Tomb Of Glass

Kaphelirea didn't know how long she had been trapped within the ice. She felt as though centuries had passed since she cried herself to sleep on the icy bank of the pond. She could no longer hear the flute of Pan, or the soft melodic songs of her sisters.

Were all the old Gods dead? She could feel and hear the earth groaning, rumbling and changing around her during her frozen incarnation. It cries of abuse from the mistreatment of mortals. Sad shaking tremors come from within the depths of its core. Mother earth wept around her. The gods must be dead or at least have abandoned this realm, because she knew that the gods would have kept the mortals obedient and not let them cause so much destruction.

Kaphelirea was not immortal, but the lives of the Naiads were much longer than humans and not easily slain. She mostly slumbered, for when she was awake, her loneliness and grief for her sisters was too much to bear, so she slept, preserved inside the ice.

One day something began to change. The sudden feeling of cold water dripping on the skin of her cheek awoke her. Drip. Drip. Drip.

Her eyes sprung opened for what seemed like the first time. The light, dull and from below the ice, was still harsh on her eyes after so long in darkness. She could see the sky and trees from above, warped images in glass.

Drip. Drip. Drip. On her face and down over her plump lips, thawing them enough for her to part and lick them. She tried to move her frozen limbs but they were still trapped, held down in an icy grip. She could slightly wiggle her fingers and toes. Although they were so numb she couldn't tell if it was a phantom feeling.

The ice was thawing. Kaphelirea's heart began to pump in her chest. Would she really be freed from her icebound prison? Were there any naiads left? Or was her fate to live the rest of her days as the last of her kind? Grief and panic hit her heart sharply and she gasped in pain. She hadn't heard the sound of her own voice in so long. Just the muddled, dull sounds of the world above and below her.

Drip. Drip. Drip.

Hot tears fell down her frozen cheeks as she lay cradled in her melting confinement. She prayed to the gods to come back and take her with them. She wept, screamed, and cursed them until her voice became hoarse. Yet still, she was met only with silence.

She fell back to sleep. Hopeful that the gods heard her pleas and that her sisters had survived and would find her. Perhaps they never came because they too had been trapped in the frost.

Her rest was short lived. A deafening crack and Kaphelirea was suddenly plunged into icy water. Her limbs finally free, she flailed and kicked, she tried to swim upward and was still met with a thick layer of ice.

She tries to break it with her fist, but she is too weak. She pounds and pounds against it to no avail. She screams, bubbles floating out from her mouth and icy water coming in and burning her throat. Nymphs cannot drown, although she wished that her suffering would have ended long ago.

Just when she gives up striking against the ice, there is another loud crack, from above her this time and a large warm hand grasps her wrist, and she is being pulled from the water. Cold air hits her lungs painfully and she starts coughing and sputtering. She feels herself being dragged across the rough ice surface of the pond, but she is disoriented.

The light, the noise, there is so much noise. The wind gusts around her delicate skin; her wet hair instantly begins to frost over. The birds are chirping and singing. The sounds of the surface are deafening after so long in silence.

There is another sound, a voice. Panicked and worried. A male voice. She tries to get her bearings as she is pulled onto the frosted earth.

There is nothing but white snowy landscape and forests of tall snow covered trees for miles around the water. The sun is hidden beneath grey clouds and flurries of snowflakes gust around in the harsh wind.

She shuts her eyes from the light, her senses feeling overwhelmed. She gasps for air, still coughing up water.

When she opens them again she is met with the warm brown eyes of a mortal man. He looks shocked and terrified. He is wearing layers of...furs of some sort. Kaphelirea decides. His head is covered with a wool hat, his dark curls surrounding his face. He is handsome for a human she thinks to herself, or at least he would be if the expression on his face was not so terror-stricken.

It takes far too long for her to realize he is speaking to her. It is not a language that she recognizes, but she does understand by his alarmed tone, that he is asking her if she is alright. His face is flushed and pale, he didn't expect to find a beautiful woman trapped beneath the ice.

She nods, and tries to reassure him in her native tongue that she is okay. He doesn't understand her, and begins undressing himself, taking off layers of his strange furs, and wrapping them around Kaphelirea's frail body.

Oh, he thinks she is cold. She hadn't thought much about the cold, although now that she did, it was much colder above the ice. She was not affected by temperature the way that mortals were.

Her mortal savior, distressed, pulls a strange device out of his trousers and holds it to the sky above him. He squints at it and rumbles a string of unintelligible words.

She tilts her head and studies this man, realizing that this is the first time in her prolonged life that she's been in the presence of a mortal man. Her sister's had told her of their exploits with the humans, and she had giggled incredulously at the thought.

Now that she was so close to one herself, she could see the appeal. For this man, was built like a god, even with all those ridiculous garments covering his body.

The nymph giggles and he looks up from the peculiar little black box he is concentrating on so intensely. Meeting her golden eyes, he looks frightened but also fascinated by her.

The naiads were known for their beauty if anything, and Kaphelirea was no exception. Her chestnut hair, even wet and frozen around her heart shaped face was thick and luscious. Her skin was almost as pale as the snow surrounding them. Her nose was sharp and pointed, but petite beneath her large golden eyes and long dark lashes. She has full plump lips. And she couldn't tell if her mortal was staring at them or her heaving bosom. She was only wearing a thin silk tunic, with no strophion underneath. Her small nipples and areolas are prominent underneath the sheer fabric.

He asks her another incomprehensible question. She doesn't answer, because he won't understand her anyway, but leans in towards him and drags a finger down his jawline. He flinches and pulls away slightly, eyes widen in surprise.

He swallows hard and moves his eyes from hers to look around as if hoping there will be some answers for him out in the trees. She leans in and feels his warm breath on her skin; it comes out of his mouth in a white puff of air as she leans down and gently presses her soft lips to his. His rough stubble scratching ever so slightly against her untouched lips.

He stiffens beneath her touch, confused and frightened, but she moans into his mouth at the feeling of his flesh against hers. It has been so long since she had felt any sensation at all, especially the feeling of touching another.

She kisses him again, sliding her hands underneath his strange garments, feeling his hot skin underneath. He shivers as her cold fingers rake over his chest and shoulders. She slips her tongue into his mouth and he groans, his nervous hands wrap around her small waist though and he pulls her closer and soon she is on his lap and they're kissing passionately.

Then she hears it, the soft trills of a flute calling to her softly. It’s Pan. Her heart jumps in her chest and she breaks away from her mortal male and pushes him away from her as she stands, searching the forest for the direction of the sound.

The dazed mortal is panting with as he falls next to her, looking at up with a stupid grin, confused at his own unforeseen passion. Kaphelirea smiles and leans down to kiss him on the cheek, a thank you for saving her. She turns and takes off into the forest, following the melody on the breeze with elation thinking that living among the mortals might not be as dreadful as she thought.