The next day, Talia could still feel the aftereffects of last night in her body as she relaxed against Alek’s chest in the back of a taxi on the way home.

It had been like a dream. A living dream that even now she didn’t want to wake up from.

Her phone dinged, and she pulled it out of her purse to glance at it, worrying it was Dr. Henrick.

Hey, made some discoveries. You might want to see them, her friend Iris sent.

Worry and excitement bubbled inside her at once, making her stomach churn. It sounded urgent.

What kinds of things? she texted back.

The kinds of things I wouldn’t try to explain over text…

Iris was always a straight shooter, not one to exaggerate small things. So even she must have found something big to be texting so cryptically.

“Is everything all right?” Alek asked, looking down at her.

“No. Well, yes. The results from yesterday are in. Iris wants me to take a look at them.”

“It seems urgent.”

“Can’t say for sure. Would it be okay if we took a short detour?” Talia asked, trying to ignore the pounding sensation her heart was making in her chest.

“Certainly. Whatever you want,” he said, the tiny grin on his lips present that only seemed to be there when he was looking directly at her.

She gave the address to the cab driver who thankfully knew his way around campus. A few minutes later, they were directly in the biology building.

“Her office is just inside. Do you want to come?”

Alek shook his head. “The scent of blood and other things in her workroom is a bit unsettling. But if you do need me, just call.” He waved his phone at her, and she couldn’t help feeling a bit of pride at his impressive use of tech in spite of where he’d been only a few days ago.

“Okay, I’ll just be a minute.” She hopped out of the cab, pulling her jacket around her, glad it was a weekend so the campus should be fairly empty and not draw attention to the fact she was still wearing her clothes from their date last night.

Thankfully, it was an incredibly short walk to Iris’s lab. And when Talia knocked on the door, Iris let her in immediately.

“Wow. Hot date, huh?” Iris remarked, sitting in her chair and already focused back on her computer screen full of numbers and graphs.

“Yes.”

“With the big guy? How hot?” The click-clack of her fingers on her keyboard filled the relative silence.

Talia didn’t respond, but her blush didn’t help protect her secrecy.

“Nice.” Iris glanced over at her, smiling with her mouth but not her eyes. “You deserve it, honestly. But…” She trailed off, again returning to the monitor.

“What did you find?”

“Take a look at this.” She turned the screen to face Talia, and she glanced at a long row of columns. In the middle was a column simply marked “Specimen A.”

“At first glance, his blood seems quite normal. Red blood cell count is good, higher than normal. Leukocytes are perfectly hardy. But compare that last graph to this—” She clicked a button, and a similar graph popped up, overlaid on it. All the bars, with one exception, showed changes in height.

“So his cells don’t replicate at abnormal speeds. That’s good.”

“No. They don’t die.” She clicked several more times, and more overlays appeared. “I put a sample of replicating cells extracted from his blood into several different environments. Ideal conditions, less-than-ideal conditions. Even straight-up toxic conditions. They’re resistant to practically everything.”

Another button click showed a graph with all bars set to zero, with the exception of specimen A, whose bar indicated an unchanging cell count.

“That’s at sub-zero temperatures,” Iris said, adjusting her glasses. “Not even cancer cells can survive those conditions. None but the hardiest of bacteria can, either.”

“So they’re invulnerable.” Talia’s brain was still trying to process everything. The world where she was a scientist, a professional, and the world where her fairy-tale love had appeared from nowhere were merging uncomfortably.

“Not necessarily. Mostly just to environmental stressors—heat, cold, et cetera. Especially cold. This morning, I tried intentionally killing some of the samples off just to see how they’d react.” She folded her arms as she spoke, staring intently at the screen as it illuminated her features. “It took extremely volatile vectors to even dent the cultures. I had to straight up pour acid in one of them. Even still, a few cells remained, and they’re recovering like nothing happened.”

“So even if they do die…?” Talia asked.

“They just bounce right back. But unlike most organisms that have the problem of overproducing, these just go back to a normal, homeostatic state and stop. As if to say, ‘Okay, this is enough cells, guys. We’re done here.’ Like they knew how many there were to begin with and are intent on just returning to ideally functioning levels.”

“So not just their environmental immunity, but also their regenerative capabilities are abnormal.”

“Talia, I’ve seen abnormal. This, it’s… It’s incredible. Straight up science fiction from a medical perspective.” Iris, whose disposition was usually as unflinching as her commitment to her vocation, appeared genuinely stunned.

Talia couldn’t believe it either. Granted, she was just a PhD student at a fairly unknown university. But the data spoke for itself.

Alek was no ordinary man.

Granted, she kind of suspected it ever since he’d emerged from a block of solid ice. But the more normal he’d acted, the closer they’d come together, the more the occurrence felt like a distant memory in her mind.

“Can we keep this between us just for now?” Talia asked, hands clasped together tightly.

“Of course,” Iris said earnestly. “You’re my friend. I wouldn’t want to do anything to hurt you or Alek.” She swayed back and forth a bit in her rotating office chair, looking pensive. “Besides, these are just preliminary results anyway. I don’t think anyone else would believe them if they saw them. It defies our current understandings of the way human bodies work.”

“What do you think this means?”

Iris laughed. “Didn’t they teach you the scientific method in Bio 101? You can’t go explaining results without context.”

Talia grinned at that.

“Honest answer. I don’t know,” Iris said. “And maybe the less we know, for now, the better. That is until we actually know something about Alek to give us context. Until then, my lips are sealed.”

“What will you do with the samples?”

“Keep a few on ice somewhere safe. Destroy the rest. I don’t want some undergrad stumbling into my work and letting this get out. But promise me you’ll be careful. We might be messing with things way above our pay grade here. Maybe even some secret government shit or something.”

Talia stood, grateful to have such a stellar friend. Iris stood, too, and they hugged for a moment.

“Also, you owe me details about last night,” Iris whispered conspiratorially.

Talia nodded, and she left the lab, the sight of Iris sitting and sighing to herself as she stared at the screen in consternation the last thing before the heavy door clicked closed.

Talia took a deep breath and counted to ten.

Did Alek even know he was special? Certainly, his bearing and overly aggrandized sense of self when he first awoke seemed to imply such. But right now, he was just… Alek. Alek, whose kisses lit her body on fire. Alek, whose blue eyes she could get lost in.

Alek, who arm wrestled an entire team of football players in their prime.

Alek, who somehow survived internment in solid ice.

Did he know and was keeping it secret from her?

Talia started walking down the hall, the sound of her boots on the linoleum keeping her thoughts moving at an even pace.

She was fairly convinced that he did have amnesia. Large pockets of Alek’s memory were still lost to him. Perhaps whatever made him unique—and somehow connected to all of these recent discoveries—was still a mystery to himself.

Perhaps it was just some genetic anomaly. An evolutionary leap the defied normal conventions.

More than ever, Talia knew she needed to keep Alek’s existence secret. At first, he was special because he was the man that had survived for centuries. Now he was special because he was the man that had somehow captured her heart.

For the time being, she would at least tell him about the test results, as promised. She owed him that much.

* * *

Talia had seen something on the blood tests. That much was certain, Alek thought as he watched her get back into the taxi with wide eyes and flushed cheeks.

His curiosity was piqued even further when she asked the driver to take the scenic route around the forest at the back of the university, saying she wanted to chat a bit on the way home.

Alek cast a wary look at the driver but noted he had some kind of headphones on and probably wouldn’t get any ideas about listening in.

“So what did you want to tell me?” He turned to her, resting his hands on his knees, liking how close she was to him as they took up most of the back seat.

Her hair was pulled back in a tight bun, as usual, and she looked every bit the scientist she was, though her eyes sparkled with passion just as they had the night before.

Well, maybe not the same kind of passion, but he liked that she seemed to love her work.

“It’s… incredible.” She smoothed an invisible strand of hair back into place nervously. “We’ve never seen anything like it. The blood tests came back and… well, I don’t even know how to explain it.”

He took a deep breath, wondering if this was the time to start explaining that he was a dragon and of course his blood would be different. But then a moment of hesitation stopped him. If she knew what he was, would she turn him in somewhere? Would she be frightened to have him sharing her world?

He knew he could never hurt her and she had nothing to fear from him. He was the lord of winter, after all, and all he cared about was protecting her heart.

All he wanted was her happiness.

So a part of him was a little nervous to explain to his little scientist that he was something no science could explain.

Especially since he couldn’t really prove it, given the unreliability of his powers.

“So what did the tests say? If you can make it simple for me,” he asked nervously.

“I… I mean it’s hard to explain, but you’re just, in a word, special. I’m not sure what, but it’s the reason you survived the cryogenic freeze, despite the unsterile and fluctuating conditions. It’s in your DNA, your blood. It’s nothing like a normal human’s.”

For some reason, his heart was starting to pound, and he could feel sweat beading at the top of his head. “Ah. What is it, then? Do you know?”

“I don’t know,” she said, shrugging. “Iris wants to do more tests, but she’s holding off for now. She’ll keep our secret, because I’m not really sure what I want to do with the information now.” She reached out and took his hand, and he wondered if she could feel how cold and clammy it was. “But regardless, you were right all along. You aren’t normal. You are special. More importantly, you’re healthy and fine. More than healthy. As I said, special.”

The word special was echoing through him painfully. Not the word itself, but the meaning behind it. He could sense that, in another language, he’d heard it many times before. So why did it unnerve him? Why was his head pounding so dreadfully?

He pulled away from her to rub at his temples with both hands. He’d had headaches since he was unfrozen, but never as bad as this.

“Are you okay?”

“Hm,” he replied carefully, not wanting to move very much, as pain was shooting through his body.

Act normal.

“So what do you want to do with this information?” he asked.

“Well, I mean, I want to still study you. But I also want to get close to you, one step at a time, as we have been. Deep down, this doesn’t change anything. I liked you when I met you. I still like you now. Of course, the scientist in me is going crazy since this is the find of a lifetime.”

He looked up at her warily. Would he become only a project to her?

She took his hand. “But for the first time, work is not what I’m worried about. I want to help you be happy. I want to be happy, too. Honestly, I’m just glad there’s not anything wrong.” She sighed. “Whatever you are, we can figure it out together.” She leaned onto his shoulder. “As long as you’re not about to drop dead on me, I’m good.” She sat up abruptly again. “Though, I admit I’m curious. I mean, what if you had superior DNA even back then? What if there really were ice kings and people who were basically worshipped by others because of their superior abilities? What if you really were special?”

That was it. The moment his mind started breaking. Though he wanted to be there with her, to hold her and talk about last night and their future, he couldn’t because the past was flooding in with a rush of icy cold.

“Stop!” he yelled, startling the taxi driver. “I need to get out.”

They were still passing through the forest, and Talia put a hand on his arm to stop him, an alarmed look on her face. “You can’t. It’s cold out, and—”

He gave her a firm look, shaking his head desperately. “Stay here. Go home. I need to… be alone right now.”

The taxi skidded to a halt, and Alek shoved the door open and stumbled out, jogging out into the deep snow, not really caring where he went as long as it was away from her.

He didn’t feel safe around her right now. He didn’t feel in control.

He could hear her calling him before she finally shut the door, making a sound of frustration.

He looked up to see a literal blizzard of ice and wind surrounding him as he walked deeper into the forest, perhaps a sign that things were finally shaken loose in his heart.

He bowed his head as he pressed onward into the snow, into the forest, into his memories, knowing the only option for him was the least desirable.

Finally facing his past.