Followed by Frost

by Charlie N. Holmberg

I shriveled inside my shell of ice and skin. I was so grateful for all Imad and Lo and the others had given me, but my cold heart splintered more with each passing day, until I could feel its shattered pieces rattling down my rib cage and settling somewhere in the hungry pit of my stomach.

I could hear the music as we trailed our way up the broad, winding stairs—engrossing melodies with dozens of harmonies and heavy, methodic percussion. It was the sort of music that could coax life into even a slow-beating heart like mine, the kind you could taste just by breathing.

I forced myself to relinquish him, prying free one finger at a time, until a cold, dead ache rested solidly in my core. The kind of ache that only time can heal.

When a curse broke, was it gone? Or could the breaking be undone, just as the curse had been undone? Did a curse last forever, lingering in remission like a lifelong disease, or could it be cured for good? Did my curse have a treatment, or an antidote?