It took her half a second to recognize the new arrival.
“Aiden!” Elle shrieked. “Run…run!” She had no idea when her best friend suddenly arrived, but Elle knew they were both in very grave danger. “RUN!”
But Aiden did no such thing. There was a cruel glare on his face as he looked up the stairs at the man known as Jack Frost. Elle had never seen Aiden so angry before. Not in all the years she had known him had he ever looked as furious as he did in that very moment. With a large hand, Aiden pushed Elle behind him, instantly concealing her from view. She didn’t realize how very badly she was shaking until Aiden turned around and gently grabbed her bleeding arm.
“I should have realized her godly guardian angel would make an appearance,” Jack Frost sighed. “I was not anticipating what a fighter this little wildcat was going to be.”
Elle poked her head around Aiden and stared at the man in confusion before clenching onto Aiden for fear of his life. Meanwhile, Aiden examined her arm before turning his glare back toward the man lightly descending the stairs.
Aiden scowled. “I should have realized Eros asking me for a favor meant he was trying to distance me from her,” he sneered vehemently.
Elle blinked a few times, trying to process his words. Aiden suddenly had a strange accent, almost English. Besides that, he had never spoke this coldly to anyone in the many years she had known him. How did he know the guy named Eros along with this monster?
Elle hadn’t realized she’d grabbed onto Aiden’s torso until he gently ran a hand through her hair to pat her head in a coaxing matter. The white-haired man laughed lightly, as if he found what Aiden said humorous.
“Phoebus Apollo…I would say nice to see you again, but I would be lying.” Jack Frost shrugged, directing a cold glance toward where Elle was cowering. “How about you let me have my betrothed and we can call it a night?” he asked, a small smirk to him. “This matter does not concern you.”
Elle felt a gentle warmness attack her bloody wound. She glanced down in fear to see Aiden gently rubbing the pad of his thumb over it. Suddenly, the long gash was healing itself. The skin came together as the gushing blood slowly began to remove itself from Elle’s skin altogether. The only thing she could do was stare in shock at the miraculous healing that was taking place. This was all Aiden’s doing. The way he held Elle’s arm sent a warm tingle up it, where it seemed actual heat was radiating from him.
Elle slowly dared to tilt her head up to stare at one of her two best friends. Aiden watched her quietly, his anger evaporating as he now looked a tad sheepish. “You probably have a lot of questions, Elle,” he said quietly, watching her with what seemed to be pity.
Elle stared at him, feeling lost. “W-what are you?” she asked, her voice quivering at the end. He most definitely wasn’t human; that was certain. Last Elle checked, humans couldn’t heal each other by rubbing their thumbs over their cuts. That most definitely would’ve been mentioned on the news or the National Geographic by now.
Aiden watched her sadly. “My birth name is Phoebus Apollon, but I go by Apollo. You see, Elle, I’m an immortal god.”
As if to show he truly was the god of something, Aiden gently brought the palm of his hand up to allow a flicker of flames protruding from the center. He seemed to radiate a small glow around him as he watched her. Elle stared at the flame in his hand for a few seconds before she collapsed in a faint, her knees buckling as her eyes went to the back of her head. Apollo easily scooped a hand under her bare legs as his other arm cradled under her slender shoulders. He picked her up with ease.
Apollo’s eyes darted to see Jack Frost idly standing by, watching this exchange with boredom. “Well,” the immortal prince of winter said, “she took that well, did she not?”
Apollo diverted his eyes to the beautiful girl unconscious in his arms. He decided that there was only one place he could bring the young woman to ensure she would not be murdered by the bastard of a god before him.
“Oh, you better not be thinking of taking her where I think you are,” said Jack in anticipation, his pale jaw clenching in frustration. Even he knew the one place in that very universe where the girl would be safe. He would be unable to kill her then.
“What’s wrong, Frost? Afraid your father is about to find out you tried to murder your intended fiancée?” Apollo drawled, disappearing within the blink of an eye while leaving the angry god of winter in his departure.
Chapter Seven
Elle slowly stirred. She blinked her eyes wearily before she stuffed her head back under the large white pillow. Slowly closing them again, she was enjoying feeling relaxed. Elle hadn’t gotten a good night’s sleep in ages. She wasn’t about to lose out on the opportunity now, given how comfortable she was.
Elle stiffened, her eyes bolting open. She realized she must have forgotten to set her alarm. She had a six in the morning wake-up call today for work that started at seven!
Scrambling out of bed, she fell to the floor after tripping over her own feet. She wasn’t anticipating she had three steps descending from the bed. That was unusual.
It took Elle a moment to get her bearings together. This wasn’t her bedroom. This wasn’t her mint green bedspread. This was all a dazzling white sparkled bedspread on a very large four-poster canopy bed. Those weren’t her mint green and purple pillows that she was lying on. All the long pillows on the bed were either light grey or sparkling white. Glancing around the room, Elle found herself to be in a winter wonderland-themed bedroom. Even the floor looks to be made from a strange, white granite floor. It was cold to even step on.
The four walls surrounding the large room were a crisp white, while the bed’s design looked as though the main theme was ice. The posts of the bed were sculpted from a material that glittered, resembling diamonds, while the rest of the room, from the dressers to the large desk, seemed to be made from the same beautiful material. A large chandelier glistening with sparkling crystals hung down from the large ceiling, looking as though it were made from pure ice as well.
Elle took in deep breaths, the memory of the night before slowly coming back to her little by little. The strange boy who gave her the snow globe…the ice man trying to kill her…Aiden producing fire from his hand. It was as though she had a few seconds of peace before the horror came back to hit her.
As Elle slowly made her way toward the door, she found the room connected to a decent-sized living area complete with an all-white couch, two matching white chairs, and a silver flat-screened TV facing the sitting area. The flat screen was so very large it put Lucy’s fifty-inch flat screen to shame.
Beautiful paintings of trees with snow sitting on the lengthy branches decorated the walls. They stretched up the fifteen-foot walls to make it appear as though they were actual trees instead of paintings. They were beautiful. Given different circumstances, Elle would have spent more time admiring the art work instead of beginning to panic.
“Hello,” a feminine voice said with a giggle.
Elle jumped at the sound of the light, musical voice, staring around to find a young woman sitting on the edge of the large couch across the room while holding a book. Elle hadn’t realized she was there, as her attention had been focused on the room’s decor.
“Where am I? Who are you?” demanded Elle, her suspicious alarm not hidden.
Those seemed to be the two questions Elle needed answered most at the moment. The young woman stood, allowing Elle to see she was an impossibly beautiful girl who looked in her early twenties. She had the palest of skin, with snow white hair that made her gorgeous skin even paler. She had green eyes, heavily made up with light blue and green shadows to highlight them. It was her dress Elle was stunned by. It was a spectacular silver diamond-studded number with a sweetheart neckline. It hugged the small curves she had. The dress seemed to trail behind her as the woman slowly approached. The silver of the dress highlighted her wintry features, causing them to stand out more than if she were wearing a different color.
&n
bsp; “My name is Khione, child. Introductions for yourself are not needed. I already know your name, Evangeline.” The young woman smiled. “You are a heavily discussed topic in our kingdom.”
Elle shrugged her shoulders lightly, not having anything to say to that. “Where am I?” she finally squeaked.
“You are in the palace of King Boreas, little one.”
Elle’s eyes narrowed. She was finding herself deeply annoyed someone who looked close to her own age was calling her little one.
“Come along, we shall get you dressed and then you shall meet my father,” the woman said, her accent sounding marvelously similar to a cross between an English accent and an Australian one. Elle didn’t follow the woman. Instead, she started to pinch the soft skin under her upper arm in a bid to see if she was dreaming. As she felt the sharp pinches on her delicate skin, she quickly deduced this was no dream. Even slapping herself a few times didn’t help. Not moving, Elle watched as the woman gently crossed over to the door, beckoning two women to enter. Both looked to be in their mid- to late forties, and both were dressed in all-white clothes that resembled long-sleeved nursing scrubs. The women made their way over to the wall across the room, where they opened a silver knob sticking out of the wall, revealing a large walk-in closet.
“Normally, I would not be so bold as to take charge of dressing a near stranger, but I am afraid you are a tad under-dressed for a meeting with the king,” Khione explained. It was only as Elle glanced down at herself did she find she was still dressed in her pajama shorts, dark tank top, and ripped grey hoodie that had blood on the sleeve from where she had been stabbed the night before.
Elle felt at her arm, only to find the stab wound was gone. “Do not worry, Evangeline, you shall look marvelous by the time your meeting takes place,” said Khione happily.
“I don’t want to meet the king,” said Elle stupidly, lacking a better response. There was no way to make sense of this madness. “I want to go home. Where the hell am I, and where’s Aiden?” Those were her only two concerns. Going home and finding her best friend.
Elle noticed the two women fumbling in the large closet turned and gaped at Elle as if she were a bizarre, three-headed creature.
Stepping forward, a rather ugly woman with dust-bunny grey hair and a pointed nose looked appalled. “You shan’t speak such ways to the princess of the North Winds!” she exclaimed hotly, whipping a finger at Elle. Her beady eyes further narrowed as her stubby hands placed themselves on her large hips.
Not batting an eyelash, Elle rolled her shoulders in an uncaring fashion. She didn’t care if this woman thought she was disrespectful. “Yeah…I want to go home,” she said, turning back to Khione. “You seem to know where I am and why I’m here. I want to leave. Now.”
The woman named Khione frowned. “I am afraid no such thing can be done. You are meant to stay here for the remainder of your engagement until you marry my brother.”
Blinking a few times, Elle tried to grasp what the strange words meant. “You’re…uh…marry who?”
Khione raised a thin brow. “You are betrothed to my brother, Jacques Frost, otherwise known as Jack. You shall be married in a few months’ time.”
That was when Elle fully remembered the night before. All the little details hit her like a freight train. The man had claimed to be Jack Frost, and he had stabbed her with his dagger. He wanted to kill her because they were betrothed. Elle shook her dark head, trying to grasp what this all meant. “Whoa, whoa whoa! You mean to tell me you think I’m engaged to the psychotic bastard who tried to kill me?”
“Hold thy tongue from such foul language when speaking to the princess!” the hooked nose woman barked, casting a stony glare in Elle’s direction.
Elle found herself unamused. She wanted to throw out a nasty reply, but she realized angering these people probably wasn’t the best way to approach the situation. Not when she wanted to go home.
“There is no thinking about it, Evangeline Darrow,” Khione said, stepping forward. “It was written in the stars a very long time ago; you are betrothed to the first in line of winter’s throne, and you shall be the one to conceive a child who shall be heir to the throne of winter.”
Elle looked to Khione, to the door exiting the room, and then back at Khione. In her mind, the girl seriously had to be on serious hallucination-caused medication if she thought Elle was going to be having anyone’s baby. This was insanity.
“Whatever.” Elle shrugged, rolling her eyes as she left the woman and the two servants. She had no idea what her current game plan was, but it most definitely wasn’t sticking around and supposedly marrying some psychotic fairy tale character and popping out a baby. She would find Aiden, get out of this picturesque winter wonderland, and then she would verbally kick Aiden’s butt for being able to produce fire from his hands without telling her. That was just a little something you tell your best friend about!
“Evangeline, where are you going?” Khione asked curiously, hurrying to follow Elle. To her surprise, Elle found the hallway outside the bedroom had even taller ceilings than the room. They were maybe twenty or twenty-five feet high, decorated in the same winter theme as the bedroom, with icicle chandeliers every ten feet or so. Elle had no idea where she was headed, but she stopped when she saw something beautiful, yet frightening. As she walked past a rather large window, a beautiful city that was a combination of silver and crystal was outside. The outside sky was a combination of pink and mint green, causing Elle to realize she couldn’t tell what time of day it was. She recognized the city. It was an exact replica of the gorgeous city inside the snow globe she was given by Eros.
“Where am I?” Elle breathed, not daring to blink at the beautiful silver city in case it was to suddenly disappear before her eyes.
“The North Pole,” Khione answered simply. “Your new home!”
Chapter Eight
Elle said nothing as Khione led her around the enormous palace. The woman kept muttering under her breath about Elle’s terrible outfit, but Elle didn’t care. She didn’t want to be dressed in a draping gown that flowed a few feet behind her like Khione wanted to dress her in. When she thought about it, the last time Elle wore a dress was for her high school graduation. That was enough for her. Give her jeans and a hoodie any day of the week and she was set.
Looking down at herself, Elle was thankful she had saved up and had gotten her legs waxed the week before. Parading around in pajama shorts would have been pretty graphic for her if she hadn’t. Still, she wished she were wearing shoes so her fire engine red painted toenails weren’t showing. Khione placed a few hard knocks on a random set of large doors, causing Elle to glance up in awe as large diamond doors that looked as tall as the near twenty-five-foot ceiling stood before them. “Come in,” a loud voice called, echoing throughout the room.
Khione nodded, motioning for Elle to follow. Even though she didn’t want to, Elle didn’t see much choice in the matter. The only plan she really had now was just to keep following Khione and telling whoever she met that she wanted to go home. Eventually, someone would listen to her pleas, right?
“Ah, my most precious of daughters,” a man with a deep voice and a flowing white beard announced. His voice was loud and echoed throughout the large room. Elle found an old man sitting on a very large throne. His place had the same beautiful ice features that made the throne look as though it consisted of icicles and diamonds. Elle found she could mistake the old man as Santa Claus if not for the dazzling silver armor across the man’s body and the large crystal scepter in his hands. The last time Elle heard, Santa didn’t dress like that.
Khione smiled graciously at the old man. “I am your only daughter, my lord. I am afraid I do not count as most precious for that reason alone.” She gave a small curtsy and motioned for Elle to do the same. Elle stared at her as Khione used her hand in a very lady-like way. She clearly but silently was telling Elle to bow. Shrugging at Khione, Elle gave a strange kind of curtsy, only for her long hair to fall
all over the place as she did it. She had to take a moment to blow it out of her face as she straightened her posture.
“Ah yes, Evangeline Darrow, I presume.” The old man smiled, waving his hand airily. He frowned after a moment. “My daughter, why is she dressed as though she were a common worker of the mines?”
Khione sent Elle a reproachful glance. “My apologies, Father. The girl did not wish herself to be dressed in anything else of higher worth.”
The old man lifted his gaze onto Elle, as if studying her. “Interesting,” he finally admitted. “There is a visitor of our kingdom who wishes not to take advantage of our hospitality. A first for a lover of any of your brothers, no?” The man chuckled, causing Khione to smile wryly.
“Indeed, Father,” she agreed softly. “However, I am afraid the child is not adjusting well to her surroundings—”
“As long as you’re talking about me, you could just say my name,” interrupted Elle, casting an annoyed glance at Khione. Even though she’d been nothing but pleasant, this entire situation was getting old. Couldn’t these people see she just wanted to go home?
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