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Erik shot upright a cold pain coursing through his chest. Sliding his hands over the sheets he searched blindly for Mina, but her side of the bed was empty, and her scent faint on the air.
“Mina?” He called out, scanning the room, but no response came.
Rubbing a hand over his chest, he slipped from the bed and grabbed his silk pajama bottoms from the chair when they rested. He slipped on a robe and headed for a door out into the hall.
There was no sign of her, so he tilted his head back and let his nose guide him. She’d gone left. He took two steps and another scent crossed his path.
He turned on his heel and he arched his eyebrow at Andrea as she approached. “You’ve returned?”
“I have.” She gave him a small bow. “And I have a surprise for you, Your Majesty.”
“A surprise?” He frowned. The witch was known for her cold demeanor. Surprises weren’t in her wheelhouse.
She turned, extending a thin arm toward the hall that would take him to her chambers. “This way.”
“I need to speak with Princess Mina, can it wait a mo—”
“Oh, the princess will be there,” Andrea said smiling.
Erik hesitated. “Oh…alright.”
Moving to follow her, he walked slowly in her path. Something felt wrong. It had woken him from a dead sleep, but he couldn’t put his finger on what. Mina was gone from his bed, and now the witch was being nice to him. He couldn’t shake that feeling of unease clawing at his throat.
The thought distracted him so much, he didn’t notice they’d arrived at Andrea’s chambers until the door closed behind him. Blinking out of his haze, he frowned. The order he’d grown used to in her things was gone. The tables, and floor were littered with debris. Shattered jars sat around his feet, a chalk circle beneath them, smeared in dark crimson and gray sludge.
“What happened here?” He demanded. “Where is Mina? You said she’d be here.”
Andrea chuckled and swept over to the beaded curtain that still blocked half of the room from his view. At the door she turned. “She’s on her way, Your Majesty. You needn’t worry.”
“Why am I here then?” he asked, glaring at her.
She snapped her fingers and her faint blue cloak vanished revealing a dress of soft dark verdant fabric that reflected the spark stones hanging off the walls.
“I have been working on something for quite some time,” she said. “I made you a promise. Do you remember what it was?”
“You promised that Evangeline would return to me one day. Why?” Erik asked, feeling his stomach churn.
She gestured to the curtain beside her and on a phantom wind, the beads parted perfectly revealing a long glass box sitting on a table much like the one she kept in the center of the room. Except the glass box wasn’t a box at all. Stepping closer, his eyes went wide. The top to the box had been removed, but there was no mistaking it for what it was. A glass coffin and laying inside was Evangeline. His wife. Perfectly preserved and as he watched her chest rose and fell in even breaths.
“H-how?” he asked.
“Magic, and a little bit of ingenuity,” Andrea said.
Erik couldn’t breathe as he walked closer. Afraid to make noise, or blink, he couldn’t believe what sat before him. It was her.
Andrea moved behind him. “She’s alive, Your Majesty. You can touch her. Wake her. She lives again.”
Standing over the coffin he reached forward and brushed his knuckles over her cheek. Her skin felt smooth as he remembered. Smooth and silky as cream.
As he brushed a strand of hair from her forehead, Evangeline’s eyes fluttered. “Mmm.”
“My Darling?” He whispered, and her eyes opened.
She blinked a few times, and then met his gaze, her soft red lips lifting into a smile. “Erik. You found me.”
Her voice rang in his ears like a bell. How had he ever thought Mina could be Evangeline.
