Stellan Aphelion's Arc

Chapter 1 of 4

Stellan Aphelion had guarded the Queen for seven years, and tonight his own hands were the threat. He stood in his tower, far from the palace, gripping his mother's crystal amulet against his chest. The ice inside him would not sleep. It had woken three days ago, when an assassin's blade came for Evangeline. He had stopped the killer, but also froze half the throne room then fled rather than harm anyone else. Frost crept across the stone floor. The amulet glowed and bit cold into his palm. It held the power, but only a little. The crystal cracked at one edge now, thin as a hair. He felt the surge build again, a pressure behind his ribs, and he could not push it down. He knew what he wanted, he just didn’t know if they were achievable. His first priority of course was the queen‘s safety, though he also wanted her hand. A guard dare had no right to ask but, neither mattered if he could not master his ability. A man who almost froze an entire room could not stand close to the one he loved. The doors suddenly swung open. A loud slam echos throughout his chambers. Evangeline stepped inside, her boots crunching on the frost. She had ridden alone, without guards, her hair threaded with blue and dusted with white beads from the light snowfall outside. Stellan backed away. "Stay out," he said. "I can't hold it." "You held a blade off my throat," she answered. She steadily closes the distance. "I'm not afraid of you." "You should be." His breath came out in white clouds. The cold surge began to grow. Ice spread toward her feet. She knelt in it anyway. From her cloak she drew an amulet he had never seen, silver and carved with snowflakes, a pale crystal set in its heart. "My mother left this," she said. "The old court called it The Frostbarrier. I think it was waiting for you." She pressed it into his free hand. The moment his fingers closed, the cold rushed out of him and into the stone. It did not scatter. It poured through both amulets, his mother's and hers, and found a shape. The ice on the floor rose and gathered. It did not freeze the room. It stood, four-legged, tall as a horse, fur made of frost and crystal spines along its back. A wolf. Its eyes were pale blue. It looked at Stellan the way a hound looks at its master, and the surge in his chest went quiet. He breathed. For the first time in three days, his hands were still. "You didn't run from me," he said. "I never will," Evangeline said. After a moment her expression hardened. "But I came to warn you. The assassin who died carried a seal. A noble of my own court sent him we just don’t know who but…he will send more." The wolf's ears turned toward the door. Stellan tightened his grip on both amulets. The power obeyed now. The danger inching closer to home.