In Principio

Wake Up

These will be one shots about the Lady of Ice, a character I've created. (sometimes the names may change)
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She slept like an angel. A cold beauty by day, a pale princess by night. Maybe that was why Evalin felt drawn, to touch the silken golden threads that splayed across her smooth snow skin. Or how all the tension dissipated from the woman’s face making her just a young lady, just another sane, perfectly normal girl. Or maybe it was because they were both in the same bed, with Alevon silently sleeping on her stomach next to her, slow, even breaths moving her blue tank up and down.

It was too late to contemplate because her hand was already moving of its own accord to touch the delicate strands, to just lightly push them off of her back. Evalin wasn’t really thinking; no, she was just doing something in her sleep-deprived state with little consideration of consequence. It was too late for pragmatism with the alcohol in her veins from self-induced inebriation.

Her hand grazed Alevon’s back as she slipped the nearest lock off her back, revealing a patch of luminescent moon skin.

Alevon’s eyes flicked open.

It happened so fast, no one could have seen it. Maybe that was why they called her the Reaper.

Evalin’s back slammed hard against the bed as her arms were pinned above her, the blonde’s feline body straddled over her. Jaw set, her glacial eyes bore into Evalin’s skull, ruthless and distant. Fear crawled through Evalin’s spine as the grip on her wrists tightened. Alevon bared her teeth and snarled, sounding more like a vicious leopard than a human.

“Who are you?” she whispered, a crazed look gleaming in her narrowed eyes.

Evalin lay frozen as fear now spun a web of her arteries, closing out any rationality.

“Who sent you?” she spoke louder this time, digging her nails into Evalin’s wrists and drawing a thin line of blood. The pain sent a jolt of adrenaline through Evalin as she remembered what was happening. ‘It will take time. They shattered her mind. But she cannot be broken, and she will heal.’

“Wake up,” Evalin said, pushing enough conviction in her voice to keep it steady. Alevon drew her face closer, her long tresses making a curtain.

“TELL THE TRUTH!” she screamed as her face twisted into a hideous mask of rage. Her corded frame shook as she yelled again. “WHO SENT YOU?”

“Wake up, Alevon. This is not real. This is not real,” Evalin repeated, pushing more strength into her words as she willed the girl to become lucid. Alevon held her there for a moment as she searched Evalin’s eyes for a shard of absent truth. Evalin imagined for a split second someone walking through the door, and what this might look like to them. Blinking the thought away, she tried one more time, desperation leaking into her voice as it cracked on a syllable.

“Alevon.”

Evalin began to feel slightly panicked now, thinking that Alevon may not wake up as intrusive images flooded her brain, kicking her wild imagination into overdrive. Was there a knife somewhere? Just when she filled her lungs to shout, cool air hit her wrists as Alevon’s vise slackened. Her piercing gaze cleared, her face went blank. Evalin held her breath, eyes wide with anticipation. A small strangled sigh escaped Alevon’s lips as she saw where she was, what she what she was doing. She let go completely and slipped off, collapsing to the side where she heaved in great breaths of air.

What the bloody hell had they done to her? What vile, infernal being had cracked her beyond the point of no return? Evalin simmered with rising fury as she saw a young girl aged too far too quick, made done things no human should ever have to see, let alone do for a living. Alevon, the most fearsome lady across the empire, someone no man dared raise his eyes for and no woman dared even murmur about. It was rumored that she descended from royalty, and that the reason for her ivory beauty and icy blonde hair was that her father was Elvish and had conceived her with an angel of Milath’s Towers. Only rumors, of course, but Evalin couldn’t help but wonder that they came dead close to reality. She watched silently, clamping the heated ire in her body with the cold bitterness of the truth: Alevon had to be brought back, no matter the cost — even if it meant throwing her back into her past one more time.

Alevon’s breathing stabilized as she ripped the sheets off and walked to the open french windows, the night air caressing her clammy skin in a conciliatory manner. She said nothing, only stood there taking in the vast expanse of starry sky, the silence between them growing pregnant. At last, while Evalin had begun to drift back to sleep, she mumbled softly but audibly.

“‘For he is gone, where all things wise and fair / Descend—oh, dream not that the amorous Deep / Will yet restore him to the vital air; / Death feeds on his mute voice, and laughs at our despair.’”

Evalin recognized the poem instantly, and she was surprised that Alevon would be versed in such classic literature. The other girl, as if uncannily sensing Evalin’s thoughts, looked ever so briefly back over her shoulder to the bed, eyes downcast in what Evalin could only describe as mild gratitude. But before she could see anymore, the girl had leapt from the window and disappeared into the dark night, leaving only a light scent of verbena in her wake.