The room stills.
I stagger back, my body nearly numb, teeth chattering as I stare at the demon trapped within its prison. My hand trembles as I reach for the poker by the hearth, but the moment my fingers close around the metal, agony explodes behind my eyes.
“Neve!” the demon screams inside my skull.
My hands fly to my head, clawing at my hair as if I could tear the sound out of me.
“You think it would be so easy to end me?” it roars. “I witnessed the birth of the world. I feasted at my master’s table while souls were devoured for millennia. I cannot be ended so easily.”
Its voice crushes my thoughts like a vice. I collapse to my knees, cradling my head.
“I will have you!” it shrieks.
But even with the screams filling my head, something familiar gets through. Chatter and bickering and tiny wings buzzing.
I drag my eyes upward just in time to see Mink and Fitz, each of them clutching a lump of coal in their hands. They glance at each other, nod once, and throw.
Their aim is true, and with their deceptive strength the blow lands like a boulder. The frozen mass shatters in an instant, fragments slamming into the stone and bursting into thousands of glittering shards, too many to count, too small to ever be whole again.
The sprites cheer, triumphant and wild.
Then silence.
The voice in my head is gone.
I push myself upright, still reeling from the pain, from the cold lodged deep in my bones, but I am free. Truly free.
I turn to Luceran.
He is still slumped in the chair, arms reaching for me.
I rush to him, collapsing into his embrace, sobbing against his chest as he gathers me close and rocks me gently.
“You can let it go now,” I whisper through my tears. “You can let the winter go, my love.”
I lift my face, my hand sliding from his chest, still rasping with shallow breath, to the back of his neck. I draw him to me.
Now it isIwho kisses him.
Where there was cold, I give him warmth. My tears spill freely, running down my cheeks and mingling with our kiss as it deepens. I feel his body strengthen beneath me, his arms tightening, his hands reclaiming me in a way that makes the terror of this night begin to fade into something distant and unreal.
Beneath my palms, his skin warms.
His blood pumps hot.
The cold drains from him like poison from a wound.
When my eyes flutter open, his gaze glows blue and gold, his cheeks flushed pink with life. He smiles against my lips.
Somehow, I find the strength to smile too.
And through the shattered window, in the rose garden beyond, a single brave green shoot pierces the snow.
Epilogue
As Brunemar thaws, I learn that warmth does not banish fear. The world Luceran and I wake to is brighter, yes, but it is also raw and uncertain, shaped by shadows that survived the long winter.
When the sun rises over Castle Frostwyn the next morning, Luceran, Atilia, and I sit at the dining table for a long while in silence. Around us lie the remnants of that horrible night: spilled wine and spilled blood, bright pink fruit left to soften and rot beneath a sun that has been hidden behind winter’s veil for an age.
