I hope readers find it alright. It's my first story, you see... and please forgive me if you still can find grammar or spelling mistakes in the text. Hope you enjoy it! And by the way, please reveiw, even if you are reveiwing to critisize. : ) And I apologize for the short chapter...

Prologue

Akarat Kanda. That was what I had been told my name was since I was eight. My former name was Aconite Winter. An elephantine fire killed my parents. My mother was named Aconite too. Perhaps that was why my "new" (adoptive meaning) parents renamed me, given name and all.

They were kind to me after adoption, treating me like their own. I could compare because they had a biological son, Yuu, who is two years older than I am, but he freaks out every time he is called by that name, so insists that everyone call him by his surname, so Kanda he was. He was not mean, but was extremely cold towards me (and everyone else), and on top of that, he pronounces everything from a broken nail to a fire on the roof as "none of his business", whether he ended up helping or not, in a surprisingly irritating indifferent way. I believe it is because of this that I grew to be quite distant from my dear brother…

Chapter One

Five years after the fire. The scratching sound of my pen is lost in the ear-splitting howling of the wind. The amount of snow falling from the grey sky is so large that it is nearly as though it had not snowed in years and all the accumulated snow is being snowed(if you know what I mean) in these few days before spring is due. I probably would not notice if someone pressed their nose against the window panes.

"Aka," My name in short. "We'll be going for a few days, tell your brother that, will you?" That was my mother, dragging a multi-colored scarf over her neck, my father doing something alike beside her.

"What!" I screeched after them as they made to open the door. It was quite normal for them to go on business trips, but to go in this bizarre, no, deranged was a better word for it, weather was too much.

"Yes, dear, just for two or three days, like the few weeks ago," my father mused, misunderstanding my yell. Before I could explain that, however, he had opened the door, bringing in a great gust of freezing wind, and had soon vanished into the snow with mother, closing the door behind them with tremendous effort.

After recovering from the shock of their daring, I yell in the direction of the rooms in the house.

"Mum and Dad just went out. Again." I added. No reply. I take it that Kanda heard me. I subconsciously touch the ruby hanging on a fine, silver chain from my neck – the only remaining artifact of the Winter family.