Chapter 6
Vidar
Her warmth still burns against my skin, a lingering fire that should be painful but instead feels like salvation. I lie perfectly still, arm draped over her sleeping form, afraid to move lest she wake and realize what she's done. What we've done.
Five centuries of isolation shattered by a single night. A single touch. A single human woman who burns like the sun against my winter.
I expected her to fear me when my control slipped this morning, when she saw what truly lurks beneath my human disguise. Most humans would scream. Run. Go mad from the sight. Instead, she touched my antlers. Called me beautiful. Invited the monster into her bed.
Impossible woman.
Frost forms and fades in rhythmic patterns where my chest meets her back, her heat forcing my cold into ever-shifting crystalline designs.
I watch, fascinated, as the frost ebbs and flows with her breathing.
Her skin should be blue with frostbite by now.
Instead, it flushes pink where we touch, as if her inner fire pushes back against my winter.
I breathe in her scent—warm, human, now mingled with my own cold essence.
The blending creates something new, something I've never encountered in all my centuries.
The mate-bond stirs again, no longer a distant memory but an insistent reality.
I push the thought away. Absurd. She is human.
Temporary. A moment of warmth in my eternal winter.
Yet I cannot deny what happened between us was more than mere physical joining.
The storm responded to our coupling, my domain acknowledging her in ways I don't fully understand.
Even now, hours later, the blizzard outside maintains a gentler rhythm, snow falling in patterns that mimic her breathing.
Her breathing changes, sleep giving way to wakefulness. I should move away, reestablish distance, rebuild the walls her touch has melted. Instead, I remain, something fragile and unfamiliar blooming in my chest like frost flowers on spring ice.
She stirs, turning within the circle of my arm to face me. Her eyes—ordinary brown, yet somehow more compelling than any magic I've witnessed—find mine. No fear clouds them, only curiosity and something warmer.
"You're still here," she says, voice husky from sleep.
Where else would I be? This is my domain, my cabin, my bed. But I understand her meaning. I didn't flee after our encounter. Didn't retreat behind walls of ice and indifference.
"Yes," I say simply.
Her fingers reach up, tracing the edge of my jaw where the skull mask receded during the night. My glamour has reasserted itself with rest—the antlers reduced to their crown-like appearance, the skin more human than frost.
"I thought I might have dreamed it all," she says.
"You didn't."
"Good." A smile touches her lips, unexpected and devastating in its effect on me. Something stirs in response—an echo of a smile I've forgotten how to form.
She sits up, keeping the furs wrapped around her. Her hair falls in tangled waves down her back, one shoulder bare where the covering has slipped. Frost immediately forms where my gaze lingers on her skin, as if my very attention carries winter with it.
"Are you... okay?" she asks. "After what happened?"
An odd question. I am not the fragile one here. Not the mortal whose body was claimed by something ancient and cold.
"I should be asking you that," I say.
"I'm fine." She looks down at her skin, where faint traceries of frost still shimmer in places my cold marked her most deeply. "Better than fine, actually."
Her frankness continues to surprise me. Humans usually speak in circles, in euphemisms and half-truths. She cuts straight through to the heart of things, like a blade through ice.
"You should have frozen," I say, the words emerging more harshly than intended. "My touch has killed before."
"Maybe you didn't want to hurt me." She says it so simply, as if the answer is obvious.
I consider this. Perhaps she's right. My cold responds to my will, conscious or not. And I wanted... want... her alive. Warm. With me.
"What happens now?" she asks, breaking the silence that has stretched between us.
A question I've been avoiding. What indeed? The storm still rages, though gentler than before. The search parties remain at bay. We have time yet before decisions must be made.
"Now you eat," I say, practical concerns easier to address than the larger questions hovering between us. "Your body needs nourishment after..." I hesitate, unsure how to name what transpired between us.
Her cheeks flush pink, a reaction I'm beginning to find endlessly fascinating. "After you tried to bring the roof down on us with those antlers?"
I blink, startled by her teasing tone. Then something long dormant stirs—a chuckle, rusty and barely recognizable, escaping before I can contain it.
"They did leave marks," I acknowledge, glancing at the gouges my antlers carved in the ceiling during our passion.
"Battle scars," she says with a grin, sliding from the bed with the fur still wrapped around her. "Worth it."
I watch as she gathers her clothes—now fully dry—and retreats to the bathroom. The space feels emptier without her presence, colder in a way that has nothing to do with temperature. I rise, dressing quickly, moving to the kitchen area to prepare food.
My hands work automatically while my mind circles back to the question she asked. What happens now? I cannot keep her here forever, though part of me—the ancient, possessive part—wants nothing more. She belongs to the human world, to warmth and light and the changing seasons of a mortal life.
I belong to winter. To solitude. To the endless cycle of snow and ice and cold.
When she emerges, dressed but with hair still tousled, I have a simple meal prepared. We eat in companionable silence for a time, the only sounds the clink of utensils and the distant howl of the storm.
"Will you tell me what you are?" she finally asks, setting down her spoon. "Really?"
I consider deflection, half-truths, the kind of mythical nonsense humans tell themselves to make sense of things beyond their understanding. But she deserves better. She's seen my true form, felt my cold inside her, and still sits across from me without fear.
"I am... a guardian," I begin, the words coming slowly. "Of winter. Of this territory."
"Like a nature spirit?"
"More and less than that." I gesture toward the window, where snow continues to fall. "I maintain the balance of cold in this region. Ensure winter comes as it should, stays as long as it must, retreats when necessary."
"How long have you been doing this?"
"Five centuries, give or take a few decades."
Her eyes widen slightly, but she doesn't question the impossible age. After what she's seen, perhaps nothing seems too fantastical anymore.
"Were you... born this way?"
The question touches on memories long buried under centuries of snow. "No. I was human once. Long ago."
"What happened?"
Ice forms on the table where my hand rests, spreading in agitated patterns. "A choice. A sacrifice. A winter that would have killed everyone in my village if someone didn't... become one with it. Contain it."
Not the full truth, but as much as I can bear to remember. The rest lies buried in ice so deep I'm not sure I could reach it if I tried.
"So you saved them," she says softly. "By becoming this."
I nod once, uncomfortable with the admiration in her voice. "It was necessary."
"And you've been alone ever since? For five hundred years?"
The question cuts deeper than it should. "Winter is solitary by nature."
"But you're not just winter," she argues. "You're still part human too. I've seen it."
I look away, unable to meet the understanding in her eyes. "That part grows smaller with each passing century."
"Until I came along and messed up your perfect isolation?" There's that teasing tone again, gentle but persistent.
"You are... disruptive," I admit, finding myself almost smiling again.
"Good." She reaches across the table, fearlessly placing her warm hand over my cold one. "I think you needed disrupting."
Where our skin touches, neither frost nor steam forms now—just a perfect balance of temperatures. Something has changed between us, some equilibrium found that shouldn't be possible.
"What about you?" I ask, turning the focus away from myself. "What drives a human woman to wander alone in dangerous territories with nothing but a camera?"
"Beauty," she answers without hesitation. "I chase beautiful things, even when they might kill me." Her eyes meet mine, making it clear she isn't just talking about landscapes.
"A dangerous pursuit."
"The best things usually are." She squeezes my hand once before releasing it. "My turn for questions again. Do you have to stay here? In this territory?"
The question catches me off guard. "I... yes. My power is strongest here. The further I travel from my domain, the weaker my connection to winter becomes."
"But you could leave? Temporarily?"
"For short periods. Days, perhaps weeks if necessary. Why?"
She shrugs, too casually. "Just wondering about your limitations."
Clever woman. Already plotting, planning, looking for possibilities I haven't considered in centuries.
"The storm is calmer today," she observes, glancing toward the window.
"Yes."
"Your doing?"
"Not consciously."
"But related to..." She gestures between us, another flush coloring her cheeks.
"Yes." I see no point in denying it. "My emotions affect the weather. My... contentment... has calmed the storm."
"Contentment," she repeats, a small smile playing at her lips. "Is that what we're calling it?"
Heat that has nothing to do with temperature rises to my face—a reaction I didn't know I was still capable of experiencing. "Among other things."
Her smile widens. "So, theoretically, if you were to become... discontent... the storm would worsen again?"
I narrow my eyes, seeing where her thoughts lead. "The search parties."