Elentári Springborn woke before dawn, sure her King had come. She had waited for Christ in the Garden since God breathed her out of the first spring. All night she had planned the gift she would lay at His feet: a crown of Eden's rarest blooms, proof she had kept His creatures well. She rose from the castle of mossy stone and gold and ran to the flower patch to gather the first petals. The frost stopped her at the gate. White crystals coated every leaf. The exotic blooms she needed hung stiff and gray. She touched a pink petal and it cracked like glass. No frost had ever crept into the Garden. She pressed her palm flat against the cold ground and felt no spring beneath it. "They will all die by midday," she said aloud. The crown she had promised her King was dying before her hands could weave it. Hoofbeats broke the silence. Laurelin Meadowstride came through the white grass, her green horse-legs quiet, blue flowers in her white hair. The centaur had tended these same creatures beside Elentári since God made them both. She knelt low to study the frozen patch. "Your blooms shiver, dear keeper," Laurelin said, her voice soft and singing. "But frost cannot hold where fire still breathes." Elentári did not understand. Then she remembered the bronze lion that guarded the far edge of the Garden. Its eyes burned with living flame that never went out. Heat lived in that creature. Heat could save the flowers. "Help me bring the warmth here," Elentári said. "We cannot move the patch. We must move the fire to it." They ran to the lion together. The bronze beast stood tall, its mane catching the gray light, flame flickering in its gaze. Elentári laid her hand on its cold metal side and begged it to walk. The lion turned its burning eyes to her, then paced toward the frozen blooms. Where it stepped, the frost hissed and thinned. Laurelin circled the patch and cupped the dying stems in her hands. Elentári led the lion slow around the flowers, close enough that its heat washed over them. Ice melted from the petals and dripped into the warming earth. Color crept back. The pink and peach blooms lifted, soft again, alive. Elentári gathered the first petals before the sun fully rose. Her crown could still be made. She held the wet blooms to her chest and laughed with relief. Then she saw the ground where the lion had walked. Its heat had saved the patch, but it had scorched a black path through the Garden grass. The frost was beaten. Yet the creatures beyond the castle still shivered in the cold, and now the one beast that could warm them left ruin wherever it stepped. Yet, how did the frost come to this place? God had deemed it eternal spring? Who could have done this? She must go to the Tree of Life for answers.

Elentári left the scorched path behind and walked to the Tree of Life. The great oak stood at the Garden's heart, its golden leaves shining like coins in the morning light. Carved vines wound up its trunk. She had come here only when her questions grew too heavy to carry alone. Today the frost was such a question. She knelt among the roots and pressed her hands to the warm bark. "Lord," she said, "who broke the spring You promised? Show me what to do." "Dear keeper." Laurelin stepped from the trees, her green horse-legs quiet on the moss. The centaur had thawed the blooms beside Elentári at dawn, and worry still creased her pale face. "The trees whisper of a stranger in the Garden. Something new walks here." She tucked a blue flower tighter in her white hair. "I feel it the way grass feels the first cold." Light broke through the golden leaves. It did not come from the sun. A man stepped down from the roots, clad in white, a gold sash at his waist. White wings folded at his back. His hair shone like the tree above him. Elentári had never seen him, yet she knew him the moment he spoke. "You called," the angel said. "God heard." Elentári rose and bowed her head. The cross on her crown caught his light. "You are sent from Him." "I am Aurelion. God sent me to guard this Garden." His blue eyes did not blink. "The frost was no accident. An enemy crept in while you slept. He means to ruin what God made beautiful. He will try again." Laurelin stepped closer, her tail swishing. "An enemy. Here." She said it like a stone dropped in still water. Elentári felt the warning settle in her chest. "My flowers," she said. "The blooms for my King's crown. He will kill them again." "He will kill more than flowers," Aurelion said. "The creatures in your care are next." He looked at her without pity and without doubt. "You cannot fight him alone. I was sent to stand with you. But you must choose to fight." Elentári thought of the crown she had promised Christ. She thought of the black path the lion had burned, and the creatures still shivering past the castle. The gift she wanted to weave meant nothing if the enemy unmade the Garden around it. "Then I will fight," she said. "Tell me how to find him." Aurelion placed his hand on the golden bark. "The frost leaves a trail, like breath on glass. Follow the cold. It will lead to its maker." His wings spread. "I will walk with you." Elentári turned from the Tree of Life. She had come for wisdom and found a guardian and a hunt. The frost was not a wound to heal. It was an enemy to face. She felt the Garden change around her, and she set out to follow the cold.