Clothilde pulled her hood a bit further over her face against the rain. Around her the sheep were bleating, not enjoying the downpour any more than she was. Even for autumn this amount of rain was unusual. Worse, there had already been cracks of thunder in the sky. If it actually started storming it would not be an easy task to keep the herd from bolting left and right. Clothilde needed to find some shelter, and fast. But her family’s farmstead was still far away, and with a storm coming she couldn’t shelter in the forest. There weren’t a lot of other options available…

 Well, except for the dolmen.

 She could see it in the distance. Four giant stones, one lying perched on top of the three others like a primitive house. It would be a tight fit for her and the herd, but it could provide some shelter. And as far as anyone could remember, the dolmen had always been there, so presumably it wasn’t affected much by storms.

 But you just didn’t come near the dolmen. Everyone knew that… things happened if you did. A boy from the village had once gone near it when pasturing his goats. The herd had vanished and to this day he had not regained his wits. And ever since he had arrived father Adomnan had prohibited the locals from going near, to prevent any pagan worship. Clothilde wasn’t keen on being lectured by him if he found out she’d spent time there…

 The first Lightning flashed through the skies and Clothilde made up her mind. If she stayed out here, she was in at least as much danger as if she went under the dolmen. If she was going to die either way, she’d rather die dry. So she started herding the nervous sheep towards the stones.

 With a bit of effort, Clothilde managed to squeeze herself and the sheep in the small space. She slumped against the stone for a moment, allowing herself some rest. The situation was almost kind of peaceful from here. The warmth of the sheep, the sound of the rain clattering and distant thunder from outside. If only the wind wasn’t so cold.

  “I haven’t seen you around here before.”

 Clothilde let out a shriek as she opened her eyes again. At the centre of the dolmen stood a girl. The sheep eyed her warily and maintained their distance, leaving a small circle around her clear. It was obvious that she was not local, nor a human for that matter. She was tall and lanky, with pale skin that shone eerily in what little light there was. Long and thick strands of curly hair fell from her head. She was dressed strangely, not in woven cloth but in a long dress of animal skins sewn together. Some bronze jewelry hung around her wrists and neck. Looking down, Clothilde gulped as she saw the girl’s feet. Cloven like a goat’s.

 And then there were her eyes. There were no whites or irises. They were just shiny, jet-black circles, almost as if they were made out of a beetle’s carapace.

  Clothilde quickly bowed.

 “I-I’m sorry! I only came to shelter here because of the storm. I didn’t mean to intrude or anything!”

 The girl looked her over before smiling, showing teeth that seemed just a bit too sharp.

 “Don’t worry, you can stay until it passes. No harm will come to you.”

 Clothilde nodded, still on edge.

 “Okay, thank you, miss…”

“You can call me Nissa. But what’s your name?”

“Clothilde. I uh, live in a farm a bit away.”

 Nissa nodded, and things were silent for a while. Clothilde did her best to keep the sheep below the dolmen, but Nissa’s presence seemed to act as a curious deterrent to them. The girl wasn’t doing anything threatening, just watching her and the sheep with a slightly bemused smile, but Clothilde could understand their nervousness. There was something in the way Nissa looked at her that made her feel on edge…

 Heavy as the storm was, it did not last long. Soon the rain turned into a light drizzle, annoying but not a threat. Clothilde turned to look at Nissa, though she tried to avoid the girl’s eyes.

 “Well, thank you for the hospitality. But I’ll have to go now, my parents will be worried.”

 Nissa nodded, smiling that smile again.

 “Of course. You’re welcome back anytime.”

 Something about the way that was said made Clothilde’s heart do a flip. She quickly turned to herd the sheep away without another word.

 ----

 Clothilde wasn’t sure why she went back to the dolmen. By all accounts, it was foolish. Father Adomnan had warned everyone in the village about demons with cloven hooves, and the old men always muttered among themselves about the elves in the wilds and how they would lure mortals to their doom. But something compelled her to go. Perhaps she wanted to know if Nissa was still there, or would come back. If the strange meeting that night had not just been a trick of the night.

 So a few days later, she herded the sheep towards the dolmen again. It soon became clear that it had not just been the cold and stress playing tricks on her, as the lanky figure of Nissa was perched upon the roof of the dolmen, cross-legged.

 Clothilde could not imagine how Nissa could have clambered up there, considering the lack of supports and the height of the stones.

 “I knew you’d be coming back.”

 Clothilde narrowed her eyes.

 “How would you know that?”

 Nissa shrugged.

 “I had a feeling about you.”

 Clothilde replied, somewhat testily:

 “Hm. Well, I hope I’m not intruding.”

 Nissa shook her head, before hopping off the stone.

 “As I said last time, you’re always welcome.”

 Without thinking, Clothilde replied, though she immediately regretted it.

 “Why? The last person who came here didn’t exactly come out of it very well.”

 Nissa hummed, leaning back against one of the stones.

 “The boy with his goats? Well, he wasn’t welcome like you are.”

 She wasn’t sure if it was wise to continue asking, but now her curiosity had been prickled. If you were going to get preferential treatment by a supernatural creature, you might as well know why.

 “But why am I welcome and not him?”

 Nissa shrugged.

 “I like you. And-“

 She grinned, walking closer to Clothilde, though she still stopped a distance away.

 “I think you’ll grow to like me too.”

 ----

 In spite of her better judgment, Clothilde kept returning to the dolmen throughout the autumn. Something made her come back and seek out Nissa, again and again. She liked to think it was just as a diversion. Usually she didn’t have any company while tending to the sheep, so it was a nice change of pace to have someone around to chat with instead of just watching the animals eat. And Nissa was a good conversation partner, even if she could be… strange, at times.

 Still, one thing that Clothilde found herself wondering about was the distance her companion always kept. Nissa always stayed a few yards away or so, without fail. It was starting to bother Clothilde. Something made her want Nissa closer. But that was normal. Nissa was a friend, somewhat. And with the other girls she knew at the village, she was always close. It made sense to want that contact. So it wasn’t long before she decided to inquire about it.

 “Why do you always stand so far away?”

 Nissa cocked her head curiously.

 “What do you mean?”

 Clothilde shrugged, trying to make it seem casual.

 “Well, you never come close to me, you always stop at a distance. It just struck me as weird, when the girls in the village get together we often stand much closer.”

 Nissa sighed.

 “It’s because of that thing on your chest.”

 Clothilde frowned, feeling around on her chest before holding up the small iron cross she wore.

 “You mean this?”

 Nissa nodded, glaring at it with unusual intensity.

 “We don’t like iron. Especially when it’s in that shape.”

 Clothilde clutched the cross a bit tighter, backing away.

 “Why do you not like it.”

 Nissa shrugged, before looking away to the sky as if nothing had happened.

 “I think it’ll rain soon.”

 ----

 “How did you get that?”

 Clothilde looked over at Nissa, who was staring at her face intently, her expression unreadable.

 “Get what?”

 “Your eye’s all black.”

 Clothilde reached up to touch her eye.

 “Oh, that. It’s nothing bad. We were out gathering wood and kind of messing about. Another girl from the village accidentally hit me in the eye with a stick. It’s just a bit sore, nothing more.”

 “What’s her name?”

 “Uh, Ada. Why?”

 “No Reason. Did you see the fox that recently moved into a den near here yet?”

 Something in Nissa’s demeanour bothered Clothilde, but she didn’t pursue the matter, focusing on the new animal instead.

 A few days later Ada stumbled into the village after foraging in the woods, shivering all over. She lay in bed for a few days, fevered and delirious, before finally dying. The old women of the village muttered about elfshot.

  ----

 In between it all, there were the dreams. She’d had them since she’d first met Nissa, but at first they’d been vague. She could only remember little bits of them, and they seemed to involve the strange girl. But they’d been getting more vivid and elaborate. They were filled with mists and an atmosphere of twilight, dark forests and a sky filled with gemstones instead of stars. There were people she didn’t know, dressed strangely like Nissa, dancing and revelling.

 And Nissa was always there, somehow. Dancing with her, leading her by the hand through the forests, hugging her. Everything there felt cold, and hazy around the edges, except Nissa. She was always warm and clear.

 Every time she woke up, Clothilde felt as if she hadn’t really slept. The dreams felt as real as her waking life, often leaving her disoriented in the morning, confused at the sudden change.

 Weirdly enough, it made her miss Nissa. During the day, the girl never came close to her like she did in the dreams. It made the iron cross feel heavy around her chest, more of a burden than a protection. The temptation to take it off was larger every visit and only a vague hesitance kept her wearing it.

 ----

 One day, while Clothilde was with Nissa at the dolmen, the first snow of the year fell. Not heavy, merely a few flakes that melted as soon as they hit the ground, but it was a sign of the approaching winter.

 “I won’t be able to visit for a while, once winter comes. The sheep are inside then.”

 “Will you miss me?”

 Clothilde saw Nissa looking at her, a slightly sad expression on her face.

 “I will”, Clothilde said, “It’s been nice being around you.”

 It was an inadequate way of describing what she felt. The idea of not seeing Nissa for an entire season distressed her greatly, especially if she was alone with the dreams. But it felt inappropriate to say something like that.

 “You know, you don’t have to leave.”

 Clothilde raised an eyebrow.

 “How so?”

 “In winter the boundaries are the thinnest. You could come with me to my home. We could stay there.”

 Clothilde gulped slightly, reading the meaning between the lines.

 “And what would we do there?”

 Nissa grinned slightly, leaning forward from where she was sitting on top of the dolmen.

 “We could be married.”

 Clothilde felt herself blushing.

 “Don’t be silly, we’re both women.”

 “My people don’t care about that.”

 Nissa jumped off the rock, coming closer, to the very edge of where she could normally walk. The edge to take off the cross was stronger than ever.

 “You’d like it, I’d take good care of you. You’d wear the prettiest gems and furs. You’d have servants. We’d dance until we’re too tired to stand, and then once we’re lying down, well,” she winked, “I’m sure you can imagine what we’d do then.”

 Clothilde had to look away for a moment, her face burning even redder.

 “So, what do you say? You just need to take that thing off, and we could go.”

 Clothilde wasn’t sure what made her hesitate. The proposal sounded so alluring. She wanted to do this, wanted the dreams to be reality. But something in her, a survival instinct or a vestige of what father Adomnan taught, made her pause. And in that moment of hesitation her nerves got the better of her.

 “I have to bring the sheep home, it’s getting late.”

 She left without looking back.

 ----

 The winter was a good excuse to not visit the dolmen again. In the last days of the season Clothilde took the sheep to greener pastures, so they’d be well-fed for the winter. And when the snows fell she had no reason to venture out of the village. The rest of the time she was stuck inside with various tasks and people chatting about her, leaving her little time alone to think of Nissa and her proposal.

 Once spring came, she had another excuse. At twenty-three she'd firmly entered marriagable age, and indeed a man had asked for her hand. Berengar had his own large farmstead and he was young and in his prime. He was as good a match as Clothilde could expect to get, so it was not surprising when her parents gave their assent and she had no good reason to object. The preparations for the wedding did not take long and by April she was no longer a maiden but a married woman. She never had to take the sheep out to pasture or even venture out of the farmstead alone anymore. There were servants for that. Once it was clear she was pregnant with her first child, she had even less reason to go out.

 That did not stop the dreams though. They hadn’t changed much since she left Nissa behind. The same images, the same activities, with Nissa ever present and warm in them. But they felt different in her new situation. Now that she was married, she couldn’t help but compare the dreams to her current life, and it was found wanting.

 It wasn’t that Berengar was bad. He treated her with respect and even seemed to hold a certain amount of affection for her. He was certainly better than some of the other men in the village. But she simply did not come to love him like other women said she would, not like she loved Nissa. The temptation to return to the dolmen grew greater every day.

 One night, not long after the birth, Clothilde woke up to the baby crying. As she soothed it back to sleep she glanced out of the window, where snowflakes were softly falling. She couldn’t help but think back to the snowy day when Nissa had made her proposal. Would it really be bad to go? She had given Berengar a child and had thus done her duty towards him. As for the child itself, there were other women in the village who could nurse it and it was not yet attached to her. Berengar was away at a meeting and would not catch her leaving, while everyone else was safe inside sleeping. This would probably be her last chance to leave without danger or guilt. To leave her dull life for the warmth Nissa promised her.

 After a few moments of hesitation, Clothilde went over to the huts table and put her iron cross on it. She wrapped herself in a warm fur cloak. With one last check to see if the baby was alright, she walked into the snowy night.

 She was already shivering by the time she came to the dolmen. The snow had died down for a moment, replaced with an eerie wind whistling across the field. The dolmen showed no sign of life.

 As Clothilde moved beneath the dolmen she started to fear. Maybe Nissa would not come anymore, after she’d left her that day. Clothilde couldn’t blame her, her sudden departure certainly seemed like a rejection. Maybe she should go home and forget about this foolish idea…

 “I knew you’d come back.”

 Clothilde turned around to see Nissa standing behind her, a warm smile on her face. The woman hadn’t changed a day since she had last seen her. Clothilde couldn’t help but smile too.

 “Well, I did say I’d miss you.”

 Nissa stepped closer to her, closer than she’d ever been before.

 “I see you’ve left that pendant at home.”

 Nissa nodded.

 “I figured it wouldn’t be very useful where I was going.”

 Nissa chuckled, wrapping an arm around Clothilde’s waist and pressing a soft kiss to her cheek.

 “In that case, we’d better get going. We need to go warm you up.”

 “We should. I don’t want to start this marriage by freezing to death.”

 That got a laugh out of Nissa. She grabbed Clothilde’s waist a bit tighter and lead her through the gap between two of the stones.

 Soon, the dolmen lay silent. The night’s snow erased Clothilde’s footsteps, a child and an iron cross all that remained of her.