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When Noelle gets home, finally, after a frantic, half-blind run through town after she'd fled from the hospital, feet pounding the pavement and fear pounding in her veins like a second pulse, it takes her a moment to realise how silent it is. Cold. Empty.
just like her
Of course, Mum is still at work. Normally, this would upset her, but in that moment, under the all-consuming fear, she feels a faint stab of relief.
Time cracks, and she slumps against the front door. Clumsy hands reach back, locking and bolting the door. A moment's hesitation, and she pushes herself into movement. Draws the curtains over every window. Makes sure every single possible entrance into the house is locked. Twice. She doesn't know why
yes she does
, but she has to do it.
Mum will yell at her for it later, probably, annoyed and tired and not wanting to dig for her keys to get inside her own house, but the fear lingers, iron and rot on her tongue, a parasite in her brain, and Noelle can't be too scared of consequences right now. Not from her mother.
Stumbling to the kitchen, she folds herself, small, into a chair. Buries her face in her hands.
Cries.
It wasn't a dream, Kris had said, an unfamiliar voice from a dearly familiar face, her watch strapped around their wrist. They'd laid a gentle hand on the small of her back to get her attention before they'd spoken. They hadn't touched skin, but still, the touch had burned. Acid eats at the back of her throat, and she scrambles to yank her sweater over her head. She throws it on the floor, and stares at it like it's poisonous.
She shivers, cold. It's cold in the house. It's cold in her soul. Does she even have one of those, anymore? It doesn't feel like it. It feels like a shard of ice has taken its place, shredding her open inside and leaving her to bleed with each breath she takes.
snowgrave in her hands, a winter's kiss on her lips as she snaps out
watch what happens when i cast a spell i don't know, watch me, kris,
berdly by her side and fast asleep and oh, that was a dream, right? a horrible, terrible dream, but she's awake now, and -
berdly is cold and horribly, horribly still, and her mind whispers
snowgrave
and
fatal
but no, that was a dream, and monsters turn to dust when they die, and -
berdly still won't wake up
It wasn't a dream, Kris said.
Shaking legs, as Noelle pushes away from the table. Shaking hands, as she unlocks the back door, and stumbles into the yard. Shaking heart, as she looks at the apple tree that grows along the fence line, tall and proud and older than her dad, and cups her hands together.
The cold inside of her intensifies. The ice that has replaced her soul floods throughout her entire being, like a cloak made just for her. A second, unwanted skin.
Like a cage, ice creeps up the trunk in an explosion of winter. A snowstorm rages and then settles around her. Fatal, she thinks.
The ice cracks. The tree withers.
Noelle sobs. This isn't a spell she knew before. She learnt it in the dream. The nightmare.
The nightmare that was real.
She stares at the tree. No life left on a single branch. Fatal.
Her mind goes blank. She doubles over. There's a bad taste in her mouth. There's nothing but bad, everywhere.
It wasn't a dream.
She's so cold.
She can't look at the tree anymore. She forces her legs -- stiff, frozen -- to carry her back inside. Makes her way back to the kitchen.
She's so, so cold.
She stares at her hands.
She lights the stove.
(When her mother comes back that night, tired and annoyed at having to call for Noelle to let her in, dammit, why is the door locked, Noelle serves them dinner silently.
If her mother notices the lingering scent of burnt fur, or the fresh bandages on Noelle's hands, she doesn't say anything.)