust of French society, but no longer. Now, she was an outcast. From an early age she had been possessed with a love for battle and the feeling of steel in her hands, and it had proved her undoing. Her parents, thinking her fascination a delicious "eccentricity" had encouraged her. They had the finest weapon masters in all of Europe train her. They had thought it a phase she would outgrow; they had been wrong.
      Charlotte Christine Colde had become a swordswoman, better than almost any man, but even this hadn't been so bad. Her potential suitors had thought it amusing that she could outdo them in fencing…until they saw she wasn't toying with them that was. Many a young gentleman had walked away from her with a broken ego and a bleeding wound.
      Even this was forgiven. But then she had fled to the far off land of Japan, not once, not twice, but three times against the adamant protests of her parents. It hadn't mattered to them that she had only done it to protect France from the dark ambitions of madmen and otherworldly powers that threatened all that lived.
      Well…that wasn't entirely true, there was one other thing that drew her to those far off islands in the East…Haohmaru. Oh, God, how she missed him…but she refused to put herself through the torture of dwelling of her unrequited love again.
      Anyway, she had been thrown out, barred from the Colde family forever. She was dead in her parent's eyes, particularly her father's. Jean Colde was a hard man, and nothing she could do would ever get her into his good graces again.
      It had been a big change for her; Charlotte was used to the finer things in life. No servants, no money, not even a roof over her head. The first few months had been harsh indeed. But then she had taken to hiring her blade out. Work was slow, but it kept her stomach full…most of the time.
      People were reluctant to employ Charlotte, because she was a woman, and even when she did prove her worth, they still looked down upon her. It made her want to scream in anger and frustration. Why couldn't they look past her femininity? She was far from weak, as she proved time and time again.
      Some of those that hired her were truly grateful, but they were few and far between and usually female. She remembered one girl, a few years ago, Claudia had been her name; she had begged Charlotte to take her away from her life, to teach her to be a swordswoman too.
      What fool would want her kind of life? A never-ending wandering garnished with intermittent battle? Never knowing which day might be your last or where your next meal was coming from? She had ripped into the girl cruelly, her sharp words cutting, until Claudia had burst into tears and cried for her to stop.
      Nobody understood her…except for Haohmaru, and he had made it quite clear that he wanted nothing to do with her romantically. Oh, but that had hurt, the wound still hadn't closed after all these years. Charlotte had laid her soul bare for him and he had spit upon it. But she couldn't hate him; she still loved him, no matter how much she tried not to.
      She could never quite figure out what the samurai hadn't liked about her. Was it because she wasn't Japanese? Or maybe because she wasn't soft and feminine like Oshizu, his petite lover? Maybe she just smelled bad? He never gave her any indication of the reasoning behind his refusal. Charlotte knew he admired her skill with the blade and her fighting courage in battle, but she wanted him to admire so much more…
      She thought about him all the time. His unkept, black hair - impossibly long and wild. His knowing smirk and dark, laughing eyes. His bulging muscles, glistening with sweat. The way he carried himself, so conceited, yet kind and considerate to all those he dealt with.
      Charlotte sighed.
      You're doing it again.
      I know.
      She hadn't seen Haohmaru in many years...too many. He might be dead for all she knew. He was always fighting after all, constantly searching for strong fighters to test his blade against. Such a life was doomed to end badly, but still, she hoped he was well…
      Charlotte paused. She could see Brustoke in the distance, nestled in a small valley of oak and maple trees, their skeletal branches, glazed with snow, bleak against the white landscape. It wasn't a big village, but it was shelter.
      Enough daydreaming. She quickened her pace. Dusk was coming and the winds were picking up again. Tiny crystals of ice strove to imbed themselves in her unprotected face.
      She had been disappointed to see the first lines appearing in that face a scant few months ago when she had stopped to bathe in a river. Little wrinkles at the corners of her eyes and mouth as well as two lines on her forehead. One day soon, the first of many gray or white hairs would begin to appear in her golden locks, it was only a matter of time.
      You're getting old, Charlotte, face facts.
      You knew when you signed on that it wouldn't last forever. Besides if you get ugly enough, the men might finally leave you alone.
      As if any other man but Haohmaru could ever touch my heart…
      Charlotte shook her head at that last thought, smiling sadly, and concentrated on her goal.
      She came upon an ice covered sign, it read: