Page 96 of Born of Ice

My mind must finally set back to homeostasis because I realize she’s here. She’s in front of the open gap in the ice and not some ten feet away from where her bedazzled wheelchair is standing as a lone soldier.

“Electra.” My voice is barely a rasp. It’s gravely and scratchy but those two rimmed-red, blue pools full of tears fly up at the sound, and with another heavy, broken cry she falls over mychest. Her small body shaking with all the emotion suffocating her.

“Y-you walked…s-star…you walked,” I manage to get out and break out in a coughing fit again, my weight moving the shaky ice underneath us and we both hear that sickening crunch.

“We need to get off the ice. Exton, get off the ice.” Electra is gripping my jacket, fear coursing her eyes. “She won’t be able to hold us much longer.”

“Who? Who won’t be able?”

“Mom.”

Electra

I got up and I ran.

I didn’t know I could. Didn’t consider if it was possible because all I knew was I needed to get to him.

But if I’d fall and crumble to that ice when I tried, I’d crawl. I would claw my way to him through blood and bones, to that hole that sucked him in.

The fear that ripped through me had nothing on seeing Erik lying unconscious after my fall, where I wanted to get to him to make sure he was all right. Here, today, losing Exton for those crippling seconds, I knew I’d follow him into that hole. I knew without a doubt in my mind that I’d follow my other half of the soul because life otherwise was impossible.

Instead, I ran, and he came back to me.

Erik’s love broke me.

Exton’s saved me.

Shakily and slowly, we crawl and roll over the ice to get away from the weak point Exton managed to fall through while he slowly regains some feeling in his hands and legs and his breathing evens out.

We are almost at the edge when Exton drops to ice again and that irrational fear grips me again.

My gaze tracks over him, lying on that ice and all I can think about is how close I came to losing him. How I would never be able to hold him, to kiss him, to tell him what he means to me. To feel with him. How I’d die right alongside him after he just gave me my life back.

How I’d die with denial of who he is for me.

A new, fresh wave of tears flows down my face as I break apart at his side, my shoulders shaking with grief I’ve lived through for one deadly moment before I felt his fingers graze mine.

He made me alive, and he almost took it all away again.

“Electra, shhh, it’s okay. We are okay.” His cold hand grazes against the tears on my cheek and I swat it away. And then, I swat at his chest. Punching him and slapping his wet, ripped apart jacket.

“Angry elf!” he rasps out with a cough, trying to roll away from me, but I swing my leg over him, crawling over his body, covering it with mine and kiss him. I kiss him anywhere my lips land. His mouth, cheek, nose, jaw, eyes, the crease on his forehead…everywhere.

“I hate you,” I cry into his lips, grasping his jaw harder. “I hate you so much for doing this to me. For making me feel alive. For pulling me out of that darkness. For making me love you!” I scream through the last part, my forehead on his. “Damn it.” I punch his chest, beating my fists against it as tears flow down freely and my whole body is shaking with the remnants of that life-crippling fear. “I hate you, Exton! I hate you because I love you and you just went under the ice and I th-thought…I-I th-thought…” I can’t get the words past my lips, I just keep sobbing and he wraps his arms around me, crushing me into his drenched, ice-cold body and all I can do is grasp onto him stronger, ignoring the wet clothes, the still cracking ice underneath us, ignoring it all.

“Say that again,” he whispers as I land one last half-hearted punch on his chest, feeling his cold lips on my temple. “Say it again. I’m begging you. Say it.”

“I h-hate you.”

“I love you too, Electra. God, do I love you, my angry, fierce elf.”

“You almost died, you asshole!”

“And you walked.”

“I swear to God, if you ever try dying on me again, I’ll follow you right into that world and haunt you. I’ll make your life a living hell there. I’ll even grab my favorite wooden spatula with me to poke you.”

“Never.” Exton grabs my face in both his hands, pulling my lips to his in a crushing kiss. “Never say that again, cause if you dare follow me, I’ll over-haunt you and I’ll make it worse. You know I’m competitive like that.” I choke on a pained laugh just before my lip trembles and I shake again.

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