Frostbite: Awakening *Editing*

Chapter One

Alina  awoke to darkness. It was cold and harrowing. Her breath came out in short bursts. Red eyes were glaring at her. They were menacing and bleak, unnatural. She lurched away, but suddenly, hands grabbed her and she was yanked back by her hair. Someone was breathing on her neck. She gasped and tried desperately to wiggle away, but the grip was firm and her attempts of escape were futile.

The man reeked of death. Consumed by the smell of earth and decay, Alaska hardly noticed the pinch at her neck until the pain became too excruciating to withstand.

She screamed as her body fell limp, unresponsive and totally compliant to the venom-like substance entering her veins. She came to the sudden realization that he had bitten her. Her pain-laced blood pulsed weakly beneath her skin. The man's scent her only company as she lay lifelessly in the dark. She blinked blearily before she finally succumbed to unconsciousness.

Alina's eyes snapped open. Something was tugging at her wrists. With no sense of how much time has passed, she was surprised to find that the smell had shifted. It was no longer rotten and dismal, but sweet – fruit, maybe. Her eyes widened at the sight of her naked and pale body, icicles hanging stiffly from her hair.

When her senses finally returned, she noticed she was shaking. Shivering in the darkness, she fidgeted uselessly and breathed in the unusual and sweet smell she'd awoken to. She raised her hands to her face and brushed her fingertips against the cold and frosty surface of some kind of mask. She yanked weakly against it until it landed on the ground with a hard thud, ice shattering on the surface. Alaska stared down at it, eyes wide and lips trembling. Suddenly, it dawned on her how incredibly cold she was.

Every time she moved, she flinched at the sting of frost. She whimpered as she crawled forwards in the dark before she came across a tall glass door. Her fist pounded against it, so much so that blood began to surface on her bruising knuckles. She grunted before standing unsteadily, her knees weak and her body cold.

She gathered her strength and kicked at the glass until it finally shattered. Falling to the ground, shards of ice and glass wedged in her skin. Alaska gagged at the sight. She attempted to stand again, to get away from the glass and escape whatever hellhole she'd landed in, but her limbs had given up and she was stranded to the floor.

She screamed as she felt something slither across her legs. Desperately, she tried to smack away the snake only for it to pass her a moment later, bothered. Shakily, she pulled herself up against the wall, blood smearing across the surface from the cuts in her hands. She whimpered in frustration at how slowly she was moving. Her body was betraying her.