The Villainess Wants To Retire-Chapter 116: Freezing

One moment I was swimming. The next, I was sinking. Arms too heavy to lift, legs refusing to kick, head going under as consciousness tried to vacate the premises entirely.

I barely had time to think oh, not again before hands closed around me.

Soren.

Of course Soren. 𝓯𝙧𝓮𝓮𝒘𝓮𝙗𝙣𝒐𝒗𝒆𝓵.𝓬𝓸𝒎

He was there instantly, had been following me the entire time, watching me struggle with a concerned expression he wore knowing I was being stubborn and reckless and refusing to acknowledge my own limitations.

He caught me, lifted me like I weighed lighter than a snowflake, pulled me against his chest with one arm while the other steadied us both in the water.

I looked up at him, ready to snap something defensive, and found him giving me a look.

Not angry. Not amused. Just... that look. The one that said "you worry me" and "you’re being ridiculous" and "I care about you too much to let you drown yourself through sheer stubbornness" all at once.

He exhaled.

Dramatically. Loudly. Like I was a stubborn child or a particularly difficult pet who kept trying to eat things that would kill them.

I opened my mouth to demand what exactly was going through his head when he beat me to it:

"Your body went through a lot." His voice was patient. Too patient. The kind of patience that came from dealing with someone who refused to acknowledge reality. "It needs rest, Eris. You can’t just—"

I zoned out.

Not intentionally. But he was holding me, and his chest was right there, and the water was making his skin glisten in ways that should be illegal, and I could see every defined muscle shifting as he adjusted his grip.

The droplets sliding down his abdomen were hypnotic.

I followed their path. Down, down, down to where they disappeared into the fabric that was barely holding on by the belt and prayers and...

"—not supposed to be out of the water for at least another day."

I snapped back to awareness, catching just the tail end of whatever he’d been saying.

"I’m fine," I said automatically, because admitting weakness wasn’t something I did even when I was clearly not fine by any definition of the word.

He didn’t believe me. I could see it in his eyes, in the way his jaw tightened slightly, in the stubborn set of his shoulders that meant he was about to argue.

I continued before he could. "I don’t like being wet."

"Wet." He repeated the word like he was tasting it, testing whether it was accurate. Then that smirk appeared... dangerous and playful and entirely unfair. "You’d burn me anyway if I kept you in here much longer."

The comment was light. Teasing. Expecting my fire to rise to the bait the way it always did, expecting flames to dance across my skin in response to the challenge.

Nothing happened.

I stared at my palm, confused.

Willed the fire to appear. Summoned it the way I’d been doing since I was five years old and learned that burning things was easier than feeling things.

Nothing.

Not even a spark. Not even heat. Just... nothing.

Worry flashed through me, sharp and immediate. Followed by confusion that bordered on panic. Because my fire had always answered. Even when I didn’t want it. Even when I was trying to be gentle or careful or human instead of monstrous.

It was the one constant in my burning life.

And now it was gone.

Soren caught on immediately—of course he did, because he noticed everything about me, catalogued every expression and reaction like he was building an encyclopedia of Eris and couldn’t afford to miss a single entry.

"Oh my- it seems the river neutralized your core." His tone shifted to somewhat softer and explanatory like he was a healer delivering a diagnosis. "Tamed your fire temporarily to keep it from consuming you. It’s a side effect of the healing. Should wear off in a few days once your power stabilizes and your body remembers how to contain it without burning itself to ash."

I should have been terrified.

Should have felt panic at being powerless, at losing the one thing that had defined me for years, at being vulnerable in ways I’d spent lifetimes learning to avoid.

But I didn’t feel terror.

I felt... elated.

Light. Free. Like someone had been pressing a hot iron against my skin for my entire existence and had finally, finally lifted it away.

I didn’t remember ever being like this before.

Couldn’t recall a single moment in either timeline when I’d existed without fire burning in my veins, without heat pressing against the inside of my skin like it wanted out, without the constant awareness that I was one bad decision away from incinerating everything I touched.

This was new.

This was cold. Pure cold. Real cold. The kind I’d been dreaming about without knowing it was possible, coursing through my skin from the outside in, sinking into muscles and bones and the spaces between cells until I was frozen through and through.

It was painful slightly.

Like my body didn’t know how to process the sensation and was trying every possible interpretation at once. Sharp and aching and wrong in all the ways that meant it was actually right.

But it was wonderful.

Beautiful in a way that made my chest tight and my throat close and my eyes sting with something that resembled tears.

I almost wished my fire wouldn’t come back.

Almost wished I could stay like this forever, cold and powerless and free from the god sealed in my bones and the destiny written into my blood.

A scoff escaped before I could stop it.

Quiet. Private. Meant for myself but loud enough that Soren probably heard it anyway because of course he did.

"Who knew," I murmured, barely audible, eyes still fixed on my palm where flames should be dancing but weren’t, "that almost freezing to death would feel so beautiful."