1/2 He woke with a start. On his feet, Squall barreled wordlessly and thoughtlessly for the door, his destination requiring no such ounce of forethought. Restless nights were not an uncommon occurrence for him, yet the panic that raced through his veins and hammered within his chest was of a different sort. It wasn't his own. With only a door to separate their rooms, he was by her side almost instantly. Instinct propelled his actions as he reached first for her hand, and then for her shoulder.
2/2 She was cold. Theroom was cold. He saw his breath as his lungs grew greedy for oxygen.“Wake up,” he urged, fingers squeezing gently, “Luna. It’s me,it’s Squall. You’re okay, everything’s fine, but you need to wake up.” Still,the images that haunted her haunted him, “I need you to wake up.”
Everything was coveredin ice, and if anyone had looked at her in the first moments after waking up,it might seem that she was as well. She could see her breath in front of her,and the blankets were stiff as she sat up beneath them, an audible cracklingsound accompanying the movement. The air was cold, so very cold, but shecouldn’t feel it against her skin. It felt normal. Natural. And yet, there wasnothing natural about any of this. Fingertips tinged in blue pulled aside thecurtains around her four-post bed, and a dusting of frost fell past her fingersand onto the bed.
Beyond, everything wascoated in a sheen of ice, reflecting off the light coming through her window,almost blindingly bright. Blinking, she carefully set her foot on the floor.The plush carpeting was solid beneath her toes. The air shifted with the firstslow step into the middle of her room, cold against her skin, what normallywould have chilled her to tears, and yet now she felt nothing.
Yet this wasn’t normal.Fingers glided along the edge of her bookshelf, the books on it so frozen thatthere was no chance to warp from the moisture. The drawers in her vanity nearlybroke when she tried to pry them open. The mirror distorted her image in itsfacets and hairline fractures. It might have been beautiful, in some way, if thepanic of it didn’t grip her fiercely. She was unaffected by the cold, butothers would not be so lucky. Her bare feet and arms, legs beneath hernightgown, felt nothing, but others would.
“Mother?” she calledwith an attempt to remain calm, but her voice was louder than she had intended.He doorknock slipped beneath her grasp and she struggled with it, refusing touse her magic to destroy it. Whatever was happening in their house, it was herfault, she couldn’t use magic any longer, no more. A sharp edge sliced herfinger, but the door pulled open. “Mother!”
It continued into thehallway, all the walls and portraits and vases of flowers as still as if timeitself had frozen it all in place. Tears stung her eyes, burned despite thecold. She did this, there could be no doubt; in her dreams, she didthis. Glancing down, she saw the bangle still around her wrist: silver, withdelicate chains linking the bracelet to a ring around her finger, inscribedwith Esthari designs. And doing nothing to stop her magic. Her attentionturned away from the piece of jewelry and she continued down the hall.
“Ravus!” There was noanswer from anyone. She could not find Pryna or Umbra. No replies met her ears.Just the deafening silence of destruction left in the wake of her accursedmagic.
She pounded at Ravus’sdoor, chafing her palms as she gripped the knobs and turned, pushed, bore herbody weight against the door. No magic, she swore as she slammed hershoulder against the door, ignoring the pain, until it gave way and she sawinside-
To her brother, toRavus, on his knees, half hunched over, perfectly caught in ice amidst apainful death, an agonizing scream permanently etched across his face. No lifewas left in his eyes. No movement left in his body. She began to tremble at thesight. She couldn’t move closer, couldn’t bring herself to face what she haddone. She had killed her brother, probably her mother. She couldn’t look,didn’t want to see it. Instead, she left, closed his door with a soft whimper,and felt herself giving in to despair. She did this, and nothing hadbeen able to stop it. She was going to cause the destruction of the world,starting with her own family.
Her knees felt weak andvision blurred, but she forced herself to walk, blinking away the tears. Downthe stairs, feet firm atop the ice. She did not slip, though still she grippedthe handrail. Everything dripped ice, shimmered and sparkled. Crystals hungfrom the chandelier in the main hall. The walls gleamed in the sunlight.
Her chest ached and herhands trembled as she reached for the front door. She had to find a way to fixthis, to make it right again, to bring her family back. Someone had to know.The headmaster at Garden - his wife would know. Or perhaps a SeeD (Squall,she thought, but she didn’t linger on the familiarity of the name). A staggeredbreath escaped her as she opened the front door, and found the entire cityfrozen.
Everything was gone. Thestreets glistened, houses reflecting harshly, glaring light into her eyes. Theplants didn’t move in the chill breeze. No people moved, each encased in an icytomb crafted at the hands of their Duchess. Unknowingly, unwillingly, and yetstill so. The ocean didn’t move, no waves lapped at the shores. Somehow, evenit had been frozen. Only she moved. Only she was alive.
“You did this,” avoice spoke softly, a voice she didn’t know but that spoke so close, as if tobreathe in her ear. Slowly, a shadow raised from the ice before her, a dark,shifting veil covering who it was that spoke. There was a wickedness to thefigure as it reached for her. “You didthis.”
Luna wanted to deny it,but the words wouldn’t form. Her lips only trembled. “I know,” she replied soquietly, it would not have been heard if the world had not been so still.
“This is your destiny,”they said, moving closer. “To destroy…everything.”
The darkness filled hervision with each step the figure took, growing bigger, tainting the world withshadows. The ice glistened through a haze of dusk. Her left hand frosted overas fear overtook her. To one side, the shopkeeper walking the street shattered,shards of ice splintering Luna’s skin and falling around her feet.
A tree fell into piecesagainst the ground. Luna flinched, cried, tears burning her cheeks as personand animal, plant and house, all crumbled around her, sharp edges fracturingher skin, beads of blood dripping down her arms, legs, face, neck.
“You will destroy itall.”
“I know,” she said againthrough blood on her lips.
Her name was distorted,not quite belonging to the shadow, coming from somewhere else.
“It’s me-” Thewords shifted, as if coming in through static, and for longer than she knew,she couldn’t focus on it. The shadow was too big to turn from, reached for her,fear tightening around her heart. “-it’s Squall.”
Squall. She blinked andturned her gaze to the side, looking for him.
“You’re okay-” He’scoming in clearer, his voice reaching her, and she realizes, “-need you to wakeup.”
“No,” she says in thedream, to the shadow, to the pain in her skin and the fear in her chest. Shesays it aloud as she grips his hand tightly, struggles against the nightmareuntil she’s free of it, until she awakes with a sharp breath, and the onlydarkness in her eyes is of her room. It’s cold, but he’s warm, and she feels both.
“No,” she says again, again,sitting and bringing her knees up and crying into her other hand. She knows itisn’t real, that it’s just a dream, yet still she holds his hand tightly, letsthe warmth she feels from him slowly slip through her fingers and into theroom, dissipating the chill. Slowly. Slowly, as the hold fear has over herslowly loosens its grip. She wants to apologize to him for waking him, forbeing so afraid, but she can’t form any words. She wants to tell him she’ssorry.
Maybe he can feel itanyway, through the rest of her distress.
