Cigarette's Arc

Chapter 4 of 5

Cigarette held the bare starseed to her chest. Its light grew warmer in her hands, but faint still. Behind her, Jack Daniels struggled up on the ice. Ahead of her stood the wall of frozen wind. It poured down from the north, colder than anything. She had the seed. Now she had to carry it home through the wind that had beaten her wings. If she failed, the seed died, and the queen died with it. Jack Daniels lunged. She dodged his grab and ran for the wind wall. The blast hit her like a slap. Her tucked wings ached even folded. She could not push through this on foot. The cold would kill the seed first. She stopped, gasping, and looked down at the light in her hands. Then she remembered. The seed revives in open air. Its light spreads warmth. She had felt it thaw her frozen fingers moments ago. She held the starseed straight out toward the wall of wind. The seed flared. Heat rolled from it in a slow wave. Where the light touched the frozen wind, the wall softened. A narrow gap opened, warm and still. Cigarette stepped in. She held the seed forward like a torch and the gap moved with her. Warmth pressed the cold aside step by step. She walked clear through the wall and out the far side, onto open ice. Behind her, Jack Daniels reached the wind. He had no seed, no warmth. The wall shoved him back and he crumpled on the ice, shivering, done chasing. His voice thinned to nothing in the wind. Cigarette flew now. Her wings spread free in the warm air behind the seed. She raced south over the frozen cascade where the mermaid fairy had helped her. She did not stop. The seed's light steadied and brightened with every mile of open sky. The kingdom's towers came into view, pale and thin, half-faded from the world. She flew low through the crystal spires and into the great hall. King Four Loko stood over a couch, his broad shoulders bent, one hand pressed to a shape that was barely there. The shape was Queen Smirnoff. Cigarette could see the couch through her body. "I have it," Cigarette said. She lifted the seed high. "It's alive." The king turned. His hard red eyes went wide. He looked at the queen, then back at Cigarette. "Give it to her. Quickly." Cigarette pressed the warm seed into the queen's faint hands. Smirnoff's fingers closed around it. The light sank into her and her body grew solid again. Color returned to her face. She drew a full breath. But her hand shook. She looked at the seed, then up at Cigarette, and her joy broke. "It's cracked," the queen whispered. A thin split ran across the seed's surface. Light leaked from the crack, faint and steady. "Three nights in the cloth. It's dying still. This will not last."