Chapter 2104 - 2104: Long Rest

Her Valkyries found Maria on the ground looking pale, barely breathing. Elara reached her first, her face white with terror. The others followed, forming a circle around their fallen commander.

"Commander!" Elara's voice cracked.

"Commander, can you hear me?"

Maria's eyes were open. They stared at the frozen sky, at the statue of the dragon, at the mile of dead winter she had created.

She tried to speak. Her lips moved, but no sound came.

Inga was already working, her ice magic shifting to healing, pulling the cold from Maria's wounds, sealing the worst of the bleeding. Bryn wrapped her in cloaks, her hands shaking. Sigrid and Signa stood guard, their eyes scanning the frozen horizon for any new threat. Astra and Freya knelt beside Elara, their hands pressed to Maria's chest, lending their strength to Inga's healing.

"Don't you dare die," Elara whispered.

"Don't you dare. Not after that. Not after everything."

Maria's eyes found hers. Something passed between them. Not words. Not commands. Something softer.

Then Maria's eyes closed, and her breathing steadied. Not death. Sleep. The deep, necessary sleep of a body pushed past every limit.

Elara let out a breath she didn't know she had been holding. She looked at the frozen dragon, at the mile of dead winter, at the woman who had created it with a single whisper.

"She froze time," Astra said, her voice hollow. "She actually froze time."

"No," Freya said quietly. "She froze everything. All energy. All motion. If we had been standing closer..."

They looked at each other. The unspoken truth hung between them. They would not have survived. Nothing within that mile would have survived.

"That is the power of our commander," Inga said slowly, her hands still glowing with healing magic. "That is the weight of her cold."

Elara stood. She looked at the dragon's frozen corpse, then at her sisters, then at Maria's sleeping face.

"We carry her home," she said. "We carry her home, and we do not speak of what we saw today. Not until she tells us we can."

They nodded. They understood.

They lifted Maria from the snow, careful of her broken body, and began the long walk back to the White Castle. Behind them, the frozen dragon stood guard over a mile of dead winter, a monument to a power that should not exist in any mortal hand.

And Maria slept, dreaming of nothing at all.

•••

The White Castle was quiet when they brought her home. The servants moved in whispers. The guards stood stiller than usual. The Ice Empress herself met them at the gates, her ancient face unreadable as she looked at Maria's broken body cradled in Elara's arms.

"She used it," Elara said, her voice low.

"Absolute Zero."

The Empress nodded once. She did not ask if the dragon was dead. She already knew. She could feel the cold from here, a wound in the world that would take years to heal.

"Bring her to her chambers. The healers are waiting."

They carried Maria through the halls, past the frozen tapestries, past the mirrors of ice. Her face was white as snow, her lips pale, her breath so shallow it was barely visible. The healers descended on her the moment she was laid on her bed. Hands glowing with magic. Crystals pressed to her skin. Herbs burned in silver bowls, their smoke curling around her still form.

Elara stood at the door and watched. The others had been sent to rest, but she could not leave. Not yet.

"Her ribs were shattered," one healer murmured. "Three punctured her lung."

"The arm will heal, but the burns are deep."

"There is ice in her blood. Not her own. The cold she summoned... it tried to take her too."

Elara's hands clenched at her sides. She wanted to scream. She wanted to fight something. Instead, she stood still and watched them save her commander's life.

Hours passed. The healers worked in shifts. The Empress came and went, her face never changing. And slowly, bit by bit, Maria's color returned. Her breathing deepened. The ice in her blood melted, absorbed back into her body where it belonged.

Finally, the lead healer turned to Elara. "She will live. She needs rest. Nothing else. Just rest."

Elara nodded. She walked to the bed and looked down at Maria's sleeping face. The ice princess, who had frozen a dragon solid with a whisper, looked so small in her silk sheets. So fragile.

Elara pulled a chair to the bedside. She sat down.

And she waited.

°°°

Two days passed.

Maria woke on the second morning. Her eyes opened slowly, ice-blue and unfocused. The ceiling above her was familiar—the painted ice of her chambers, the same clouds, the same frozen stars she had stared at for months.

She tried to sit up. Pain lanced through her chest, her arm, her side. She fell back against the pillows, breathing hard.

A servant appeared at her side. "Princess! You're awake. Please, do not move. The healers said—"

"Water," Maria whispered.

The servant brought water. Maria drank, and the cold liquid eased the fire in her throat. She looked around the room. Clean. Quiet. Her sword was gone, returned to wherever her gift waited. Her wings were gone, shattered on the mountain. She would summon them again when she was strong enough.

"How long?" she asked.

"Two days, Princess."

Two days. She had lost two days. Her jaw tightened.

"Where are my Valkyries?"

"Resting, Princess. They refused to leave your side until the healers forced them. Lady Elara stayed the longest. She only left this morning."

Maria closed her eyes. She did not ask if Elara was well. She knew the answer. Her Valkyries were strong. They would recover.

She lay still for a long time, letting her body remember how to breathe without pain. The healers came and checked her wounds, clucking their tongues, applying fresh poultices, feeding her bitter potions that burned going down. She endured it all without complaint.