Chapter 1: The Frozen Flame.

The cold wasn’t just cold anymore.

It was quiet. It was unforgiving. It was nothing.

Estelle Winterbourne lay chained to the black stone at the heart of the Deadfall, and the snow had already buried her to the ribs. Silver burned under her skin where the traitor’s mark had been carved three nights ago by her own father’s knife.

She felt numb.

“For the good of the pack.” She still remembered the words that bastard Darius said before plunging a dagger into back.

What hurt her the most wasn't the knife that stabbed into her back for she was already used to that kind of pain. Rather it was the person behind the it.

“ Darius..." She muttered. Estelle had lost count of how many times she said that name.

Her breath came out in shallow, useless puffs. The moon was a sliver, but the fog obscured it, making it too weak to call her wolf forward. Too weak to heal. Too weak to do anything.

This was how Silvervale dealt with 'Traitors'. They don't end you quickly... They exile you and break your spirit with the biting cold.

But she knew she wasn't a traitor.

Estelle's face was already ridden with frozen tears. If not for her constantly blinking her eyes they would have frozen shut long ago.

Then a twig snapped.

Estelle didn’t lift her head. Hallucinations went as fast as they came in the Deadfall. Wolves made of wind. Her mother’s voice. Darius promising he’d come back for her. Or even her late comrades who died in battle.

Lies... All lies. All of it.

Heavy steps crunched through the crust of snow, causing Estelle's almost lifeless eyes to now turn the source of sound.

“Still breathing huh.” a voice said. prompting Estelle's eyes to widen slightly “Your pack overestimated the cold. Or underestimated you.” Estelle's eyes widened slightly.

She knew that voice. Every pup in Silvervale was raised on stories about it. The Ice Devil of Frostveil. The wolf who tore through three alphas to take his mountain. The man her father called a monster.

Adrian Lykos.

Estelle forced her eyes open. He stood six feet away, snow to his knees, the wind tearing at his dark, furry cloak. He stood there alone, staring down at her.His eyes the color of a frozen lake — pale, depthless, and almost listless, even.

Estelle's frostbit lips curved into a weak smirk. That action alone caused the skin on her lips to crack. The wound froze not long after.

“Come to gloat?” Her voice was shredded and weak. “Or to finish what my father started?” This was how she and Adrian usually spoke. They mocked each other's misfortune while going at each other's throats.

Adrian tilted his head, his frosty blue eyes scrutinized the chain, the brand on her chest and the blue already creeping up her fingers.Then he averted his gaze with disinterest and dusted off the snow that accumulated on his shoulder.“Your father thinks you’re dead. Your stupid mate is running around, telling everyone you ran like a coward.”

Darius. Her throat closed. Her eyes which were already dry watered with hatred again.

“So I ask you, Estelle Winterbourne,” Adrian continued, stepping closer. His boots were right beside her head now. “Which one are you? Dead, or a coward?”

She should have spat. Should have cursed him. Should have died with her teeth bared.

Instead, staring into the blue eyes in front of her, she whispered, “Neither.” a tiny cloud of breathe left her lips.

Something flickered in his expression. Not pity. She would have loathed it. But it was something else. Something she wasn't familiar with.

She tried to get up, but the wolfsbane in her system made every movement agonizing.

“ Don't move. " Adrian said in low tone.

Estelle wanted to defy that order, but she no strength to do so. She coughed and stared listlessly at the sky. It seemed like the tenacity she was so proud of was going to cause her some trouble today.

Letting out a sigh, she slowly turned her head towards Adrian and opened her mouth to say something.

But before she could speak Adrian crouched. The cold rolling off him wasn’t the weather. It was him — his wolf, his nature. Frost formed where his fingers brushed the chain. With one pull, the silver links shattered.

Pain lanced up Estelle’s arms as blood dripped out of body. She bit down on a scream.

“If you trespass the Deadfall, you die,” Adrian said, slipping an arm under her shoulders. She weighed nothing to him.

“Then why—” The words died as he hauled her against his chest. He was solid, and impossibly warm for a man called the Ice Devil.

Adrian's eyes blue eyes glinted with the dark mischief she was familiar with. But his face remained stoic like a monolith's.

“ It would be quite a shame for you... A woman who caused me so trouble... to die like a stray mutt in the cold. Quite unfitting don't you think?” he said, turning his back on Silvervale’s territory. “And I want to know why the heir to Silvervale is wearing a traitor’s brand.”

The last thing Estelle saw before the darkness took her was his jaw, clenched tight, and the way the snow melted before it touched his skin.

Her enemy was carrying her out of hell.

And she wasn’t sure if she wanted to live or die to spite him.

---

“ How Pathetic..." He laughed in derision. And at the same time he scowled at the state Estelle was in. “ To think... the woman who caused me a shit ton of trouble would end up like this...Thrown away like mutt..." He let out a sharp breathe causing the fog to stir. “ Just what were you thinking Silvervale?"

Adrian stared at the woman in his arms.

Her light brown skin which usually had a vibrant sheen was sickly pale. For some reason, he hated seeing her like this.

She was his rival, someone who still keep calm when outnumbered 10 to 1. A woman whom he respected.

Yet here she is. Frozen, half-dead and poisoned. His wolf growled, disliking the sight before it.

Adrian clicked his tongue again.

“ Pathetic... utterly pathetic."