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Edaline spun in slow circles, in awe of the palace around her. It was a majestic creation, too majestic to have been carved into the ice in so little time. It was something that only could have been created by someone with control over snow and ice.

Something that only could have been created by her sister.

“Juline?” Edaline called uncertainly, backing towards a magnificent ice staircase. “Juline? It’s me… your sister…”

“Eda?”

Edaline spun around, almost slipping on the ice below her. She steadied herself, lifting her gaze to look at her sister, and… whoa. She didn’t look anywhere near the same as before. Edaline had rarely seen her sister growing up, given all the time she spent in her room… which she supposed she understood now. She’d been trying to manage her powers away from everyone else, just like what she was doing now.

But Edaline still remembered the days she did see her sister. And she definitely remembered her sister’s coronation. She’d always been beautiful, but now she looked truly regal. She looked like a queen.

She was a queen.

“Wow,” Edaline breathed. “You look… different. A good different. And this place…” Edaline surveyed their surroundings. “It’s amazing.”

“Thank you,” Juline said, her voice warm, and the sound of her sister’s voice managed to make even this intimidating, majestic palace of ice feel almost cozy. She looked around, like she was appreciating her own creation just as much as Edaline was. “I never knew what I was capable of.”

She truly must be capable of so much if she was able to cast an eternal winter all the way from the mountains to the kingdom. Edaline took a stabilizing breath. “Listen… I’m so sorry about what happened. I know I shouldn’t have pushed about Kesler. I understand your reasons for wanting to isolate yourself—really, I do—and I’m so, so sorry for pushing until you lost control of your powers.”

Juline shook her head. “No, no. It’s okay. Really. And… you weren’t wrong about him.” She averted her gaze. “If things were different… but they aren’t. This is better, anyway—me being truly alone, away from where I can hurt anyone. So you should probably go.”

“Go?” Edaline stepped back. It was her first time seeing her sister in weeks, after her first time seeing her sister face to face in years. She hadn’t expected to be dismissed so quickly. “But… I just got here.”

“You belong back in the kingdom.”

“So do you!” Edaline insisted.

“No, I don’t,” Juline said firmly. “I belong here. Where I can be who I truly am… without hurting anybody.”

Edaline grimaced. Well… now was as good a time as any to mention the whole ‘eternal winter’ thing. “So… about that—”

“Aaand that’s a minute!” Both of Edaline’s companions walked into the palace, and Edaline sighed, realizing they must have taken her request to “give her a minute” literally.

Juline’s eyes widened, and she took a step back. “Kesler?” she breathed. “And…” Her brow furrowed in confusion. “...Other guy?”

“Oh. That’s Grady,” Edaline explained. “Sorry about them. Guys, we’re not quite done.”

“In Kesler’s defense, you did say ‘a minute,’” Grady pointed out.

Edaline turned back to her sister, whose gaze was now fixed on Kesler. “We used to be so close, Juline. Remember when we were kids? We could be like that again!” Edaline pleaded.

Guilt flashed across Juline’s face, and her eyes tore away from Kesler, focusing on the ground. “No. We can’t.”

And… back to square one. “Why not?” Edaline huffed, frustrated, not even caring how young she sounded.

Juline wordlessly turned around, holding up her dress as she jogged up the ice stairs. Edaline followed, holding onto the freezing railing to steady herself on the slippery steps. “Give us a minute,” Edaline said to Grady and Kesler. Then she amended, “A while, actually. Give us however long this takes.”

Her sister disappeared between two large ice doors, which Edaline pushed open after her. Her eyes widened when she realized they were on an ice balcony overlooking the beautiful snowy mountains. “Go away, Edaline,” Juline said calmly, her eyes downcast as she leaned out over the balcony.

“You don’t want that,” Edaline said adamantly. “I know you love me. I’m your sister.” She willed her voice to be steady. “And you love Kesler Dizznee, too.”

“Edaline,” Juline warned.

“You don’t have to isolate yourself.”

“I have to keep you safe!” she insisted. “Do you think I’m doing this because I don’t want to care? Of course I care. Of course I love you, Edaline. And of course I…” Juline trailed off, but Edaline was sure the statement was going to be about Kesler. “My point is, it’s because I love you that I have to protect you from me!”

“What does it look like for us to be protected from you? Untouched by your powers? Because…” Edaline winced. She would have to tell her either way. “We aren’t.”

“You aren’t what?”

“Untouched by your powers. It’s kind of winter in the kingdom too.” For the first time, Edaline looked away from her sister, terrified of what she might see if Juline finally decided to meet her gaze. “It’s winter everywhere, and it isn’t stopping, and…”

“Wait.” Juline turned to face Edaline, and this time, she was the one looking away. “What do you mean it’s winter everywhere?”

“All of this is amazing,” Edaline said appreciatively, gesturing out over the balcony at the beautiful view. “But it extends all the way to the kingdom, and we need our summer. I guess… I’m not just here to persuade you to come back with me because I miss you. The truth is, I need you to come back so you can undo it.” She looked back up at her sister, their eyes meeting. She expected to see hesitance, but she hadn’t expected to see fear.

Juline looked terrified.

“It’s okay!” Edaline rushed, taking a step towards her sister. Juline took three steps back in return, shaking her head, and Edaline hurried to encourage her. “It’s not a bad thing! You can even come back to live in an ice palace afterwards if it’s really important to you, but—”

“You don’t understand, Edaline.” Juline’s voice was trembling. “I can’t. I don’t know how.”

“Sure you can!” Edaline said brightly, reaching for her sister. “I know you can.” But Juline pulled away, swinging open the balcony doors to run back into the ice palace. Edaline followed after her. “Juline, wait!”

“It doesn’t matter, Edaline. I can’t fix it!” she insisted as Edaline followed her through the frozen corridors of her icy castle. “Stop following me!”

“Then you follow me! Please, Juline, we can go down this mountain together. As sisters.”

“You don’t understand, Edaline. You won’t ever understand.” Snow began to gather in the air around them, falling gently on both of their heads, and Edaline brushed her hair out of her face, feeling a melted snowflake on her hand.

“Maybe so,” Edaline admitted. “But I know that if you can do something as amazing as this —” she gestured to the regal ice palace surrounding them “—you can find a way to reverse the winter in the kingdom.”

“I never learned to control my powers!” Juline finally snapped, reeling around. “I only ever learned to hide from them. I definitely didn’t learn how to reverse anything!” As though proving her point, the snowstorm in the room was only growing stronger, obscuring Edaline’s vision.

“Then you can learn!”

“From who? All the other people in the world who have ice powers? Or maybe the people who are convinced I’m a witch?” Juline laughed bitterly. “There’s no one to teach me, and I can’t just make it happen.”

“Maybe not now, but—”

“I can’t, Edaline!”

———

Juline felt the moment she lost control over her powers, ice flying from her hands before she could think to stop it. When she heard her sister hit the floor, she knew she’d made a mistake.

Her heart dropped.

“Edaline!” Juline exclaimed, sinking to her knees beside her sister. “What did I do,” she whispered. Edaline never should have come here. Even if they could never be free of her, snow falling and falling on their kingdom forever, it would at least be a lesser evil than this.

“What happened to her?” the voice of the unfamiliar man Edaline had introduced as Grady shouted, and both he and Kesler began to carefully make their way up the stairs, holding onto the icy railings to keep from slipping.

“She got hurt,” she called back. “I hurt her,” she added in a whisper, tears beginning to gather in her eyes.

“No—I’m fine.” Edaline coughed a little, clutching her chest as she sat up. “A little cold, but otherwise fine.”

Juline’s chest seized with fear. If she was clutching her chest, what if that meant Juline hit her in the heart? She still remembered what the trolls had said when they were children and she’d injured her sister’s head with her powers. That was why things had to be the way they were. They’d told her she was lucky she hadn’t hit her heart. What would happen if she had?

Grady and Kesler appeared at the top of the stairs. Juline forced herself not to look at Kesler. There was no point imagining what could have been if she was different. She never would be, and dwelling on hypotheticals when isolation was clearly the only safe option for her would only hurt them both.

Grady knelt by Edaline’s side, and Juline had a moment of sisterly protectiveness, wondering who this man was, before she realized she had no right to take on the protective role when he was checking to see if she was okay after Juline hurt her. Juline brought one hand to her mouth, stifling a sob. Please. Not her heart. Let me not have struck her in the heart.

“I’m okay, Grady,” Edaline assured him, though her voice was weak.

Grady helped her up with one of his hands, concern written across his face. “You’re freezing.”

“We are in an ice palace,” Edaline joked, though the thinness of her voice betrayed that she wasn’t as okay as she was pretending to be.

“You guys have to leave,” Juline said, standing and backing away. “You have to. It clearly isn’t safe.”

“But—” Edaline tried to protest.

“Come on, Eda,” Grady said to her quietly. “I’m worried about you. We need to find out if you’re alright.”

“I’m fine!” Edaline looked at Juline desperately. “I’m not leaving without you!”

“Yes you are!” Juline commanded, bringing her hands together. She wasn’t fully aware of what she was doing with her powers—only that they were a manifestation of her own fear. She had to push them out. She had to make them leave. She had to get them to safety—away from her.

She wasn’t expecting to create something sentient—but it was just as well.

She willed silently for the snow monster not to harm them as he drove them towards the exist of the palace, chasing them down the steps. As soon as she was sure that they were safely gone, she sank to her knees by the stairs of her palace, tears flooding her eyes. She squeezed them tightly shut.

“Juline?”

Juline’s eyes snapped open. “Kesler?” But he was gone, wasn’t he? Hadn’t the snow monster thrown him out? Or had she been so fixated on keeping her sister safely away from her that she hadn’t created something that would make him leave as well?

Kesler was standing at the bottom of the stairs, staring up at her with a look in his eyes that was incredibly dangerous. “Stop that,” Juline insisted, refusing to meet his gaze, terrified of the feelings that would unlock inside her if she looked into his eyes.

“Stop what?”

“Stop looking at me like that.”

“Like what?” Kesler challenged again, making his way back up the stairs. “I need to stop traveling on these stairs,” he muttered. “They’re so slippery.”

Juline decided his tangent meant he’d let the topic go, but evidently he hadn’t. “Looking at you like what, Juline?”

Don’t focus on the way he says your name. “Like…” she couldn’t put a name to it. Not out loud. That was even more dangerous than the look in his eyes.

“Like?”

“Listen,” Juline sighed. “You need to leave. Look after my sister.”

“Edaline will be fine. She has Grady.” There was an implication in his voice that only confirmed what Juline had suspected, and her protective instincts flared up again. She quieted them once again with the reminder that she was the one who’d hurt Edaline—possibly even by striking her in the heart with her powers—and Grady was the one who was helping her. “And you have me.”

“I don’t need you.”

Kesler was undeterred. “You’re so worried about looking after your sister that you’ve forgotten to look after yourself.” He sank down to sit beside her, wrapping one of his arms around her. She tensed, and maybe if she was stronger, had more conviction, she would have pulled away.

But she didn’t pull away.

He was as warm as he could be given their climate, and though Juline had never been bothered by the cold, there was something comforting about it. Anything warm had to be out of her control.

But in a good way.

Not out of control like her ice powers.

Out of her control as in she wasn’t meant to have to be strong. There was nothing she was supposed to do to foster this warmth other than lean into it. And so she did lean into him, resting her head on his shoulder. “The only thing I need is to be alone.”

“No,” Kesler corrected, “that’s what you think everyone else needs. You want to be alone because you think it’s better for others.”

“Is that wrong of me?” Juline challenged.

“Of course not. But it isn’t helping. In fact… I think it’s making it worse.”

Juline shook her head vehemently. “What made things worse was being with others. Everything was fine and then my sister came her and I know she meant well but look at her now!” she rambled, growing more and more anxious with every word. “What if I struck her in the heart, Kesler? What then? The trolls said that wasn’t so easily healed!”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Kesler admitted. “But I do think you need to calm down. I think it’s the only thing that might fix any of this.”

“I can’t fix any of this,” Juline whispered, screwing her eyes shut and burying her head in Kesler’s shoulder. “I can’t. I know what Edaline thinks, but she’s always been an optimist. I’m a realist. And I know how little control I have over my powers. It’s not something I can just learn, either, no matter what she thinks.”

Kesler wrapped his other arm around her, pulling her closer to him, and Juline gave up entirely on distancing herself, embracing him back. “Shutting people out only causes more fear, and if I may… I think fear might be what makes it more difficult for you to control your powers. You have to accept that people love you. Edaline loves you.” Kesler took a deep breath, and Juline wasn’t sure if she desperately wanted to hear his next words or was urgently hoping he would decide not to say them. “I love you.”

“That’s not a good decision, Kesler,” Juline said softly.

“I fear it’s not a decision.” Kesler smiled. “I don’t think I could stop loving you even if I tried. But I want you to answer something for me, and answer it honestly.” He waited for Juline to look up, meeting his gaze, before he asked, “Do you love me?”

It was the hardest question he could have asked her.

Because the answer was something she’d been trying so hard for so long not to feel.

She wanted to feel it. She wanted to feel nothing except it because she was sure it would feel absolutely amazing, but she knew the dangers of letting someone get close to her. The only person she’d ever truly let in was Edaline, and that had ended badly for both of them twice now.

But here, in Kesler’s arms, in her own palace of ice, she couldn’t bring herself to lie to herself anymore, and she especially couldn’t bring herself to lie to him. So, taking a deep breath and gathering her courage, she whispered, “Yes.”

It was like something inside her heart thawed, and every feeling she’d been shielding herself from came crashing into her.

Actually, speaking of thawing…

“I thought that might do it,” Kesler whispered, gesturing towards the frozen fountain on the lower level of her ice palace. Or, well… it had been frozen.

Now it was running with water. And it was still beautiful.

Everything about this moment, if it was isolated from all the events it was surrounded with, was beautiful.

“What do you mean?” Juline whispered, though she could already see where this was going.

“Love. It’s a warmer emotion, isn’t it?” Kesler pointed out.

“Love,” Juline whispered, touching her hand to the railing of her palace. She reached out with her other hand to cup Kesler’s face, silently asking him for permission to kiss him.

In response, he leaned down and kissed her.

Juline gripped his hair with one of her hands as she leaned into the kiss, a warm feeling spreading throughout her entire body. She clutched the ice railing with her other hand.

It melted away in her grasp.

Juline gasped, pulling away from the kiss. She laughed, and for the first time in forever, it was a laugh of pure and utter joy. “I love you,” she giggled, surveying their icy surroundings. “I love you, and… love is the answer. It always has been.”

Kesler grinned, grabbing one of her hands with his. “It’s a little cheesy, isn’t it?”

“I didn’t make the rules for how my powers worked,” Juline pointed out. “But you led me to this. Love will thaw. I can fix… whatever I did to the kingdom, then.” Her eyes widened with realization. “Maybe that’s how I can save Edaline!”

“You love your sister, too,” Kesler agreed, stepping back. “Now go use that love to save her. Maybe even save the entire kingdom.”

“That’s exactly the kind of happy ending my sister would think is amazing,” Juline said confidently, smiling so hard her cheekbones were starting to hurt.

“Your sister has fantastic taste, then,” Kesler said. “Now let’s go use this—” he held up their entwined hands “—to unfreeze the world.”