Madelynn shoved away from him, falling to her knees as she coughed violently against the heaving of her stomach. The golden mist shrunk away from her, leaving her bones chilled. She clenched her hands into fists and… snow. It was light out, despite them leaving at sunset. It seemed they were a long way from home.

  “Where the hell are we?” she asked, her teeth chattering as she stood and wrapped her arms around herself.

  “This,” Casimir started, that stupid knowing smirk forming on his lips, “is The Mother’s Spring.”

  Madelynn shot him a look of confusion. “The what?”

  Casimir scoffed at that, holding his arms out around him. “A natural Essence Spring. To awaken your Essence.”

  “A natural Essence Spring? It’s frozen out here.”

  He turned away from her then, starting toward an open field of snow. “If you’ll follow me, I’ll show you.”

  Madelynn scowled. He was playing with her, she could tell. But she couldn’t pinpoint where the deception was. Callum had assured her that Casimir would try to play games with her mind, to eat away at her until she was nothing but bones and echoes of screams. But, she couldn’t see it.

  And as she followed him, she realized that maybe she was just naive. Maybe Casimir was some master manipulator, and she was just falling into his traps. But, she’d picked up on it when he’d tried to outplay her at the Military Banquet. She had; however, ended up just running away from him. Literally.

  “Care to share your thoughts?” he called back to her, the wind carrying his voice in all directions around her. Snow had turned to ice beneath them, and she steadied herself as her boots slid with each step.

  “No.”

  At that, he turned around to look at her, and he smiled cockily, tilting his head back to look down his nose at her. “Strip.”

  “W-what?” she sputtered out, stopping in her tracks.

  “Strip,” he said plainly. “Take off your clothes.”

  She shook her head. “Uh, no thanks.” She crossed her arms over her chest, as if that would stop him if he tried… anything.

  Casimir’s eyes flashed then, and his Essence roared to life, shooting out golden tendrils of mist. They solidified before her eyes, turning into sharp stakes, as they reached out to her. She took a step back, her stomach dropping, and fell onto her butt. The cold from the ice beneath her bit into her palms as she scooted backward, watching as his Essence pressed in on her. But, just before one of those pointed tendrils reached her throat, it stopped.

  Eyes wide with fear, Madelynn’s gaze found Casimir. He was standing still, his hands in his pockets, as he watched her with an amused expression. “Strip.” was all he said.

  Madelynn didn’t argue this time as she stood and removed her jacket. His Essence retreated back into him, forming a cloud of gold around him. The frigid air clung to her arms, then her feet as she removed her boots and socks. Her hands came to the bottom of her shirt, and her eyes found Casimir again, who was still watching her intently. “Can you at least turn around?” she asked as blood rushed to her cheeks.

  “No.”

  “This is ridiculous,” she shivered out, rubbing a foot against her pants in an attempt to keep warm. “Does whatever you have planned really demand I be stripped bare?”

  Casimir rolled his eyes, crossing his arms. “It, actually, does not. But, if you can find it somewhere in your shrivelled little brainwashed mind to trust me on this, you’ll find I’m trying to help you.”

  Madelynn fought against the urge to curl into herself as snow clung to her eyelashes, her fingers and toes turning bright red. “I will gladly accept any help that doesn’t include me stripping naked in front of the man who cursed my husband!”

  Casimir froze, his jaw tightening at her words. Madelynn stood firm, despite the chill that ate at her skin and caressed her bones until they ached. They stood in silence, staring at each other for so long, she thought she might’ve overstepped.

  But then, Casimir’s hand reached behind him, and he pulled forth a knife. Madelynn barely had time to take a step back before he brought the knife over his head and plunged it into the ice beneath them. His Essence formed a second skin around the knife, plunging it deeper- until a loud crack filled the air and rocked the earth beneath them.

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  Madelynn swayed, feeling the trembling in the ice before she saw the deep crack, reaching in jagged lines from the knife all the way to her bare feet.

  She shrieked, turning to run, but lost her footing midway through her stride, and fell forward, the ice cutting into her face and hands as she slid. The crack reached forward still, and the ice began to split, chunks falling into the water below. She was powerless, even as she corrected herself, stood, and wobbled backward.

  She spared one final glance at Casimir before the split reached her, to see him watching her with a devilish smile. She held a finger in the air, one final lewd gesture, before she plunged into the water below.

  Blood rushed to her head. Her ears rang, her eyes burnt, and her throat stung against the sensation that filled her. That fire- the one that had been licking at her edges for the last week- exploded.

  The cold never touched her. The water was warm against her skin, like the soft embrace of Casimir’s Essence when he’d shifted them away. That warmth filled her lungs and spread into her veins as she sunk lower and lower into the spring.

  It felt like power. It felt like everything she never knew she’d been missing was suddenly returned all at once. She could feel it radiating from her hands and feet, exploding from her mouth.

  And at the sensation, she peeled her eyes open and strained against the fog of the water. It was green and murky, flowing around in an unnatural sway around her. She searched for the source of that feeling, and found that it was her that was green and murky. Heavy, billowing, dark green smoke poured from her skin, as if it was a part of her that’d just been released.

  Her Essence.

  Then, her feet met the bottom of the spring, and her lungs burnt at the lack of air. How long had she been underwater? She clawed at her throat as she pushed against the ground, her arms scooping her upward- was the water always this thick?

  She pushed and pulled and scooped and struggled until her hands found the bottom of the sheet of ice, and then the gap in the ice that she’d fallen through.

  A hand appeared, and she grasped it.

  She was pulled upward roughly, until she was splayed on the ice, coughing and gagging as water spilled from all her orifices.

  The cold found her once again, and she wrapped her arms around herself as she pushed herself upward. She was going to die out here, it was so cold, she wouldn’t last a-

  “Bet you wish you would’ve stripped now.”

  Casimir’s voice broke through her thoughts and her head snapped to the side to glare at him. That same green smoke built in her chest again, before erupting out of her hands. “You!” she shouted, her voice low and unfamiliar in its rage as she stood. “Why wouldn’t you warn me before you did that?”

  She took a step toward him, and he took a step back, holding his hands up as if… as if she scared him. She stopped, and looked down at herself. Dark green Essence flowed around her, starting at her feet and reaching up into the sky in a plume that could only have come from the largest of fires. She couldn’t help but smile as she watched it lick up at the sky, as if it was at last celebrating its freedom.

  Her Essence. Her Essence. It was more than what she could’ve asked for- it was glorious.

  Casimir snapped his fingers, drawing her attention toward him once again. When she looked at him, he clapped his hands together, a tight smile forming on his face. “We can go over the semantics later, but you’re going to freeze to death if you don’t get warm.”

  Madelynn ignored him. She wasn’t even cold anymore. She was free. She was everything she had been forced to restrain for twenty long years.

  A hand wrapped tightly around her arm, and Madelynn struggled against it, frowning as Casimir drug her toward him, his Essence wrapping around them.

  And when his golden mist intertwined with her green smoke, it was as if the universe had an epiphany. As if all things ceased to exist, and it was just mist and smoke dancing around the stars.

  A shiver ran down her spine, a new heat blossoming inside her that was so unlike what she’d felt with Callum. It was something she’d never felt before, as if a whole second set of senses had awakened along with her Essence. She felt… different, somehow. As if she’d unlocked a side of herself that had never existed until right this moment.

  She looked up at Casimir, and he was standing so close she could smell his cologne- something with cinnamon and pine- and she could’ve sword she saw red blossoming on his tanned cheeks. He didn’t meet her gaze, but she could tell. Whatever she’d just felt, he felt it too.

  She smiled, despite that part of herself that still screamed at her to run away from him- from all of this- and said, “Oh, that is sensitive.”

  He just stared straight ahead, his jaw working as he clenched his teeth together. As gold filled her senses, she swore she saw a smirk grace his features before he shifted them away.