Frost knelt by the old stone bridge and pressed her palm to its arch. Ice bloomed under her fingers and raced across the stones. She pulled her hand back fast. Three winters alone had made her magic wild. She only wanted to reach him, to hear him say her name at the boundary. She stood and hurried past a fountain mid-spray. The water froze the moment her shadow crossed it. Jagged spikes shot up where droplets had hung in the air. Frost stared at her blue fingertips. They ached the way they had before he ever touched them. She ran for the path, but a small pond caught her eye. Its surface had hardened into glass while she passed. Dark flowers along its edge stiffened into black glass petals. Everything she neared was turning. The cold was no longer hers to hold. Frost pressed both hands to her chest and understood. The longer she stayed apart from him, the worse it would grow. If she did not reach the bench by the hour, her magic would freeze the road itself. She wiped frost from her lashes and started running toward him.

Frost ran hard down the path. The sky above her had gone pale gold. That was wrong. The hour was almost spent. She pushed faster, her breath sharp and white. Then she saw it. The cracked stone arch rose ahead, its ice-blue surface webbed with deep fractures. The boundary was thinning. If she missed the hour, the arch would close, and his window to wait would close with it. She broke through the trees. The log cabin glowed beyond the clearing, its windows warm, its roof heavy with snow. On the bench beside it sat a folded wool scarf, stiff with ice, snowflakes stitched along its edge. He had left it there. He had gone. Frost dropped to her knees and pressed the scarf to her chest. The light bled out of the sky. She had reached the bench. She had missed him by minutes.

Frost knelt with the iced scarf still pressed to her chest. Then a low groan split the air. The stone arch behind her shuddered. A seam of light cut down its middle, sharp and white. The boundary was not fully sealed yet. It was cracking open one last time. She scrambled to her feet and ran. Beyond the arch, through the widening seam, she saw a small glass chapel on the mortal side. Its frosted panes glowed soft gold in the dusk. And there, framed in the chapel's lit doorway, stood her mortal. He was turning back. He had heard the sound too. Frost pressed her hands to the gap. The cold stone bit her palms. "Say it," she whispered. "Please. Say my name." But her voice would not carry. The gap was already narrowing. Seconds. She had seconds. She did the only thing left. She shoved the scarf through the closing seam. The wool tore. Snowflakes scattered. The scarf landed at his feet on the mortal side. He bent. He picked it up. His mouth moved, shaping a word she could not hear. The arch slammed shut. The light died. A nearby ice statue of a fairy split clean down its middle, cracked by the force of the seal. Frost stood alone in the silence, her blue fingertips numb against the stone. But he had seen her. He had the scarf. He knew, now, that she had come.

Frost stood frozen against the sealed arch. The silence pressed in. Then she felt it — a thin tug of cold air slipping through stone. She turned and followed it. A short distance from the arch, a wall of flowers stood locked in ice. A single crack ran down its middle, thin as a hair. Frost pressed her palm to it. Cold wind whispered through. This crack ran all the way to the other side. A nearby stone pillar groaned, its icy half straining outward, as if her magic on this side already pushed against the seal. She had seconds before the crack healed. Frost lifted her hands and called her power. Blue light gathered in her palms and hardened into a blade wrapped with dark roses. She drove it into the crack. The ice screamed. The flowers shattered. The blade sank deep, wedging the gap open just wide enough. Through the narrow split, she saw him — her mortal, the scarf clutched in his hands. His eyes found hers. His lips moved. This time, the sound came through. He spoke her name. The blade burst into snow, but the crack held. Frost stepped forward, her blue fingertips trembling, and reached into the gap between worlds.