Miura stood at the edge of her hidden cove, her kimono billowing in the wind. The jagged cliffs around her glittered with frost, their surfaces slick with ice that she had summoned for protection. She had been hunted, too–European sailors sent to capture or kill her had found nothing but their own graves, frozen and shattered like glass beneath her touch.

But Miura was tired. Even with her powers, her body ached from endless vigilance, her mind weighed down by loneliness. She had chosen this exile, yet it didn’t ease the sting of Sabrina’s absence. Nor did it erase the lingering guilt of their last conversation.

This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.

The crunch of footsteps on frost snapped her from her thoughts. Miura turned sharply, her hands already weaving patterns in the air, ready to summon the cold. But then she saw Sabrina, bedraggled and trembling, standing at the edge of the ice.

“You shouldn’t be here,” Miura said, her voice like steel.

Sabrina staggered forward, her breath visible in the freezing air. “I didn’t mean to lead them to you.”

Miura’s eyes narrowed. “What do you mean?”

The sound of distant cannon fire answered her question. Sabrina turned, her face pale with terror. “Robert… he’s close.”