Frostmere, Aiseryn.
In the heart of the frost-laced kingdom of Aiseryn, nestled within towering ice-covered peaks and encircled by frozen lakes, stood Frostmere ... a castle of unforgiving beauty and stoic silence.
The cold never left Frostmere.
Even in summer, the air hummed with the chill of ancient snow and whispering winds, a place where warmth was a distant memory.
High in the castle's north wing, framed by a towering window carved from enchanted ice, stood a man who seemed carved from winter itself.
Neris Winterbourne.
The Lord of Ice and Water, Warden of Winter, gazed out through the tall arched window. He was every bit the legend whispered in the southern courts.
The fading light of day glazed the snowfields in silver. His long silken hair .. a pale icy blue ..flowed straight to his mid-back, catching the light like strands of moonlight.
He stood 6'2, lean yet carved with the discipline of power, like a sword concealed in frost. His piercing crystal-blue eyes remained fixed on the distant horizon, unreadable. He was both beauty and blade....refined, lethal, cold
Behind him, a steward whispered something low and careful. "My lord... it is done."
As the words landed, Neris's expression changed. Neris didn't move at first. Didn't even blink.
Then, ever so slightly, his expression shifted. His jaw tightened. His breath frosted the air.
The window in front of him clouded over in a web of frost so sudden and furious, it cracked at the corners.
"Who gave the order?" he asked quietly, his voice like ice scraping steel.
The advisor hesitated. "It was... your mother, my lord. The Dowager Queen."
Silence.
And then Neris turned, his cloak swirling behind him as he strode out of the chamber like a coming blizzard, the walls frosting in his wake.
his boots echoing like thunder through the marble corridors. The temperature around him dropped. Courtiers and servants parted in silence, heads lowered, breaths fogging as the chill of his fury bled into the hall.
He didn't slow until he reached a familiar set of tall, ornate doors.
He stopped in front of a tall set of double doors ....polished wood carved with scenes of winter wolves and glacial forests. He didn't bother to knock. With a swift push, he burst into the room.
The Dowager Queen, Morwenna Winterbourne, sat in regal repose on her lounge chair ... her posture flawless, her face serene.
She had once been known across the realms as the Iceflower of the North. Though silver now threaded her raven-black hair, and time had sharpened her beauty into something colder, the iron will behind her calm gaze had not dulled.
Two maids were attending to her. One knelt at her feet, meticulously shaping her toenails. The other massaged her shoulders with scented oil. Morwenna's eyes were closed, her fingers curled around a delicate goblet of iced wine.
She didn't flinch at his entrance. She didn't even open her eyes....until she felt the drop in temperature.
"Close the door, Neris. You're letting in a storm," she murmured.
"What have you done?" Neris snapped, ignoring her instruction.
"You're angry," she said calmly, not bothering to rise. "I take it the news has reached you."
Her eyes snapped open the moment her son uttered those words. She gave a small sigh and dismissed the maids with a flick of her hand.
"Leave us."
They obeyed swiftly, skirts swishing as they scurried out.
"Why, Mother?" Neris said, his voice dangerously controlled. "Why would you do such a thing without speaking to me first?"
Morwenna took a calm sip of her wine before responding. "Do what, exactly, that has you storming through the halls like a tempest?"
Morwenna met her son's glare with aristocratic calm.
"You'll need to be more specific," she said, swirling the wine in her goblet. "I act without your consent quite often."
"Don't play coy. You know what. You sent a message to the South .... to Azarion ...requesting to annul my engagement to Aurelia. You did it in my name."
The room grew colder. Frost gathered in delicate patterns on the marble floor beneath Neris's boots.
Morwenna sighed and set her goblet down on a tray. "I thought you'd thank me."
Neris clenched his jaw. "Thank you? For making a mockery of my word?"
"You had no right."
"No right? I am your mother, Neris. I have every right."
"She was promised to me. That oath was sealed in fire and ice, with both gods as witness."
Morwenna stood, adjusting the folds of her gown. She arched a brow, unbothered.
"Tell me, son ... if I hadn't acted, would you have gone through with it? And would you have honored that oath, truly? Would you truly have married her, knowing what she has become?"
Neris's fists curled at his sides. "Yes. A man's word is his bond."
Morwenna gave a short, disbelieving laugh. "Spare me the theatrics, Neris. If you intended to marry her, you'd have done so the moment she turned eighteen. That was years ago. You stalled, waited, ignored every letter. So don't lie to me now."
He turned away from her, running a hand through his hair. Frustration carved itself into his expression.
"Even her own father couldn't bear to look at her," Morwenna continued, her voice low but biting. "He locked her away in a tower. There were whispers .... whispers I refused to believe until I had them investigated myself."
She rose gracefully, moving across the room like a shadow cast by the moon.
Morwenna's voice turned sharper. "Even her own father locked her in a tower, Neris. For years. Do you think that was just cruelty? No. It was shame.
I've heard whispers for years...of her deformity, of the curse that devoured her beauty. Azarion hid her from the world, but not well enough. I found out. I saw the truth with my own eyes. That girl is cursed, deformed beyond recognition."
Neris turned back, his face darkening.
"She's still Aurelia."
Morwenna's expression hardened. "No, she's not. The Aurelia you once knew ....the fire-haired goddess you adored .... is gone. What remains is a tragedy. She's hideous, Neris. And I will not ..... will not ..... allow my only son to marry a cursed creature."
He flinched. Not from her words, but from the echo of his own doubts. He had thought these things. In quiet moments. In the dark.
He remembered Aurelia as she was .....radiant, fierce, intoxicating. The idea that she had become a monster haunted him.
The North remembers," Neris said softly, almost a whisper. "We honor our oaths."
"That promise wasn't your word," Morwenna snapped. "It was your father's. He made that oath before the curse, when the match was politically advantageous. Now? It's suicide.
You know what people will say .... what they'll think .... when they see her. They'll pity you, or worse... they'll mock you."
Neris remained silent.
Morwenna stepped closer, her tone softening, though the venom still lingered.
"Be honest with yourself, my son. If you stood before her now, if she reached for your hand... could you take it? Could you kiss her lips, marred by curse and time? Could you lie with her ... not out of duty, but desire?"
could you touch her? Could you look at her without flinching? Could you lie with her...make love to her, even out of duty?"
He said nothing. Couldn't.
She stepped closer.
Neris turned his face away, shame and conflict painting his features.
"You may try to honor your father's oath," Morwenna whispered, circling him like a vulture around wounded prey, "but your father is dead. And his oath died with him. I will not see our bloodline diluted ....tainted .... by this broken thing Azarion still calls a daughter."
The words hung in the air like falling ice. Harsh. Final.
"You fell in love with a memory. With the girl who lit the sky on fire. Not the broken shadow she is now."
"That's not fair."
"Neither is fate. But I will not let our bloodline be tied to that curse. You're the Warden of Winter. And she is a ruin."
Neris clenched his fists, breath ragged, emotion swirling in his chest like a blizzard. He hated how much truth there was in her words. And hated even more that some part of him had wondered the same things.
Was love enough if it lived only in memory?
His mother leaned close, voice like a blade against his skin.
"You can honor a dead man's promise, or you can protect your future. But you cannot do both."
Silence followed.
And in that silence, winter deepened.