Sometimes, in the middle of the night, the sky would open up in a downpour. The roofs of the Regalian districts would ring of raindrops as they were battered senselessly. The streetsweepers would snarl in annoyance, beggars crept farther into their shadow, and guards on their late shifts would kick their plated foot out into a puddle, muttering.
Rain was not welcomed by most, it flooded the streets and chilled bones. Yet, still, by some, it was loved dearly.
As the coins of rain scattered over the roofs of the Holy City, children would be awaken from their slumbers- lightening cracking across the sky like a whip. Out of their beds, the child- whether they be a Tigran whelp or an Ailor that be the heir to a duchy- would pull themselves to their windows and peer out into the rainstorm.
The drops would lash across the wind and perhaps some of those children would be brave enough to creep out their doors and dance in the rain like fools. The storm would carry on and some would be found in the morning, asleep against the windowsill while others had gathered on the floor under the window.
But now it was winter, and it did not rain. The snow suffocated the city and those same children did not get waken in the night by the dropped coins of rain. The poor huddled away from the window, wrapped in their trampled blankets and no longer finding themselves dancing out in the lamp light of the night.
Winter dug her claws into the hearts of those children and with it, by Spring she had taught them what it was like to suffer. For others, they would not see Spring or her rain again.
