She had no idea what instigated the stir toward reality — the birth of her return to actuality. At first, she was nothing but a wisp of memory, her own memory of the being who once walked the earth. The being who mourned long before her final dying day.
Now, she began to physically congeal, a body forming from the elements. Bones calcified first, then muscle, a thin layer of fat beneath protective skin.
Soon, in addition to thought, other senses joined in:
Smell: the dank, musty odor of earth pressing around her.
Sound: the faint noise of worms digging through soil.
Touch: the resistance as arms moved hands upward, fingers clawing away clods of damp earth, at last tunneling through cold snow and grasping air.
The body followed, easily dislodging the disrupted dirt from its path. With one final thrust, she emerged from the ancient grave, clods falling from the fully-formed body.
Sight: eyes opened to stare at tall trees, pines, birch, and hardwoods towering beneath a brilliant blue sky. Snow piled high in banks and drifts.
Taste: tongue flicked out to savor the zest of pine-flavored air that flowed in on a deep breath and activated the sluggishness into awareness.
She frowned. Every part appeared to be functioning except one. She could not feel her heart beat, nor did her chest rise and fall, air flow in and out through her nose and mouth.
She stroked down her body, then stared at as much of it as she could see. A slender figure, high breasts beneath a ragged doeskin dress. Knee-high makizins on her legs and feet, lined with a soft animal skin and beaded in a remembered pattern her fingers had sewn eons ago. Hair long and tangled below her waist, held back by a band. Her fingers traced the design, the same as on the moccasins.
It appeared to be a zigwun month, one of those when the world was on the verge of opening to the growing and mating season after so long dormant. Maybe bobakwudagimegizi, the month after onibinigezis, the snow-crusted month. Where the frozen snow covering broke, slicing the asubikagun on the agim, the netting on the snowshoes. Though deep evening, nearing dibiguk, the sun was still a few minutes away from totally surrendering to darkness. The snow indeed had a hard layer, as though it had thawed some during the day, then refrozen as night approached. Icicles hung from tree limbs, formed when the sun hit snow-laden limbs and the melt dripped downward.
What had brought her back? Her thoughts remained listless, her movements lethargic as she took a few steps, then more. She had no idea where the trodden path led, yet kept moving as her senses awakened. As memories returned. At first, it was only wonder at being again. Then long buried pain surfaced … and the reasons for it.
She shrieked in misery and raced through the wilderness.