Blazing in the Snow

(Please be aware this chapter may be triggering for some people. Viewer discretion is advised)

Everything was black, and not a single thing could be seen. "Hello?" Lilian echoed. There was no answer back, only silence.

Lilian's conscious eventually began walking and looking for something, until her satin blue eyes suddenly came upon a deep red glow. She stopped and hesitated to get close. As if being told to do so, her hand gently reached for the blazing light and within an instant Lilian felt a weird warmth inside of her.

For a moment, there was a strange presence Lillian felt, "Do you wish to live?" a sudden voice said.

Lilian didn't understand why the voice asked her such a question. But, she answered Anyway. "...Yes, I do..." a long pause started.

"Are you sure?" the voice said.

"Yes, I'm sure." Lilian spoke this time but with more certainty.

Lilian felt herself suddenly waking up. As she slowly fluttered her eyes open for the light to adjust, she noticed the sky was clearer. It had become daytime. As Lilian got up from the snow she looked around at her surroundings, icicles scattered among barren trees and it was dead silent, the only movement she could see was the fog from her breathe.

"huh?"

She lifted up her hand and soon realized the flower that was there last night was gone. Not a single trace of it, just a strange flowerbed of withering lilies from where she laid. It was all very strange to her.

It was early morning, Lilian could tell by the sun. She felt odd. She noticed she didn't feel cold anymore, if anything it felt room temperature. It was as if her senses became heightened, her eyesight could see further and she could feel the animals that burrowed underground.

Looking around Lili tried to find the path from which she came, She inwardly sighed and realized her steps had been covered. She sat in thought for awhile. The snow may have covered her steps but the snow might not have been packed just yet. Feeling around some-what optimistic she was right, the soft parts of snow were same as her footsteps. She began to slowly follow her covered path back and eventually got back to the hill she was last night.

It was practically noon now.

Lilian looked out at the manor and stared for a moment at the garden, her eyesight did indeed get better. She could see more of the details in the hedge statues and was able to make out the knobs on the garden doors.

Then she remembered.

She gasped "oh no!"

She was going to be in big trouble when she got home.

Lillian's thoughts ran like crazy wondering how Fredrick must have reacted to her not being there that morning. His silver eyes filled with worry, how was she gonna make up for it? And her parents, oh they must have sent a regiment by now to find her! Lilian ran as fast as she could all the way home.

When she finally reached the manor Lilian went through the garden maze and walked around for a little while. She hoped someone would see her. She would be able to give them the excuse that something caught her eye in the garden that early morning and she went to look for it. Luckily enough, people had been looking for her and a maid came by yelling for her, "Lilian! Young Lady Lilian! where on Earth is this child?" This was her que! "Ms. Berry? what's the matter? did something happen?" Lilian pretended to be confused with what all the yelling was about. Her almost always nonchalant face made it nearly impossible to tell that Lilian was acting or lying. "There you are! The whole manor has been looking for you everywhere! Your mother and father even sent a platoon of guards out in the wild to look for you!..." Ms. Berry went on and on, she was like an aunt to Lilian. As Ms. Berry continued to ramble and scold Lilian about being unsafe they headed back inside and sent word to Lillian's parents about the "situation". Luckily Lilian did this once before, so her parents believed the excuse she gave them.

As soon as Ms. Berry turned around to give word to the messenger, Lilian already ran off to her room. She closed the door behind her and finally she breathed a heavy sigh of relief. She made it out alive luckily, but what she really wanted now was a warm bath and some alone time. Maids quietly came in and filled the bath for her and left as per her request. As Lilian was about to get in the bath though, she looked in the mirror and suddenly jolted with shock. Her eyes once a beautiful deep blue, were a bright red like blood engraved into an inferno. She quickly took a closer look in the mirror taking in the color in front of her. How did no one notice? Her eyes felt evil to her. She thought maybe she'd become a monster. Her eyes were like a beacon against her long pure white hair.

Lilian stared at her eyes for a while, long enough for her bath to become cold. In the end she just washed her face and put on a clean white nightgown she had sitting on her bed. She decided she would take a bath in the morning.

As she sat in bed looking at her eyes in a small handheld mirror, the only clue she had of who her real parents were. Lilian's mind began to ramble. Could she have contracted an illness? Was she going to die? What was going to happen to her? What was she going to tell everyone?

Lilian heard a familiar knock coming from her bedroom door. "Lili, it's me! I'm coming in you better be dressed!" it was Fredrick! Lilian bolted towards the door realizing she forgot to lock it. "Don't come in here!" she shouted. Fredrick began placing some of his weight on the door to keep it cracked open, "What are you saying!? open the door already, what's going on with you? You've been acting strange."

"You, can't see me at the moment..." Lilian's odd response halted him.

He looked at the door as if he saw her, waiting on the other side. "... Lilian, what's going on?" Fredrick waited a bit for her response. After waiting a good several minutes he put his hand on the door, and noticed there wasn't a weight on it anymore. He lightly pushed it open and saw Lilian covering her face, tears rolling down her cheeks unable to look Fredrick in the eyes. He was somewhat taken back. "Fredrick I- I touched the flower- and I just- I don't know what happened to me my...my..." she couldn't even finish her sentence. Before she noticed it, Fredrick was lightly hugging her while tears streamed from her face.

It took her a while, but Lilian finally calmed down a little enough to stop crying. Fredrick tried to gently pull away, but he was surprised by Lilian's sudden movement to keep him locked in place.

"Fredrick, before you move. Before you look at me. I want you to know this..." She hesitated, but Fredrick stayed quiet.

"I went to the flower last night..." her voice became quieter.

"You wha-" her grasp got tighter on him,

"...I had a dream. And now, my eyes, they're different." She whispered.

"What are you saying?" He whispered back.

"My eyes, they aren't beautiful anymore... I'm afraid I've turned into an evil beast, Fredrick..."

Lilian's body was shaking alittle. Unable to make eye contact with her brother, she sat in the same position alittle longer with him. Afraid of what he would have to say.

"Lilian, open your eyes, and look at me." He said standing up

"No." Lilian refused.

"Coward." Fredrick smirked.

Lilian stood almost tripping on her hair and looked up at him with an angry expression, "How dare you call me coward! You're the cow-... ward..." Lilian stopped when she saw the look on his face. "Woah... How in the gods did that happen?" Fredrick couldn't believe what he was seeing, Lilian's eyes were actually really red. "I know... they're ugly now aren't they? And it's all that stupid Flower's fault!" Lilian became upset again, but more so angry this time. "They aren't ugly at all, just different." Fredrick noted. "Well, yes, but it could also be a sign of something bad! Also, how are we supposed to tell mother and father about this?" She deadpanned.

After a while of chatting, Fredrick and Lilian came to the conclusion it would be better to tell they're parents in private. Lilian covered her face and kept her eyes shut while her brother led her to their parent's chambers that night before supper.

"Well, if it isn't my children coming to greet me at this fine time, hehe, what brings you here darlings?" Duchess, Mother, and Eleanor, were the names this woman went by. Fredrick took after her soft red hair, but other than that he got everything else from the Duke. Lilian never liked the duchess too much, there was something amiss about her, so Lilian rarely talked around her.

"Good evening Mother, sorry to disturb you but, where is Father? we need him here aswell. It's important." Fredrick said in his most gentleman of ways. "well, your father happens to be in the study at the moment dear, also, what's our Lilian doing hiding behind you there, hmm?" The duchess leaned side to side almost playfully like a cat trying to see Lilian behind his back.

The two backed up from their mother's prying, "It's about Lili's eye's, She touched this flower that was outside yesterday and... well, they changed color..." after hearing what Fredrick said the duchess sent word for their father to come and see to the situation. After taking a look at Lilian's eyes and considering the situation they said it would just be best to get a physician in the morning. Lilian had a gut feeling something was wrong.

That night Lilian ate in her room, and no servants were allowed to enter so Fredrick was on duty to bring her dinner. When Fredrick came to her room he opened her door without a single knock. For a moment they looked each other in the eyes, they practically stared at each other. "do you think... I'm gonna be okay? Fredrick?" Lilian looked down scared, yet she felt almost ashamed of herself. "I don't know... all we can do is hope for now... I'll see you in the morning Lili, goodnight, make sure to sleep." Fredrick shut the door after putting her meal on her nightstand and giving her a hug goodnight.

Eventually, Lilian passed out unable stay awake any longer after staring at her eyes all night.

When she woke up she found herself in a familiar place, but she didn't know where.

"Lilian~" a woman's voiced called.

"Lili~" she called again.

Lilian looked around, she was in a small room decorated with homemade toys. The warm sunlight shone through a window with flowing curtains. She looked outside and there she saw a beach and a breathtaking ocean. A woman she couldn't see the face of, stared at her and she stared back. "Lilian, come here" the woman's voiced cooed. Lilian slowly walked to her reaching her tiny hands out to the woman. But as soon as Lilian did that, her hands began to shake. The woman backed away and she was on fire. The room was on fire and Lilian couldn't breath. The last thing she saw was a familiar red glow replacing the woman she once saw.

Lilian gasped awake. "what a nightmare..." she muttered. Lilian quickly realized her bedroom was hotter than it should've been and noticed a weird burning smell. There was smoke coming from the door. Lilian couldn't believe what she was seeing. A fire was right outside her door! She shuffled quickly out of bed bringing the mirror with her.

"AGGH, IT'S BURNING PLEASE, PLEASE HELP ME HELP ME GODS AGHHH!!!"

Lilian could here the screaming and crying of people on the other side of the door. She couldn't think, she wanted to find her family, she wanted to see them okay. The screams could still be heard from the servants burning in agony. She couldn't open the door, she knew she would die if not she would be severally injured. She trembled as she gathered whatever sanity she had left and shook as she walked towards her window. Lilian looked one last time at her room, her red eyes in tears. "I'm sorry!" she cried.

Falling once again into the hedge her window busted with the fire coming ablaze. She started to run. Tears constantly fell from her face no matter how hard she tried to wipe them away. Lilian ran as far away as she could. She couldn't look back, she knew if she did she would lose herself in the moment.

Eventually the sensation of the ice cold feeling under her feet began to slowly bring her back as she made it to the once familiar hill. Snow was falling and the stars of the night couldn't be seen. Lilian could feel her hair caressing her face as the wind blew. Her legs gave way at the sight before her.

Embers flickered In the reflection of her burning eyes.

"it's... all gone..."