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𝐌𝐈𝐍𝐀 𝐅𝐄𝐋𝐓 𝐀𝐒 𝐈𝐅 𝐄𝐕𝐄𝐑𝐘 𝐁𝐎𝐍𝐄 in her body had shifted out of their joints, and had been relocated forcefully and carelessly. The pain smashed like a relentless hammer; on her knees, head, ribcage, everywhere, over and over again in a throbbing manner.

She wished she could just stay unconscious, but as her senses grew so did the aching of the uncomfortable position she laid in. Her arm rested in a painful angle under her back while a row of sharp rocks pressed in her left thigh, hip and lower back. A freezing cold rose up from the floor underneath her as well, adding to the pain that already resided deep within her bones, and she mustered her courage to move.

Mina groaned while slowly pushing herself up by rolling onto her side and freeing her arm from behind her back. However, her breath scraped like sandpaper through her throat and she quickly stopped making any sound at all. Her throat and jaw felt bruised and sore, and she flinched as she carefully touched it but her cold fingers were a relief to the heated skin as well.

A shiver ran down her spine as she remembered how Darkan had enclasped her jaw in a likewise manner, but she took a few deep, yet painful breaths to calm her mind. She wondered where she was, and how much time had passed in her unconsciousness.

While swallowing in a grunt, Mina struggled back onto her feet as her body felt weak and trembled uncontrollably. She sought support with her other free hand by something cold, vertical standing and rod-shaped next to her. Iron bars. She dared to bet she was in the dungeons of Cair Paravel, as a prisoner of the Winter Lady.

Mina started to see more and more in the twilight of the dungeon as a faint gleam far in the distance, like a beam of moonlight, shed light on her surroundings. There weren't any windows, and frost covered the walls, causing the cracks between the stones to glisten in the faint light. The only way in and out seemed to be the spiral staircase at the far end of where Mina stood now.

The iron bars of the cell door, though, didn't budge at all as she shook at them. She only heard a small squeak of the hinges near the stone ceiling and floor, and a jingle of the lock, but the door itself stood as unwavering as a mountain. The cold iron bit in the skin of her hands and she let go of the door again, pressing her hands under armpits to try and warm them up a bit again.

Mina's brown eyes wandered through her cell, a thoughtful look on her face. She wanted to get out, but how?

Her heart skipped several beats, though, when she suddenly noticed a large and slightly moving heap in the cell next to her. Its weak breathing reached her ears in a irregular manner, and the sound was barely audible above her own heartbeat.

Mina squinted her eyes as she tried to make out more details from whatever laid in the cell, and it seemed as if the heap consisted of a lot of fur. With a little bit of imagination, she tried to envision what it would look like in daylight, and she gasped for air as the pieces fell together like a perfect fitting puzzle.

'Aslan,' she breathed out, ignoring her painful throat for a moment, and the great lion lifted his head from the ground with a slurred movement.

Even though they were surrounded by shadows, Mina saw the lion's dark eyes stood dazed and hazily; as if he wasn't really aware of what was happening. His usually golden fur coat shimmered with a silvery grey colour in the twilight, but she shrunk in sympathy when she noticed darker spots all over his body, including the mane under his head. The lion's fur clumped together with dried blood and frost, and the closer Mina looked, the more wounds she discovered. She didn't know much about lions, but she felt it was a miracle Aslan was still alive.

Mina pushed her own pain to the back of her mind and with trembling legs ─ feeling as if she could collapse any second, she walked closer towards the lion's cell. She sank in an uncontrollable movement on her knees by the bars that separated the cells from each other and if she stuck out her arm, she could almost reach the great lion.

'Aslan,' she said again, but before she could ask what had happened to him, a movement in the corner of her eyes caught her attention and the words froze on her lips.

She stared without blinking at Darkan as he stepped closer towards her cell. His eyes shone through the darkness like blue stars, but there was nothing comforting about their unnatural light. His dark toned clothing was covered with swirling shapes of frost, allowing him to seamlessly blend in with the dungeon's walls, and Mina realized he had been here already since she had woken up.

Darkan opened the cell door with a small iron key, and despite the improbability of it, Mina hoped he was helping her escape. Somewhere, beyond the enchantment, the Archenlander still had to be there, but that hope shattered like ice on a lake when he roughly hauled her on her feet.

He twisted one of her arms in a painful manner onto her back, and Mina cried it out, trying desperately to fight a way out of his grip, but her body was weakened. Darkan dodged her elbow blow aimed towards his face with a scoff and forced her to walk towards the cell door.

'Darkan, please,' Mina managed to say between her painful cries. 'This isn't you. Let me go.'

Darkan, however, ignored all of her pleas and practically dragged her up the staircase and through the many hallways as Mina felt her strength leaving with every passing second. She needed water, food, but above all, warmth. The freezing ache of winter was edged into every fiber of her body, and the warmth of a crackling fire started to feel more and more like a faded memory.

Mina landed painfully on her knees when Darkan let go of her arm twisted behind her back, and she carefully moved her wrist a few times before looking around the room they were in.

Five beautiful decorated stone thrones stood at the far small side of the room on an elevated platform, and though there probably had been a tall window behind it, it now consisted of a gaping arched-shaped hole. The glass roof of the throne room was shattered as well, only the vaulted foundation of the roof still stood tall, and the winter's sky above them was almost as white as actual snow.

'Mina,' a sweet-sounding voice came from next to her and Mina snapped her head in the direction of it.

'How nice of you to drop by. Welcome back to Cair Paravel.' The Winter Lady towered far above Mina as she kneeled on the marble floor, but also even a head-length above Darkan who stood next to her. On top of her light blonde hair still stood a crown of ice crystals, just like the first time Mina had seen her on the balcony of the castle, and her grey-bluish dress rustled softly as a freezing breeze blew past them.

'It is Minakshi to you,' Mina snarled at the woman. 'Who are you? And what do you want from me?' she demanded to know, though fear coursed through her veins and caused her voice to tremble. Mina glanced at Darkan's stoic face, a part of her still hoping he would snap out of the enchantment, but he seemed to look right past her.

The Winter Lady cackled softly, her gentle tone disappearing in an instant, as she noticed Mina's glance and she stroked Darkan's jaw with one of her sharp and long fingernails. Blue ice appeared underneath her touch and added to the frost already swirling over his face.

'He won't help you,' the woman said with a smirk, withdrawing her hand and taking a step closer towards Mina. 'He's my minion now, and a very handsome one. Who knows, I might promote him to something a bit more personal for the nights.'

Mina bristled with fury by hearing those words and she tried to climb back onto her feet. 'Don't you dare to touch him,' she growled, but her breath got knocked out of her lungs when the Winter Lady hit her across her face with the force of a frozen bludger and sent her flying back towards the floor again.

Mina struggled to breathe, her ribs felt broken and her bruised body screamed with every movement. Tears ran down her cheeks and her heart throbbed in her throat when the woman kneeled down next to her, a wicked smile plastered on her ageless face.

'My name is Malanix,' she said, 'and what I want is very simple: I want the magic flowing through your and your friends' veins.'

Malanix lowered her hands and hovered them next to Mina's head while a thick, white fog streamed out of her finger tips. The fog danced around Mina's head for a moment, but then with the sharpness of a snake's bite, it shot through her skin and its cold seemed to turn her insides into ice.

Mina's agonizing screams echoed between the walls of the throne room while Malanix' evil laugh added to it as well, and together the sounds formed a horrible song of a nightmare that had come to life. . .

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𝒄𝒉𝒂𝒓𝒂𝒄𝒕𝒆𝒓𝒔 𝒕𝒉𝒊𝒔 𝒄𝒉𝒂𝒑𝒕𝒆𝒓:

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