The Elementals - The Ice Princess

Chapter 6

A few minutes have passed when I finally am able to realize that I am not in school any longer. My head is pounding and my stomach feels like I am going to be sick. For a minute I think that Laney decked me and this headache is the end result of it. That is when I realize that I am looking up at blue sky, not the fluorescent lights of the nurse's station or the principal's office or the cafeteria for that matter. A snowflake lands on my cheek and I take in a deep breath through my nose and can feel the air filling my lungs. My mind begins to clear a bit as I watch a cloud that looks like a giraffe with a dolphins head float by. I blink as another snowflake lands in my eye and smile at the feeling.

I am laying on something hard but my body doesn't want to move to find out what it is. I am exhausted from whatever has happened. How did I get outside? I wonder to myself, but can't come up with any kind of answer. It's only been a few minutes.

I reach down and grab for my pendant and find it safely hanging around my neck, seemingly untouched. The feel of it in my hand automatically makes me feel better. I love the way it not only feels around my neck, but the way it feels in my fingers when I touch it. No matter how many times I have, it sends a calm throughout my body. This time is no different. A gentle calm washes over me the way that waves gently wash up on the shore of a beach. I am beginning to feel at peace.

After a few moments, my headache begins to subside and I begin to recall what happened, the blue light coming from my pendant, the immense pain that I felt, Alexander getting me out of the gym and the way that all the kids were looking at me, Laney included. The look that Laney and I shared, I could tell it wasn't a look of surprise like the other kids were giving me. It was more of a look of satisfaction, like she had just accomplished something, something big.

The air is cold but I am not bothered by it. I finally shake the cobwebs out of my head and sit up to see Alexander watching over me. "What happened?" I asked shakily. My voice sounds weak, like it does just before you lose it to a sickness. "Where are we?"

"Well, to answer your first question, you fainted, or passed out from the pain that you were in. You're alright though, there will be no lasting side effects from it. And to answer the second question, I'm not quite sure," he responds, "just a bit out of town, I think."

The pain? The word pain doesn't ever begin to describe what I felt in the cafeteria. My fingers gently rub where I remember it hurting the most and find only a small area along my collarbone that is tender.

Looking around, there are recognizable pieces of the terrain in the distance. The most easily recognizable is an open field that is planted with winter wheat, sitting just below the old Snowspell water tower. That water tower is pretty useless these days. It mostly serves as a spot for seniors to throw parties and provides a place for couples to go and make out. Brave souls have even been known to climb the rusted ladder on a dare to see how far they could make it before chickening out. For sure as least one person has made it all the way to the top and that brave soul just happened to be an artist. The letters have long been manipulated so that it no longer says Snowspell, but rather "SnowHell". The people here are so clever.

Alexander and I are about a mile south of the water tower which means we are near Rock Glen. I used to camp here with dad when we first arrived in Snowspell. It's a rather large forest that spans for miles and is cut in half by Eagle River. This is one of the only forests in all of the United States that is home to oak, spruce and maple trees. The cold winters help the maples thrive and from time to time, they get tapped and people are able to enjoy the maple syrup they produce.

There is not a lot of traffic around here at this time of year because of the cold and the snow. My dad was adamant about spending time away from people just after my mother died. It must have been his way of coping with the loss. I didn't mind though because he taught me a lot on trips in places like this. It didn't matter what town we were living in, he always found a way for us to get "back to nature" as he would call it. To be honest, I kind of enjoyed these trips. I learned some basic survival skills, like how to build a shelter and start a fire, even with wet wood. I guess you never know when a 16 year old girl will be trapped in the wilderness.