Frosted Dreams (NaNoWriMo2020)

Kanakolu kūmāiwa

A nauseously cold feeling trickles through her body from the site of the wound. The fire burning in her veins freezes solid and Hika exhales in a gasp, desperately trying to suck in air. The air bites into her lungs in a way it wasn't doing a few heartbeats before, tearing into her skin with razor-sharp talons.

Her legs collapse beneath her and she sinks to the ground. Jaak cries out from behind her and she can hear the snow crunch from his direction as he races towards her. But Hika is too busy staring up at Loki, his face set in a snarl as he glares down at her. He reaches down for the knife, presumably to pull it out of her and consign her to blood loss, but he twists it instead.

Hika cries out, her vision filling with black spots. A hand grips onto her shoulder for a heartbeat before Jaak leaps over her, positioning himself between Hika and his father. He has his staff pointed towards his father and his fingers twitch at his side.

Hika doesn't need to hear his voice to know his message and she reaches to her side as best she can without moving the dagger in her stomach. She pulls her fire stick free and reaches up to press it into Jaak's hand. He points it at his father, blue fire sparking from the tip of the fire stick to complement the frost drifting off of the crystal ball at the end of his staff.

"Father, leave her be."

"She will destroy you, Jaak."

Hika can practically feel Jaak's scowl and her body shakes with silent laughter, painful as it is when it jostles her wound. Hika winces and forces herself to still, inching back towards Jaak. A cold wind stirs against her neck as snow swirls past her, forming a shield between Hika and Loki as Jaak prepares himself to face off against his father. Jaak lifts his chin.

"Father, you must stop this madness. Hi'ilani will cause no harm to me. In fact, you are causing harm to me by attacking her."

Hika feels her chest warm at this, driving back the ice in her heart for a fraction of a second. Loki looks shocked by this.

"You've only known her for a few days! You know nothing of this girl."

"I know enough. Now leave. Her. Be."

Loki moves forward, perhaps to reach through the shield and twist the knife again. Hika rallies her starlight to burn him, but there is no need. Jaak slashes out with the fire stick and icefire snaps out, slicing a line of red across Loki's chest. Loki looks down at the burn and back up at Jaak, his face filling with raging despair.

"Very well, Jaak. I will go, for now."

Loki disappears in a whirlwind of snow and Jaak sags, dropping his shield. He moves to touch Hika's shoulder but stops, turning to vomit into the snow. She can't blame him. It must be a horrible thing to harm your own parent, no matter how dangerous they may have become. She would certainly feel the same way Jaak does now if she had to defend someone she cared about from her own mother. Once done, Jaak turns to her and frowns at the knife in her belly.

"That doesn't look good."

"It doesn't feel that bad."

The rush of cold that tears through her and sends her shivering proves otherwise and Jaak's expression closes off.

"Can you move?"

Hika frowns and places a hand against the hilt of the dagger, positioning her fingers on either side of it to keep it in place. She tries to push herself up with her other hand, but that sends a pang of blinding pain through her, and another bought of nausea. She sags back against the ground, feeling the melting snow seep against her back.

She feels hot, burning inside. She never feels hot. Her heart feels cold too, the two sensations warring with each other. Hika swallows nervously, feeling the blade of the dagger shift inside of her, and does something she would really prefer to not do.

She lights a star above her and coaxes its light to shine down on her wound. Shimmering blue tendrils are webbing out from the site of the dagger, creeping across the skin. Jaak makes a choking sound and Hika looks up at him, biting back the bile in her throat that rises at the horror in his face.

"It's bad, isn't it?"

Jaak nods, shaking. "We need to get you somewhere less exposed to the elements but you can't walk, and I can't carry you down the mountain alone, even with my snow."

"Your mother?"

At her suggestion, Jaak sends a stream of snow spiraling off into the distance, presumably to summon Skadi. Hika cranes her head up, trying to get a better look at the wound while keeping her abdomen still. She immediately regrets it as she forces herself to swallow back the rising vomit.

She fails, and twists to hurl the contents of her stomachs onto the snow. The snow steams beneath the bile and her belly screams at her movements. Hika sags back against the snow, panting. Her skin burns and her fingers grasp at the snow, trying to pull it against her skin.

Jaak frowns at her, worried. "Hika? What's wrong?"

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Kanakolu kūmāiwa = thirty-nine, when counting

What do you think is going on with the hot and cold feelings? What do those tendrils mean? What do you think is going to happen next? Tell me your thoughts!

Happy reading and I'll see you next chapter!

~ Goddess of Fate, signing out