Silently, Donia drew the cold into herself, pulling the bite from the air with only a moment’s effort.
“No.” He went to the bed and pulled the heavy quilt from it. After wrapping it snugly around himself, he returned to her side. “I’m fine.”
When she didn’t release the cold back into the air, he repeated, “I’m fine, Donia. In fact . . .” He bent to the floor, opened his bag, pulled out thick socks, boots, several warming layers, a heavy coat, mittens, a scarf, and a hat. As she watched, he dressed, and once he was completely bundled up, he caught her gaze. “I’m going for a walk.”
“But . . . I don’t have all of that.” She pointed at his winter-weather clothing. “I didn’t know you had all of that.”
“You’re a faery,” he said gently. “Unless you choose otherwise, the only one here who will see you walking with me is me. You don’t need all of these layers.”
He held out his hand.
She looked down at the thin nightdress she wore.
His hand stayed outstretched to her. “Walk with me. The cold is pressuring you, so we’ll walk a little ways.”
“We’re in higher elevations, and I didn’t think about the temperature here and—”
“Walk with me,” he interrupted. “I’m already dressed, so you might as well give in before I overheat.”
She winced at his words; her reaction to his loss of Summer and his loss of immortality was still as sharp as it had been the day he woke up human. Keenan stepped closer to her and took her hand.
“Donia?” He waited until she met his gaze. “I’m happy. If I’m human or if we find a way to return me to being fey, I’m happier now than I’ve ever been in nine centuries. The only sadness in my life is that you worry over things you don’t need to . . . so stop.”
Donia half hid a small sob. “I thought about going out later while you slept, but I didn’t want you to worry so I thought about telling you I was going but—”
He kissed her, swallowing her frosty breath, pulling her ice-cold body against his heavily clothed one, and silently cursing those layers. He’d happily freeze to death rather than be separated from her skin.
Which is exactly why she worries.
With that sobering thought, he pulled back. “I can be careful.” He cupped her face in his hands and stared into her eyes. “I grew up in a home of ice with Summer inside of me. That’s not so different from living with Winter as a human. I’ve been trained for this. I can do this.”
Then he stepped back, held his hand out, and asked in an even voice, “Would you like to take a walk with me?”
Donia could feel the weight of Winter inside her skin; the blissful pressure tangled with worry over the now-very-human love of her life.
“Trust yourself. Trust me. Trust us.” He spoke quietly as they walked through the lobby, and she realized with a smile that there was something oddly freeing in being invisible to the humans they passed, but not to Keenan.
She’d never shared the joy of the first snow with anyone. It was a heady feeling, this first. She leaned in and whispered in his ear, “No one but you can see me, but they can all see you.”
He couldn’t answer just then, as they were passing the front desk.
The Winter Queen flashed him a wicked smile before nip-ping his earlobe.
Keenan startled visibly enough that the desk attendant gave him a puzzled look.
“They can’t hear me either,” she said in a level voice, and then she told him how she wanted to celebrate the first snowfall.
Keenan laughed and said, “There are days I feel like the luckiest person alive.”
“That’s nice,” the desk clerk said tiredly. “Have a nice night.”
“I will,” Keenan answered with a look at Donia, who understood now the sort of joy that made Summer faeries dance and spin.
She blew him a kiss and raced outside.
By the time Keenan caught up with her, she was standing at the edge of the parking lot. He took her hand and led her farther from the light. Once they were hidden from any passing humans, he kissed her soundly.
When he pulled away to catch his breath, snowflakes were falling like a thick curtain all around them.
“Where to?”
She pointed at the ski slopes in the far distance. “There.”
“That’s miles away. Let me get the keys,” he started.
“No.” Donia shook her head. “No cars. I am the Winter Queen, Keenan. I’m not going to start my season with a car. We go on foot. Anyhow, the slopes aren’t open yet, so we’d attract attention.” She paused and frowned. “You’d attract attention with the whole visibility problem.”
Keenan thought yet again that he’d be too much of an encumbrance to her if he didn’t shake his mortality. He didn’t bring it up, not tonight. He wasn’t going to risk the change back to fey without her agreement. They’d spent too many years at odds for him to want to start his second stretch of eternity with discord between them.
“If you hold my hand, I can be invisible with you.”
“Exactly . . . and we can still run as if you were fey. Hold on to me,” she invited him.
“Always.”
Without another word, they ran.
It felt but a few moments until they reached the very top of the mountain, despite their having gone miles. Donia closed her eyes and exhaled. Keenan stayed beside her, but he released her hand—becoming visible as he did so.
Reflexively, Donia became visible as well. He had faery sight, but they were alone on the mountain. She wanted to be as he was; she wanted him to watch her with his mortal eyes. Never had she scattered snow on the earth when she was visible to any other than faeries. Here, in front of her newly mortal beloved, she would be truly visible. She knew that faeries had seen her create snowfalls, but she’d never noticed their presence. With Keenan, she was as aware of him as she was of the snow and ice.
Neither spoke as she cloaked the world in white. It could have been moments or hours as she walked through the night and covered the earth; all that Donia knew was that everything in her world was perfect.
With Keenan.
In the cold.
Where we both belong.
Finally, she stopped walking and turned to look at him. He lowered himself to the ground as they stared at each other. She stood barefoot and barely clad in the snowy air; he sat in his bulky layers of warm clothing, a mortal in the midst of a thick fall of snow. Her eyes were frost filled, and her skin glistened with the same icy rime that coated the trees. His eyes were damp from the sting of wind, and his exposed skin was red from the cold.
He couldn’t have been here when he was the Summer King.
I couldn’t be here if he hadn’t surrendered his immortality to save me.
He is mortal, but he is here with me.
“If you’re never fey again, I’ll still be happy because we are together now.” She walked toward him, her bare feet leaving the first marks on the freshly fallen snow.
“Let me try to be fey,” Keenan pleaded. “Let me be a true part of Winter. Let us have forever.”
The wind swirled faster and whiter all around them as Donia lowered herself to the snowy ground in front of him. “What if I lose you?”
“If I stay mortal, you will lose me. Mortality means I’ll die.” He came to his knees so that they were kneeling, facing each other. “We can have eternity, Don.”
“You don’t know how it hurts, Keenan. How do I agree, knowing what that pain feels like? How do I agree, knowing it could kill you?”
“I won’t do it if you say no, but I believe it’ll work.” He leaned his forehead against hers. “I don’t want you to have to hold yourself back from me. I don’t want to be a weakness, but someone who can be fully in your life. I want you, all of you, forever.”
Instead of answering, she drew a wall of snow toward them and shaped it into an igloo. Outside, she let the storm rage. She felt it: snow spiraling wildly in the air, the icy wind she’d released con
tinuing to shriek, and ice coating the trees. Inside the snowy shelter she’d built, she had no need to release any more cold. She’d let it loose outside, and now she was able to free Keenan of those layers of clothes and celebrate their first winter together.
Late that night, Sasha crept inside the igloo, plopped down beside them, and nudged them with his head. The wolf didn’t speak—as far as Keenan knew, he’d never spoken—but the nudge was message enough.
Donia stood and stretched. “Time to go back.”
After Keenan dressed, Donia exhaled and scattered their shelter; the snow that had only a breath ago been a building now joined the rest of the snow spread over the ground. She smiled as she looked around them. The moon was high in the sky, and the perfect snowfall all around them gleamed in the clear white light.
“Beautiful.”
“It is,” she agreed.
Keenan laughed. “I meant you, but the snow is lovely too.”
Beside them, Sasha butted Donia with his head again, and a prickle of alarm went through Keenan. He looked to the open expanse of the snow-covered ski slope, but no tracks marred the white ground. He attempted to see farther into the woods, but his human vision revealed nothing.
She is the Winter Queen. In her element. At her strength.
The mental reminders didn’t allay his fears. Sasha wouldn’t hurry them on without reason.
Absently, Keenan lowered one hand to the wolf ’s head— and was rewarded with a gentle nip. He looked down as Sasha tugged on his hand.
“Don?”
“I don’t see any threat.” Donia answered the question without his needing to voice it. She understood Sasha more than anyone else ever had. He’d been her companion for years, and he’d chosen to stay with her when she became Winter Queen.
Sasha growled.
“We’re coming,” Donia assured him as she took Keenan’s hand in hers and they began to run back to the hotel.
Nothing pursued them, and no danger greeted them when they arrived. Keenan told himself that he was simply too used to there being threats, that he was worrying about his mortal strength being insufficient to protect her, that he was being foolish. None of that eased his mind, but he had no way to ask the wolf what had prompted his behavior.
The following morning, they checked out and were walking across the hotel parking lot when they were stopped by Cwenhild.
The head of the Winter Guard bowed her head to Donia. “My Queen.” Then, she frowned at him. “Keenan.”
He nodded in reply, but said nothing yet. The cadaverous Scrimshaw Sister still reminded him of other Scrimshaw Sisters who’d drifted through his long-ago childhood home protecting him from the world even as their mien terrified him. An angry Scrimshaw Sister was a gorgeous terror, and like the rest of the Scrimshaw Sisters in the Winter Court, Cwenhild was one of Donia’s guards. Seeing her waiting was not comforting. However, she looked irritated rather than alarmed. After a lifetime of needing to assess situations quickly, he relegated this to the “not life threatening” category—which meant the interruption was unwelcome. Moreover, the stern look on her face pricked Keenan’s temper. He might not be a king, or even a faery, anymore, but centuries of ruling didn’t predispose him to responding well to censure.
“Is anyone dead?” Donia asked.
“No,” Cwenhild said.
Keenan put an arm around Donia. “Then why are you here interrupting our first ever holiday?”
“Because there were witnesses to your . . . to . . . Human video exists of you looking very inhuman.” The way Cwenhild glared at him made Keenan want to either apologize or send her away. His having had Scrimshaw Sisters as nursemaids in his childhood had the unsettling effect of his now feeling guilt when any one of them scowled at him.
“You’ve certainly left me a mess to fix,” she said. “This business of your being human is not ideal for our queen. If you were fey, none of this—”
“Excuse me?” Keenan snarled at her. He was grateful then that his temper was easier to restrain than it had been when he was a faery regent, but even so, he had to remind himself that Scrimshaw Sisters rarely wasted time with politeness. He forced himself to say almost calmly, “I am human because our queen was—”
“Explain what happened,” Donia interrupted.
“There was a camera on the ski slope last night,” Cwenhild announced. “You, my Queen, were recorded creating a building in an instant after standing barefoot in a nightdress in a snowstorm a moment prior. The same video shows that building vanishing. It shows you with him”—Cwenhild nodded at Keenan—“embracing in the snow as an igloo forms around you.”
“Oh,” Donia murmured.
Cwenhild continued, “We had to hire mortals with technical skills. There is some sort of video page on the computer-net.”
“The internet,” Keenan corrected. “There are numerous video sites.”
Cwenhild waved her hand. “The technician said there were many ‘hits.’ This is troubling. I propose killing the video maker, but as it’s a human, I require your consent.”
“You can’t kill someone for sharing a video,” Donia said resolutely. Her cheeks were tinged pink. “I apologize for causing you trouble. It’s the first of Winter and—”
“My Queen!” Cwenhild interrupted. “You don’t need to apologize. I’m sure you had good reason to be visible.” She glanced at Keenan and, after a moment, sighed and said grudgingly, “And I suppose you aren’t truly at fault. You are human because you saved my queen’s life, and she loves you, and . . . I’ll find a solution to this exposure before any of the other courts learn of it.”
“Without killing any humans,” Donia reminded her guard.
“As you wish.” Cwenhild paused and shot a hopeful look at them. “I don’t suppose we could destroy this internet thing?”
The laugh that slipped from Keenan’s lips was quickly turned into a cough as Donia elbowed him sharply.
“No,” Donia said.
Cwenhild sighed. “You might want to return home. Many, many people are seeing this video.”
Behind Donia, a small group of humans were clustered. One of them pointed at Donia, and a boy who looked of an age with Keenan’s mortal appearance stepped away from the group and began to walk their way. Keenan started to move so that he was between Donia and the approaching boy, but Cwenhild snagged his arm. “No.”
“No?”
“You are finite, and you are valuable to my queen.” Cwenhild bodily moved him behind her, and Keenan cursed the scant human strength that made it so easy for her to do so.
She’d do so if I were fey too, he reminded himself. As an average faery, he’d be weaker than the Winter Court’s strongest fighters. He knew that, but logic did little to assuage his pride.
“Get in your car,” Cwenhild instructed. “Sasha!”
The wolf bounded toward her. He looked every bit the feral creature he could be, and Cwenhild—despite her human glamour—didn’t look much more civilized. She towered over the humans, a fierce young woman with corded muscles and an unwelcoming expression.
At the sight of her, the human boy faltered. He looked over his shoulder, and his friends came to join him.
Keenan opened Donia’s door as if there was no alarm, and in reality, there wasn’t true danger. Humans—like him—were no match for either of the faery women. The true danger was in gaining too much human attention. He’d lived among them for most of his life and had only the barest brushes of exposure. Now that he himself was human, he’d unwittingly contributed to the largest exposure he’d ever known of. Video of us. The wrongness of it all made him feel helpless.
Silently, he slid into the driver’s seat and turned the key. Without any further attention to the words Cwenhild was exchanging with the group of humans, he eased the car around them and onto the road.
“Turn left.”
“Left?”
“Left,” Donia repeated. “I am not going home because of one stupid video.”
“Don—”
“I am on vacation.” She gave him a look, daring him to quarrel, but he wasn’t going to refuse the opportunity to enjoy at least one more day with her.
He turned left.
As they drove, Donia sat quietly at his side. They were almost at the resort when she reached out and took his hand. “I’m sorry.”
“Me too,” he said tentatively. After a moment, he added, “What are we sorry for this time?”
She laughed, and a small cloud of frosty air brushed his cheek. “For letting my fear keep us from trying to change what you are. I don’t want to make your choices any more than I’d want you to make mine. If I were mortal, I’d risk anything to be with you. I did.” She took a deep breath. “I can tell myself that I might not have done so if I’d known how it hurt or knew that it could kill me, but I walked into what I thought was certain death twice out of love for you. I shouldn’t try to stop you, and I shouldn’t expect that you’ll be happy being mortal. I can’t pretend to be mortal. You can’t tell me it’s enough for you . . . and I don’t want to try to keep my Winter leashed. Last night . . . I wanted you to be breathing the snow into the world with me. At the very least, I want you to be able to be safe from it.”
He steered the car into the resort and waited until he pulled into a parking spot before asking, “Does this mean we can try to make me fey again?”
No stillness in the world could compete with the still of Winter, but he had learned centuries ago that sometimes patience was the best choice. He waited as the car filled with frosty air. He waited as Donia exited the car. He waited as they registered and checked into their room.
Then, she turned to him. “We can look at all of the possibilities before we decide what to try, but between the centuries you’ve lived and the centuries some of our friends have lived . . . I am willing to believe that there is an answer. We can find a way.”
Several icy tears slipped down her cheeks, but when he tried to embrace her, she held up a hand. “Your word that we will only try it if we are reasonably certain you won’t . . . die.”