Glaciana Frostcall's Arc

Chapter 10 of 10

Kristian's hand was still in hers on the water stair. Glaciana felt his fingers warm against her palm, and something in her chest pulled back. She had wanted this answer for weeks. Now she had it, and her body was already flinching from it. She let go of his hand before she meant to. He noticed. He always noticed. "You believed me a moment ago," he said. "I did." "And now?" "Now I am afraid of it." She stood and moved up two steps, away from him. "I have kept every suitor out with my song or my silence. You walked through both. There is nothing left between us. That is what I asked for. That is what frightens me." She walked back into the hall and did not look to see if he followed. She heard his boots on the ice behind her. She went to the outer arch and called her dragon down from the high ledge. It landed on the terrace and folded its wings. She put her hand on its scaled shoulder. The cold of it steadied her. "I could send you off on it," she said. "I could tell you to go home. You would go, because you love me and I asked. That would be easier than this." "Easier for who." "Me." She kept her hand on the dragon. "Every time I have been loved before, I froze it or it froze me. I do not know how to stand still and let it stay." Kristian stepped up beside the dragon. He did not touch her. He put his own palm on the scale next to hers, close enough that his little finger met hers along the ridge. "Then do not stand still," he said. "Flinch. Step back. I will still be here when you step forward again. I already crossed the sea to prove it." She looked at their two hands on the dragon. His was not warmer than hers. It was the same cold. She had spent so long expecting love to arrive as heat that she had not planned for this. She turned her hand over. He set his into it. She did not pull away this time, though the pull was there. She let it move through her and stay. "I am going to do that again," she said. "Flinch. Tomorrow. The day after." "I know." "You will not go." "No." She sent the dragon back up to its ledge with a nod. It lifted off and the wind of its wings pushed her hair across her face. She did not let go of Kristian's hand to fix it. The frozen thing behind her ribs had not melted. She felt it clearly, a hard shape she would carry for a while yet. But she had held his hand through one flinch. That was new. Tomorrow she would try to hold it through another.