Chapter 5

Luminesa

Why did it matter to her? She couldn’t say.

Maybe it was because she wasn’t comfortable with males who only walked on two legs. Or possibly it had to do with something else.

Truth was, she hadn’t a clue.

All she knew was that from the moment she’d been sucked into this strange world she’d felt an undeniable pull to the male. That when he’d looked her in the eyes she’d felt as though she was tethered to the ground by the very merest thread of string, and that one strong gust would snap it in half and she would float away.

That when he came close to her all she could smell was the beguiling scent of horseflesh, and pure, powerful male. That her heart thundered like horses hooves in her chest and that she was terrified because she hadn’t felt emotion this powerful since the moment of her rebirth.

All those things she felt and more, but none of them seemed capable of falling off her tongue.

Watching him through the looking glass she’d felt a spark of life flow through her. A strange, tingling warmth that’d robbed her of breath.

And even as she craved more of that spark, she was also terrified of feeling again. Not just feeling for a man, but feeling anything at all. For so long she’d shunted off those emotions, to the point that she’d thought herself deadened to them.

Her heart was rimed in ice and that was how she liked it. Her only worries had ever been for her children—the creatures that roamed her icy forests—the animals she called friends and companions.

Maybe as his horse she’d not feel this anymore. This strange curiosity and yearning for something long dormant.

He shook his head, causing the long ends of his black hair to swish down around his thick, barrel chest. Piercing green eyes the color of pine stared back at her with a heavy frown.

“Ice Queen, will you not answer?”

Her pulse stuttered, he was upset with her. It shouldn’t bother her that he was. It’d never bothered her before. She’d angered many creatures in her time, and none of it had fazed her, until now...until him.

She swallowed. “My name is Luminesa.”

Green eyes—far prettier than they had any right to be on a male—blinked. Long lashes fanned along the tops of his honey colored cheeks. She couldn’t help but wonder if his centaur half was the same shade as his flesh.

Inhaling deeply, she turned her face to the side, not sure why she’d offered him her true name when she’d done it so rarely in her life. Why had she come here? She could say she hadn’t known what would happen when she finally touched the glass, but that would be a lie.

Because deep down she’d suspected the true power of the glass rested in holding it.

Baatha hadn’t wanted to come. Even now she felt his resentment at being forced to. He did not enjoy people. Like her, he too had been hurt by outsiders, he could not understand her desire for coming. And in truth, neither could she.

If she could return home now, she probably would have. But she’d already tried. She was as stuck here as the three of them. Confused and irritated by her own strange emotions she made to turn, to head for the castle and a room farthest away from all of them, when suddenly she felt the roll of warm magic pulse against her.

Luminesa stood perfectly still, hardly able to breathe as she gazed up at the centaur male. As his half horse, he’d grown. Standing several heads taller than her now.

And her guess, that he’d be that same velvety honey color on his flank, had been right. Steam rose from off his withers, curling foggy white fingers through the chilly sky.

It was hard to see much more of him with the cloak on, and as though he understood that, he reached up and unclasped it. Dropping it casually across a forearm. 

He was glorious. Strong sinewy cords of ropey muscle and smooth, toned flesh. Like his sister he was also furrier than the typical centaur breeds of the great plains, his kind had clearly bred themselves to handle the harsh living conditions of her home. He wore leather wrist braces that buckled, a dark halter on his back, no doubt to hold a weapon of some sort. This male was a warrior through and through and she felt her pulse skitter in her chest.

She’d not been around a male (of any species) that exuded such an air of raw, primal masculinity the way he did.

But it was his eyes that drew her gaze over and over again, a blazing green that seemed unnatural, and that studied her as intently as she studied him. 

“I am called Alador,” he said it softly, but proudly.

She had already known that, Haxion had referred to him as such, but hearing him say his name now with that strong, gravelly inflection caused her flesh to break out in goosebumps.

By the gods he was a thing of beauty.

The winds began to pick up in intensity again. Sleet and wet flakes of fat snow dripped from pregnant clouds above. Alador shivered, clearly the cold did affect him.

Luminesa frowned, wishing she could help ease his pain a little. But her powers only seemed to go so far in this place. The magick hadn’t completely quelled her ability to manipulate ice and snow, but it’d lessened it to an almost laughable degree.

“Let us go inside before we drown in this,” she said it slowly, sending out a mental projection to her creatures to go and seek shelter as the night was only bound to get worse.

She did not trust this place. At all.

From the corner of her eye she caught Alador frown. “Are you not controlling this?”

Holding up her hand, she flicked her fingers, causing a swirl of flakes to dance ahead of her. “I can control the elements in here, but only a little. The magick the Goblin used is very powerful. I cannot turn this weather off completely.”

Baba Yaga was a true force of nature, her powers of darkness were legendary and feeling the wave of her dark magick rolling through this enchanted night, Luminesa feared that the worst was still to come.

The tingling force of power undulated along her flesh like a prickling caress.

How was she ever supposed to release them from this place?

Alador trotted gently beside her, tossing occasional curious glances her way. The way his forehead furrowed with frustration and how his lips would thin or tighten up. She knew he wanted an answer to his other question, the one about what part in this game she played.

Luminesa debated answering, or simply letting him draw his own conclusions, but she felt a queerness of spirit. Restless anticipation for something...though for what, she had no idea.

By the time they’d reached the courtyard made of glasslike ice, she still hadn’t a clue what to say.

She’d not been forced to carry on a conversation in some time. The tension between them grew thick and made her anxious.

Alador cleared his throat once they walked through the entryway toward the main part of the castle.

She’d purposefully designed it to look like her own ice palace back home. With multiple rooms hewn from thick blocks of blue ice that sparkled and gleamed like cut diamonds in the noonday sun. She’d injected the ice with a form of bioluminescence that would always glow day or night so that use of lights wasn’t a necessity.

Honestly she was surprised the magick inside this place had allowed her to design the castle. And while it was tempting to be happy that she could, she suspected that the palace was merely an illusion of safety.

Her stomach twisted up in tight knots of apprehension as her mind dreamed up a million different things that could happen to them this night. But it was all speculation, and the last thing she wanted was to stress any of them out worse than they’d already been.

She looked at Alador. He was staring at the palace with wide, curious eyes.

Luminesa couldn’t help but wonder if he liked it or thought it cold and sterile.

He bowed deeply. “I will find a room. But first I’d like to visit the children.”

It’d never occurred to her that he might want to. She frowned. “Why?”

And though his nostrils flared, his words were gentle. “Because they are children, Ice Queen.”

She frowned harder. He’d called her Ice Queen again. It shouldn’t bother her. Biting down on her back teeth, she swallowed the question on the tip of her tongue. The one that demanded to know why he still refused to use her true name after she’d gone to the effort to give it to him.

Then surprising even herself, she pointed her thumbs in opposite directions. “The girl, if she is now done eating, would be sleeping in the West and the boy in the East.”

His hooves clacked against the ice as he moved toward the west, she watched him go with eyes as wide and round as saucers. But he stopped, and turned to look back at her.

And again her heart did that stupid, stuttery beat in her chest. She curled her fingers against her breast, wondering what it was about the male that discombobulated her so.

“Do you feel anything at all? Or are you chiseled from the same ice this palace is?” he asked.

His arm gestured wide, encompassing the whole of the place and Luminesa could only blink, as her thoughts continued to try and suffocate her.

Though the words stung, there was no bite or condemnation to them. Merely curiosity.

Luminesa felt tongue tied and unsure of herself or how to even answer him. All she could seem to do was breathe and swallow and stand there like a fool.

Grunting, he shook his head and on his face was a look of such genuine disappointment that she felt it as keenly as if he’d slapped her. Handsome visage twisted in a deep scowl, Alador turned and left without saying another word. She watched him go, standing like a statue even once he was long gone.

Clutching fingers to her breast, she told herself that he was nothing. That these people were nothing to her. That she was here for one purpose only, to thwart the Goblin’s plans for her.

She swallowed hard, wondering why there was such a strange lump in her throat of a sudden.

Baatha’s shrill cry was what finally caused Luminesa to turn.

He circled her head, once, twice, and then a third time to let her know he wished her to follow.

And like an automaton she did, but her head was aswirl with a jumble of thoughts. How was she was supposed to set about freeing them, why had the Under Goblin done as he’d done, and why did Alador’s words continue to echo through the recesses of her thoughts?

He’d asked her if she felt.

Did she feel?

Looking back through her new life she tried to spot a moment where she’d really felt something. A spark of anger. A spark of desire. Fury. Fear. Curiosity...but everywhere she looked for it, she came up empty.

There’d been annoyance, and irritation, but those had been very low lying emotions, hardly even skin deep. The one time she’d really felt something was the day she realized how truly evil the Under Goblin was, but even then her conviction hadn’t been soul crushing.

But all of that paled in comparison to what she’d felt the moment her eyes had landed on Alador’s. That quivering, soul-stealing thread of anxiety that’d tunneled like a hot, little worm through her lower stomach.

And how her frozen heart had beat so hard in her chest it’d felt like pain the first time it’d happened.

Baatha wound up a spiraling staircase; she knew where he was leading her after a moment. To the study in the upper tower.

Dragging her fingers along the blocks of ice she inhaled deeply, allowing the cold to seep into her veins, to turn her pleasantly numb again. She smiled as the burgeoning pain, worries, and questions slowly eased out of her. The ice taking her fears and giving her that blank, emptiness back.

The peace of feeling nothing again.

That familiar emotion of stark barrenness where nothing hurt. Nothing pained her and nothing could ever hurt her again.

Landing on the top step, she turned and opened the ice door of the study. She’d not built a roof on this part of the palace, and so she stood out in the open, staring at the sky that danced with millions of flurries, losing herself in the peaceful tranquility of darkness that now blanketed this cursed place.

Baatha landed on her shoulder, his talons digging deeply into her shoulder, causing blood to trickle down her icy frame in red, frozen rivulets.

Above the lights of night danced, a painting of neon green and vivid blues that undulated through the sky like the belly scales of a snake.

Inhaling the frosty nip of the air, she quieted the jumbled thoughts in her head and simply allowed herself to become one with the ice and blackness.

No more doubts. No more questions. She would be methodical. Cold. Calculating. She would work out the Goblin’s riddle and she would send them home and then she would leave and never look back, never wonder about the centaur with eyes as green as spring.

~*~

Alador

He wasn’t sure what he’d expected to find when he reached the first tower. The children huddled into themselves crying out from pain and hunger and begging for him to save them. It was with shock when he opened the door and instead found Kai bundled under several layers of thick, dark fur.

The room softly aglow with a strange sort of flame from the corner hearth. The fire was crystalline in color, a shifting rainbow of shades as it burned and gave off its heat, making the room warm and comfortable.

Twirling, he stared at a table laden down with fruits, cheeses, and nuts. Pitchers of juice sat there as well. Frowning, he walked over to the table, picked up a square of yellow cheese, sniffed it—it smelled slightly grassy and nutty—then popped it into his mouth, chewing thoughtfully.

It was delicious.

Soft, but not too soft, with a sharp nip to it.

Clenching his teeth, he turned back to look at the boy.

The tow-headed child had his hands tucked beneath his cheek, his rosebud lips slightly parted as he breathed deeply without the strain of a frown between his brows.

Hooves muffled by the plush tanned carpet covering every square inch of the floor, Alador made his way over to the bed and laid his fingers against the boy’s forehead.

He was warm.

Lifting the furs just a little, he noted a new pair of nightclothes on him too. The Queen had given him new clothes?

Keeping his thoughts to himself, Alador turned and quietly left the room. Walking the long distance between Kai’s room to Gerda’s, arriving several long minutes later.

And again he found the same thing.

Frowning in puzzlement he stared at the blond-haired, pixie-faced girl who slept as peacefully as her brother.

Why had the Queen done this?

Her hatred of humans was legendary. She’d banished the children without so much as a backward glance. Alador had expected the worst. Expected to see them blue and shivering from the cold, or near to death. Not contented, not with full bellies, and sleeping soundly.

He’d not expected to walk into their rooms and felt warmth. Seen fire.

Not from her.

Not from a Queen who cared for no one and nothing.

Not from the woman who’d not deigned to answer a single one of his questions, the cold woman as beautiful as she was harsh.

He’d accused her of feeling nothing, and she’d not even defended herself.

Why?

Exhaustion laced every inch of his bones. He desperately needed sleep. Needed food. But his brain would not stop wondering, couldn’t stop wondering why she’d done this. Why she’d come for them.

Leaving Gerda’s room, he walked down several winding halls before stopping to stare out the icy window at a night that seemed to stretch on into eternity. Above, the borealis danced with fairy light, hypnotizing him for a moment.

The palace was enormous. Grander than any space he’d been in before. A centaur’s home was little more than a nest of hay to bed down into for the night. When the weather turned bad, occasionally they’d build a hut to keep the worst of the snow off them, but that was it.

His kind did not enjoy the feeling of being enclosed, he craved the outdoors, the vast expanse of forest. But even he wouldn’t have lasted long in this raging storm of ice and snow.

Muttering beneath his breath he shoved fingers through his hair with one hand, while he rested his other palm against the frozen block of wall.

It was the strangest thing, the wall was ice. But, it was also warm.

Which was bizarre, it should be little more than a melted puddle at his feet, and yet there was a perfect balance between cold and hot. A strange blue glow filtered from it, casting a radiance down the halls and through the rooms so that it was never truly dark.

Picking at the wall with his nail, he frowned at the glittering beauty of it. There was something oddly appealing about this place.

Cold, foreboding, and yet...alluring. Much like the creator herself.

And as though his thoughts had conjured the woman, when Alador glanced back out into the night, there she was. Standing as a sentinel, exposed to the cruel elements. But not buried by it, not like he and the children had been.

The queen—Luminesa—was one with the fury of it. Her long hair blew like a banner in the breeze behind her. Her arms were held high above her hand, and from her fingertips it seemed as though the ice danced for her, it swayed rhythmically above her.

In profile her face was even more harshly pretty. The gown she wore that looked as though it’d been built from ice sparkled like the flame that glowed in the hearths, lighting up the night so that she shone brighter than even the beams that swayed through the sky.

His fingers dug into the wall as he gazed at her.

Alador had only ever known the rumors. That she was cruel beyond imagining. A harsh mistress never to be angered, and always to be feared. He’d grown up hearing the stories of her as a child, that if you did not do as your parents demanded the Ice Queen would come and eat you in your sleep.

That she loathed humans, and would as soon drop them from a thousand foot cliff than show them even a measure of kindness. Then he’d grown into a man and his suspicions had only been confirmed by the knowledge of the treaty his people were forced to endure every time they needed to cross over into her border.

For so long the Ice Queen had been an enigma, the boogey-man they feared, the ruler they loathed.

And yet there she stood, silent, alone, and with her face tipped up to the sky with a look of desolate abandon.

She was no monster.

Not that he could see.

No, what he did see was a woman set aside. One possibly so terrified of feeling anything at all that she’d closed herself off to the world.

Keeping to herself not because she hated others—clearly if she could tend to the children as she had, she was not evil—but because maybe she no longer knew how to interact with anyone other than her creatures.

What had turned her into this?

Her lips moved and Alador caught himself wishing he could hear what she said, what words fell from her lips with such solemnity that even at such a great distance he knew she suffered.

Planting his free hand on the pane of ice so smooth it was glass, he shook his head. Not sure why he cared as he did.

One thing she and his kind had in common was their disinterest in the outside lives of others.

Except for him.

Alador had never much been like his people. Physically, yes. But emotionally, spiritually, where it really counted, he’d never been centaur enough.

Because he did care. He’d always cared deeply for the plights of others. A bone of contention between he and his sister was his fascination for the humans who lived on the steeps.

And now, here in the middle of a barren landscape, he found that same fascination for others begin to blossom for a woman built of ice, but who had a heart made of fire.