Archive of Our Own ^beta

The bells begin before the carriages arrive.

They toll once, then again—deep and deliberate.

Prince Jay stands near the top of the stairway, surrounded by courtiers and his father’s advisors. “They’ll freeze before they reach the gate,” he murmurs, voice low enough that only his attendant hears. “Southern silks were never made for wind like this.”

A quiet snort answers him. “They requested the visit, my prince.”

Jay’s mouth curves faintly. “They requested to be seen.” His eyes remain fixed on the far road, where the tree line quivers with motion. “Let’s see how long their gold holds against the cold.”

“Jay.”

His father’s voice isn’t loud, but it cuts cleanly through the hush.

Jay straightens at once.

“Manners,” the High King reminds him, just as the first of the southern carriages crests the hill.

And with it, color arrives.

Where the North is all stone and shadow, the South moves like sunlight through snow. Their procession glides into view—carriages of white lacquer trimmed in gold, wheels crunching slow over frost. The banners of the southern crown shimmer faintly in the gray light, pale fire against the cold.

From the first carriage steps the Southern Emperor: tall, grave, his cloak a sweep of crimson and cream. His wife follows, smile practiced and warm. Behind them, courtiers emerge one by one.

Then the door of the second carriage opens, and a young man descends. The Prince Imperial.

He carries himself like someone who knows exactly what power looks like when it enters a room. Jay tilts his head, studying him with the detached interest of someone assessing a blade.

“So that’s the brother they sing about,” he says quietly. He wonders, distantly, how their realms will fare once he and the imperial prince are the ones seated on their respective thrones.

But then—

The last carriage halts.

For a moment, no one steps out. The wind slides through the courtyard, brushing past the gathered crowd like a whisper. Then a smaller figure appears at the threshold.

Jay almost misses him at first.

The boy is wrapped in layers of pale gold and white, the hem of his cloak skimming the steps as he descends. His movements are careful, almost tentative—until his boot catches on the edge of the carriage. He stumbles, just slightly.

An attendant reaches for him. He steadies himself before the hand can touch.

There’s a pause—barely a breath—and then the boy laughs, soft and quiet, the sound melting into the snow itself.

The laugh carries across the courtyard. Faint. Warm. Unexpected.

Jay’s gaze catches on him despite himself.

Snow keeps falling. A flake lands in the boy’s dark hair, dissolving almost at once. He lifts his face to the sky, lashes dusted white, cheeks flushed pink from the cold.

Something unguarded lingers in that expression. Wonder, perhaps. Or the quiet disbelief of someone seeing winter for the first time.

Jay realizes, with a frown, that he probably is.

“Who is that?”

One of his advisors leans closer. “The youngest, my prince. He is Prince Sunoo of the Southern Imperial family. This is his first appearance beyond their own court.”

Jay hums, eyes not leaving the boy. “He seems… young.”

“Not meant for succession,” the advisor murmurs. “But important enough to be shown.”

His father’s voice cuts in. “In courts like theirs, presence is its own power.”

Around him, courtiers bow, heralds announce names, and the air fills with ceremony. But the southern prince doesn’t seem to hear it. His attention is on the snow, on the way it gathers at his sleeves and melts against his gloves.

For one strange, fleeting moment, Jay wonders what he sees in it.

The High King takes a step forward then, cloak sweeping over the frost. Jay follows, schooling his face into composure.

By the time they reach the Southerners, the prince has finally lowered his gaze. Up close, he looks even younger than Jay expected—bright-eyed, lips pink from the cold, curiosity softening the formal posture drilled into all royal sons.

“Your Imperial Majesties,” Jay’s father greets, voice echoing faintly against the stone. “Welcome to the North. May your stay be warm despite our winter.”

The Southern Emperor smiles, offering a bow. Polite words pass between them—honor, peace, brotherhood—but Jay’s attention drifts again to the prince standing a step behind his parents and brother.

He’s not listening either. His gaze is turned upward again, watching the snow fall through the sky.

When their eyes meet—briefly, almost by accident—Jay looks away first.

The High King clears his throat. “My son will show you to your chambers, and the castle will be at your family’s disposal. The solstice festivities begin in two days’ time.”

The Southern King nods. “We are grateful for your hospitality.”

Jay bows. “I’ll see to the arrangements.”

The southerners begin their ascent up the stairs, trailing heat and perfume and faint laughter. Jay steps aside as they pass, the prince brushing by last. He smells faintly of citrus and cold air.

When the boy turns his head, it’s only for a heartbeat—but in that heartbeat, Jay catches the smallest smile, one meant for no one in particular.

And somehow, the courtyard doesn’t feel as cold.

-❄️-

The chamber they’ve prepared for him is far larger than anything Sunoo has ever slept in. The ceilings are carved like the inside of a cathedral, pale stone gleaming faintly beneath candlelight. The hearth crackles, but the cold still lingers.

He sits by the window after the servants leave. It is the first time he has ever seen snow fall this close. A flake lands on the sill and melts before he can touch it. Then another, and another. 

He should sleep. The hour is well past midnight. The supper bell rang long ago, and the courtiers will expect him bright and mannered come dawn. But sleep feels wasted when the world is being remade before his eyes.

So he slips on his cloak—the one trimmed in southern fur, too thin for this land—and unlatches the window.

“Good morrow to the North,” he whispers, to no one but himself.

The corridor outside his chamber is dim, lit by sconces that flicker as he passes. His fur-lined cloak is too large for him, trailing behind as he tiptoes down the stairs. Every step creaks like it’s telling on him. Still, he makes it to the courtyard.

Snow has buried the garden paths. Sunoo tilts his head back, breath fogging the air as snowflakes kiss his lashes. He laughs under his breath—so softly that only the night hears it.

“Ooh, cold,” he murmurs, cupping both hands to catch a handful of snow. It stings, but in a way that makes him feel alive.

His breath fogs at once. Snow crunches beneath his feet, barely protected by thin slippers, sharp and shocking.

“Fool,” he mutters to himself, laughing quietly. “You absolute fool.”

His toes burn, his fingers ache, and still he kneels to scoop another handful of snow. It stings his palms, but he holds it close, as if the cold is something meant to be cherished.

A smile ghosts across his face. He looks half-dream, half-boy.

From the shadows beneath the colonnade, Jay watches.

He hadn’t meant to linger. He came to clear his thoughts, perhaps walk the walls before rest, as he usually does. Yet there, in the courtyard below, stands the southern prince—almost barefoot in the snow if not for the slippers, eyes bright as though the world itself has just been made.

The boy’s an idiot, clearly. Doesn’t he know frost can take a man’s toes before dawn?

And yet—there’s something about him that makes the air feel less bitter. The way his cheeks glow, flushed pink by the cold; the way he tips his face to the sky as if trying to memorize the shape of every falling star.

Jay stays long enough to see him spin once, quietly, as if the night itself might join in his dance. Foolish southerner, he thinks. Doesn’t even know the cold could kill him.

He turns away before Sunoo can look up, before the snow can tell on him.

-❄️-

The next morn breaks pale and blue.

When the chambermaids rouse him, Sunoo pretends not to notice their quiet giggles at the sight of his frozen cloak hung near the hearth, stiff and rimmed with ice. He feels the soreness in his toes, the faint ache of foolishness heavy in his bones, and yet he would do it again in a heartbeat.

By the time he reaches the Great Hall, the Northern royals as well as his own family are already seated.

The room feels colder than it should, even with the hearth blazing. The walls rise like cliffs of stone, banners of deep blue and silver hanging from the rafters. Outside, snow still falls. Inside, conversation hums low and careful.

At the head of the table sits the High King. Sunoo bows low with the grace taught to him since childhood. The air smells faintly of roasted pine nuts and smoke.

He hesitates before taking his seat beside his elder brother. Everything here feels heavier, richer, quieter.

Jay sits a few chairs away, posture perfect, eyes unreadable. He looks every bit the North’s crown prince: composed, distant, carved of cold and quiet steel. Sunoo finds himself wondering if Jay’s bones are literally made of ice.

Steam curls from bowls of oat-porridge thick with cream and butter. Beside it sits a plate of salted fish, smoked until it gleams like silver. There are rolls—dense, dark, smelling of rye and stone-ground wheat—and roasted roots still hissing from the oven.

He’s never seen a feast like this. Not extravagant, not gilded, but heavy and honest. Food that fills rather than flatters. In the South, it's different. 

He feels his stomach stir, hunger sharp enough to almost betray him. But he’s a prince, and princes eat with composure. So he folds his hands, nods politely as servants pour his tea, a dark amber brew, and waits for the others to begin.

Sunoo reaches for the honey jar out of habit. His fingers brush the small pot before he notices that no one else touches it. A quick glance down the table shows it’s salt, not honey.

“Ah,” he murmurs, withdrawing his hand awkwardly. Then he takes one sip and almost coughs. It’s bitter. 

Jay notices. Of course he notices.

“In the North,” Jay says, “we drink our tea as it is. Without sweetening. It keeps the spirit sharp.”

The tone isn’t cruel, but it isn’t kind either. It’s the sort that makes Sunoo wish the earth would swallow him whole.

“Oh,” he says faintly, setting his cup down with care. “Yes. Of course. Sharp spirits.”

Some of the royalties seated with them smile into their cups. Jay doesn’t. His lips twitch, like he’s fighting a smirk, or maybe just amused by Sunoo’s misery.

Sunoo pretends not to notice. He reaches for the bread next, a small dark loaf that looks sturdy enough to break teeth, but when he tears it open, warmth spills out with the smell of butter and salt. His eyes widen before he can stop himself.

He shouldn’t be this delighted by bread. He really shouldn’t. But he can’t help it. The North tastes like something ancient and kind, made by hands that love survival more than presentation.

He takes a careful bite, then another, slower this time. The salt pricks at his tongue, and the butter melts soft against the rough grain. His eyes flutter closed.

When he opens them again, Jay is staring. Not in amusement anymore, but something else. Something like disbelief—or fascination he isn’t ready to name.

Sunoo blinks, caught mid-bite, suddenly aware that he must look ridiculous: wide-eyed, lips dusted with crumbs, almost, if not yet, swooning over a piece of bread.

“You look as though you’ve discovered divinity.”

Heat floods Sunoo’s cheeks. “Maybe I have,” he mutters before he can stop himself. “Yours tastes like salt and stone, but it’s divine all the same.”

Jay tilts his head. “Careful. The North doesn’t take kindly to blasphemy.”

“I wasn’t aware bread was sacred here,” 

The table stills, waiting for the crown prince’s response. Jay only hums, a low sound of approval or amusement. It’s hard to tell which. Sunoo swears he hears the faintest roll of eyes in the hum.

The High King clears his throat again. “Enough,” he says. “Jay, you’ll guide our southern guests for the week. The others already know the court and the grounds. You’ll see to the youngest prince’s comfort.”

Jay straightens. “Alone?”

“Alone,” the King confirms. “I trust you can manage civility for three days.”

Jay bows his head. “Of course, Father.”

Sunoo bites back a grin he can’t quite hide.

Jay notices that too, and this time the look he gives Sunoo feels less like ice and more like a challenge.

-❄️-

When Sunoo steps into the courtyard, he pulls his cloak tighter around him, the fur brushing against his chin.

He lingers near a low stone wall, watching his breath fog in the cold, when a voice cuts through the quiet.

“You’re early,” Jay says.

Sunoo turns. The crown prince stands a few paces away, wrapped in heavy black fur, a silver clasp gleaming near his throat.

“I didn’t want to keep you waiting.”

Jay’s gaze flicks toward the snow beneath Sunoo’s boots. “And yet, you seem to have dressed for a spring stroll.”

He’s judging me, Sunoo thinks. And not gently. He glances down. His cloak is Southern make—light wool, woven for breeze rather than frost. “It’s warmer than it looks.”

Jay hums. “Sure. You southerners have curious definitions of warmth.”

Sunoo presses his lips together, unsure if he should respond. The silence stretches until Jay gestures toward the eastern walkway.

“This way. We’ll start with the inner court. You may find it less... bleak than the rest.”

Sunoo has to hurry slightly to match Jay’s stride. He thinks Jay walks like a man who’s never had to chase anyone for a laugh—and probably never will.

“You must find it strange,” Jay says after a while, “how empty our castle feels. You southerners always travel with noise.”

“Noise?”

“Laughter. Song. Things that distract from silence.”

Sunoo blinks, a small smile forming despite himself. “And you Northerners prefer silence?”

“We were born in it,” Jay says matter-of-factly. “It teaches you to listen.”

“To what?”

Jay glances at him, the faintest smirk tugging at his lips. “Everything you miss when you talk too much.”

Sunoo narrows his eyes, realizing the jab. “I don’t talk that much.”

“Mm.” Jay hums again, clearly pleased with himself. “Not yet.”

Sunoo huffs a breath that fogs the air. They pass beneath a row of archways where icicles hang like glass teeth. Light catches on them, scattering cold rainbows across the stone. Sunoo tilts his head, utterly transfixed.

Jay notices. He doesn’t tease this time. He just watches, a crease forming between his brows as Sunoo’s gloved hand hovers near one of the icicles but doesn’t touch it. Cowardly or cautious? Jay wonders. Probably both.

“This way,” Jay says again. “The library is ahead. Try not to slip.”

“I won’t.”

“You did, last night.”

Sunoo freezes mid-step. “You—what?”

Jay’s smirk returns. “The courtyard walls aren’t as blind as you think. Try not to go barefoot again. The healers would weep.”

Heat rushes to Sunoo’s cheeks, his words stumbling. “I—I wasn’t—I mean, I wanted to—”

“See the snow?” Jay finishes for him, tone almost teasing. “So I gathered.”

Sunoo glares weakly at him, lips pressed thin, embarrassment radiating off him. Jay doesn’t laugh outright, but the glint in his eyes says enough. Foolish southerner. He’d die happy in a snowbank, no doubt.

They continue walking, silence filled with the crunch of boots and faint rustle of fur.

Jay doesn’t admit it aloud, but for all his irritation, there’s something oddly steadying about the boy’s presence. Annoying, but… grounding.

He leads with his hands clasped neatly behind his back, and Sunoo trails half a step behind, eyes darting everywhere—at banners with silver wolves, sconces shaped like curling antlers, the way snow clings to the glass outside in perfect, branching stars.

He wants to touch everything. He doesn’t, but the urge sits in his fingers. Southerners. Always needing to touch.

“Is it always this quiet?” Sunoo asks.

Jay glances at him. “In the mornings, yes. The castle rises late in winter. The cold slows everything but the wind.”

“That’s poetic.”

Jay raises an eyebrow. “It’s practical.”

“Practical can be poetic.”

Jay hums under his breath, barely a note. “You southerners find poetry in everything. Even in frostbite, I imagine.”

“Maybe that’s why we live longer,” Sunoo says lightly, grinning.

Jay turns to look at him. “Do you always answer back?”

“Do you always provoke people to?”

That earns him a soft, reluctant laugh. And irritatingly… charming, Jay thinks.

They turn another corner, the corridor widening into a gallery of royals—kings, queens, warriors of old.

Sunoo slows. “They all look sad,” he says quietly.

“They’re Northerners,” Jay replies. “It’s our resting face.”

“I think they look lonely.”

Jay glances at the frames again. “They were painted for remembrance, not comfort.”

“And is that what you want?” Sunoo asks. “To be remembered but not comforted?”

Jay stops walking. The question is earnest, direct. It takes him a moment. Then he exhales, turning back toward the hall. “You ask strange things, Prince of the South.”

“I like strange things.”

“I can tell.”

The corridor ends in a pair of tall doors bound in iron and dark wood. Jay pushes them open, and the scent of parchment and cedar rushes out.

The library feels alive.

Rows of shelves reach the vaulted ceiling, ladders gliding quietly on rails. The air carries the dry weight of parchment and ink, touched by the faint warmth of a hidden fire. Light pools gold across the stone floor, catching the slow drift of dust like small, lazy stars.

Sunoo’s breath hitched. “It’s… beautiful.”

Jay watches him from a few paces back, hands clasped neatly behind him. “You have libraries in the South.”

“Yes, but they don’t smell like this.” Sunoo brushes a gloved hand along a table, tracing the grain of the old wood. “Yours smells… older. Like it remembers.”

Jay tilts his head. How does a place smell older? What does older even mean? “And what do your libraries smell like?”

“Jasmine,” Sunoo answers at once. Like he doesn’t need to think about the smell to remember it—he just knows. “Ink, beeswax, and jasmine.”

Jay’s mouth twitches. “Even your knowledge blooms in warmth.”

“Do you ever tire of the cold?”

“The cold keeps us steady,” he says. “It reminds us what it takes to endure.”

“It’s what separates the living from the foolish,” he adds.

Sunoo grins. “Then I must be foolish. I quite like it.”

“That much is becoming apparent,” Jay murmurs, though his eyes say something else.

Sunoo huffs, feigning offense. “You Northerners find pleasure in mockery, it seems.”

“Only when it’s well-earned,” Jay says.

Sunoo slows to glance at a mural lining the wall—a painted history of the North in deep blues and silver leaf. Kings crowned under falling snow, the same stars wheeling above them all. “You have so many stories here,” he murmurs. “Ours are all about the sun, the sea, the things that burn or bloom. Yours are about what endures.”

Jay turns slightly to look at him. “That’s what winter teaches. Endurance.”

“Do you like it?”

“What?”

“The winter.”

“Well, there is nothing to dislike.”

Sunoo nods, running his fingers along the worn wood of the shelves, then turns toward a table near the hearth where an unfurled map of the heavens lays in faded ink.

He bends closer, tracing the lines with one careful finger. “Is this your sky?”

Jay follows his gaze, stepping to his side. “Ours, yes. The northern constellations. They change as you travel south—the stars turn, but the heart of them remains.”

Sunoo leans in further. “This one,” he says, pointing to the brightest mark drawn in gold at the very top. “It’s different. Larger than the rest.”

“Polaris,” Jay replies simply.

“The guiding star?”

Jay’s lips curve faintly, not quite a smile. “That’s what the scholars call it. But here in the North, we tell it differently.”

He turns to the hearth, the fire’s light glancing off his profile. “They say the North Star was once a prince’s heart, or a god’s, depending on who you ask. Some say he froze waiting for someone who never returned. Others say he tore his heart out to light the way for his people.”

“Either way,” Jay shrugs, “he stayed. And that’s what matters most here: constancy. In the North, we survive by remembering what doesn’t waver.”

For a long moment, Sunoo says nothing. Then, softly: “But maybe the star didn’t stay because it couldn’t move.”

Jay turns to him.

“Maybe it stayed because it wanted to be found.”

Sunoo’s gaze drifts to the shelves around them, where leather-bound tomes crowd the space like a frozen forest of knowledge. One small, tattered volume leans half-buried on a lower shelf. Its spine reads in faint gilding: Dies Nivis. The letters catch the torchlight, trembling as if unsure whether to be seen.

He pulls it free, dust motes swirling in the air. Flipping it open, he finds fragments of the old hymn written in curling, archaic script—an ancient language of their region, used long before modern tongues were taught. Most of it is a blur, words half-forgotten, syllables that never stuck in his mind because he’d never paid close attention in lessons. But a few he remembers, enough to recognize the rhythm, the echoes of meaning.

…Dies Nivis, dies illa

Sol recedit, ventus spirat,

Terra muta sub nive silens.

Fluctus gelidi sub luna candent,

Omnes corda in pace tremunt…

 

He reads the words aloud in a whisper, tasting the language on his tongue. They are strange, beautiful—like snow caught in sunlight. He only understands fragments: “day of snow… the sun withdraws?… earth is beneath snow…” 

Sunoo closes the book slowly, pressing it to his chest. “I wonder… if the sky remembers this too.”

Jay feels a flicker of something—recognition, curiosity, perhaps a warning of the emotion that is beginning to settle between them. Dies Nivis is here, planted, waiting to unfold.

He clears his throat, a small sound breaking the stillness. “Come,” he says, stepping back toward the door. “You’ve seen our stars. You may as well see where they fall.”

“Where they fall?”

Jay doesn’t answer, only gestures for him to follow.

He leads Sunoo through the northern wing—past the council chamber, the small chapel, and long halls. Eventually, the hallway opens into a glass corridor overlooking the castle’s back courtyard.

Sunoo stops, breath catching.

Below, the courtyard stretches wide and white, untouched since dawn. “You can see the old observatory from here,” Jay says, nodding toward the dark tower beyond the courtyard wall. “My father built it long before I was born. No one uses it now.”

“Why not?”

Jay shrugs. “It’s too cold. The scholars claim the instruments freeze. They prefer the warmth of books to the sting of wind.”

Sunoo smiles faintly. “And you?”

“I prefer the cold.”

“Of course you do,” Sunoo murmurs, almost to himself, but Jay hears it.

Jay raises a brow. “You say that as though it’s a fault.”

“It isn’t,” Sunoo says quickly. “It suits you. You’re very… northern.”

Jay almost smiles. “And you’re very southern. Do you ever stop smiling?”

“Do you ever start?”

The retort earns him a soft huff.

They linger at the window longer than either meant to. The world below is still, the snow unbroken. When Jay finally turns away, he finds Sunoo still watching, his reflection caught faintly in the glass—all pink cheeks and starlit eyes, as though winter had never frightened him at all.

“Tomorrow,” Jay says quietly, “the festival begins. You’ll see more of the North than any book could tell you.”

Sunoo turns toward him, the faintest spark of wonder flickering across his face. “Then I look forward to tomorrow.”

-❄️-

By the next morn, the castle has changed.

The quiet halls of yesterday are unrecognizable—every courtyard now alive with the sound of bells and laughter, of boots crunching against packed snow. The scent of roasted chestnuts, mulled wine, and sugared almonds drifts through the air.

The Winter Festival has begun.

Sunoo stands before the mirror in his chamber as attendants fuss around him, fastening his outer robe of pale cream and gold. The silk shimmers faintly under the morning light, embroidered with curling clouds and long strokes of thread shaped like cranes in flight. Across his shoulders hangs a mantle lined with soft snow fox fur—a northern gift meant for warmth more than fashion, though the two rarely disagree here.

His hair is tied half up, secured with a clasp of knotted red cord and a thin jade ornament that glints faintly each time he moves. He isn’t used to the weight of it, nor the way it brushes the back of his neck when he turns his head.

“You’re meant to look princely, not comfortable,” one of his chambermen says, and Sunoo thinks that sums up royal life rather neatly.

Jay, on the other hand, dresses with the same restraint he carries into everything else. His coat is a deep winter blue, trimmed with black fur at the collar and cuffs, the sleeves bound close with fine silver fastenings shaped like twin wolves. Beneath it, a dark vest of brocade glints faintly whenever he moves. His hair is tied low, a thin braid looping once around the base.

If Sunoo looks like a lantern—bright, warm, and eager to catch the light—then Jay is its shadow. Still, both belong to the same flame.

His breath comes out in clouds as he turns this way and that, eyes wide at the rows of stalls—one overflowing with carved trinkets of bone and antler, another with steaming meat pies and pastries dusted in white sugar that look almost like snow.

Everywhere he looks, there is movement. Life.

Jay finds him there, standing like a child seeing the world for the first time. He approaches quietly, gloved hands clasped behind his back.

“Don’t tell me this is your first time seeing a market,”

Sunoo turns, beaming despite the chill. “Not like this. In the South, winter is only a word. I never imagined it could be so—” He trails off, eyes catching on a group of children chasing one another. “—so alive.”

Jay follows his gaze, and for a moment, even he can’t deny it.

“The North is only this alive every Winter Festival,” he admits. “The festival draws traders, farmers, even soldiers from the border. You’ll find every sort of northernman here, and every one of them determined to drink before noon.”

Sunoo laughs. “Then perhaps I should join them.”

Jay glances sideways at him. “You wouldn’t last half a cup.”

“Then you’ve clearly never seen me at a feast,” Sunoo replies with mock dignity, and Jay looks away. Not out of irritation this time, but because the sight of him, cheeks flushed and eyes bright, is strangely disarming.

They walk through the market together, their pace unhurried. Sunoo stops at nearly every stall—admiring fur-lined gloves, tasting sugared apples, asking after the crafts of the North with earnest curiosity. Jay trails half a step behind, answering when necessary, watching always.

He doesn’t perform kindness, Jay notes. He simply is.

When a vendor offers them each a lantern carved from thin ice and lit with a candle inside, Sunoo holds his carefully, marveling at how the flame flickers against the transparent walls. How the fire doesn’t melt the lantern.

“Do these not melt?” he asks.

Jay glances over. “They’re made to hold long,” he says. “The ice is cut from the river before first freeze. Treated, sealed. The heat stays where it’s meant to.”

Sunoo turns the lantern slightly, fascinated. “So it doesn’t fight the fire.”

“It knows when to let go.”

“When?”

“At dusk.” Jay’s voice is even. “That’s when the binding thins. After that, it melts like anything else.”

Sunoo nods slowly. “I think I like that.”

Jay looks at him then, brief and curious. “Most people do.”

Even as he says it, he watches the way the candlelight reflects in Sunoo’s eyes and thinks that perhaps, for once, a little warmth is worth keeping.

They linger among the stalls far longer than Jay planned.

It is supposed to be a short walk, a show of courtesy, a prince’s obligation fulfilled. Yet each turn, each corner offers something new for Sunoo to marvel at, and Jay finds himself following rather than leading.

A merchant woman calls out to them from behind a stand of woven scarves, her hands deftly arranging wool dyed in northern blues and greys. Sunoo stops immediately, fingers brushing the fabric with awe.

“It’s so soft,” he says, glancing at her. “Did you make these yourself?”

The woman’s eyes crinkle with pride. “Aye, Your Highness. My husband shears the sheep himself, and I weave through the long nights.”

Sunoo smiles, genuine and bright. “You must have warm hands all winter, then.”

She laughs. “Warmer than most, I suppose.”

Jay watches from a step away, his arms folded loosely over his chest. He notices how easily Sunoo speaks with her—no princely hauteur, no condescension. Just curiosity and kindness. Of course he’d speak like that. That’s why he disarms everyone without even trying.

They move on. Sunoo stops again, this time at a jeweler’s stall—small charms and trinkets laid out on dark velvet. Among them is a pendant necklace shaped like a star, carved from clear crystal, the size of a fingernail. It catches the light, scattering it across his gloved fingers.

Jay watches as Sunoo lifts it, turns it in his hand. The merchant speaks of how it is carved from iceglass, a rare mineral that shimmers like frozen water but never melts.

Sunoo hesitates, thumb brushing over its smooth surface. He leans close, squinting at the light trapped inside the glass. “It’s beautiful,” he murmurs. “Like the frost we see on windows back home. I didn’t know glass could look like that.”

The merchant, a round-faced woman, smiles. “Made from melted river ice, my prince. The river’s frozen half the year, but when the thaw comes, we take the shards and forge them into something that lasts.”

Sunoo smiles, gentle and wistful.

“Would Your Highness like it wrapped?” the jeweler asks.

Sunoo blinks, then quickly sets it back down, as though realizing he’s been staring too long. “Ah—no, no. It’s all right. It should go to someone who truly lives beneath these skies.”

The merchant nods politely, and Sunoo steps back, though his eyes linger one last time before he turns away.

Jay says nothing, but he remembers.

Sunoo’s laughter comes easily now, even when the snow catches in his hair or when he trips over a patch of ice and pretends he hasn’t. Jay finds himself looking less at the stalls and more at him.

By the time the bells signal dusk, torches are being lit along the paths. Sunoo’s lantern from earlier has already begun to melt, the wax inside dripping into the snow like small pearls.

As they turn back toward the castle gates, Jay pauses at a stall they’ve passed before. The jeweler is packing up, humming quietly to himself. Jay reaches into the inside pocket of his coat, produces a few coins, and taps the man’s shoulder. He waits until Sunoo is distracted from stalls that are about to close.

“Do you still have that necklace?” he asks.

The merchant blinks, then smiles knowingly. “The one the southern prince couldn’t stop staring at?”

Jay rolls his eyes, though there is a faint smile tugging at his mouth. He hands over a few silver coins—enough to make the merchant blink—and takes the necklace, small enough to hide in his coat’s inner pocket. The glass is cool, almost alive against his palm.

When he looks up again, Sunoo is laughing at something an old fisherman is saying. For a brief, dangerous moment, Jay’s chest feels too tight.

Damn him.

He tucks the pendant into the inner pocket of his cloak before catching up.

“Did you buy something?” Sunoo asks, glancing at him.

Jay shrugs. “Just making sure the merchants remember their High King’s heir knows the value of northern craft.”

Sunoo smiles, polite as ever, unaware of the iceglass nestled just inches away from Jay’s heart.

Sunoo slows his steps, his breath visible in the air. “It’s strange,” he says softly, “how alive it feels here. I thought the North would be… harsher. Quieter.”

Jay, walking beside him, gives a short hum. “It usually is,” he says. “You just came at a rare time. The snow has just started to fall, the herds are still fat from summer, and every foreigner visiting our gates brings coin to keep the markets running through winter.”

He tilts his head slightly toward the square below, now a blur of moving colors and flickering lanterns. “This is the loudest the North has been in years.”

Sunoo smiles faintly, hands tucked under his sleeves for warmth. “Then I’m glad to see it like this.”

Jay glances at him. “Most Southerners aren’t. They call us bleak, cold, unfeeling. Harsh.”

“You don’t seem unfeeling,” Sunoo says before he can stop himself. His words come out too quickly, too earnest.

“Careful, little prince,” he murmurs, amused. “You sound dangerously close to flattery.”

“It wasn’t meant to be.”

“Ah,” Jay says, clearly enjoying this. “So you only insult me, then.”

“That’s not—” Sunoo bites back a sigh, glaring faintly. “You twist words like a court jester.”

“I prefer ‘heir apparent.’”

For a moment, Sunoo can only stare at him. Then, to his own surprise, he laughs. It escapes like a breath he hadn’t realized he is holding—quiet, bright, and carried by the wind.

Jay doesn’t join in, but something in his expression softens. He watches the southern prince’s shoulders shake gently under his pale layers, the faint pink warming his cheeks. Then he looks away first.

They reach a low stone wall near the edge of the overlook. Below them, the world spreads out in blues and grays, and beyond that, the far-off shimmer of ice fields catching the dying light.

“I think,” Sunoo says after a while, “I’ll miss this when I go back. The air feels… clearer here.”

Jay leans on the wall beside him, his tone quiet. “Clear, yes. Cold too. It strips things down until only what matters stays.”

Sunoo looks at him then, something unreadable in his gaze. “And what matters to you?”

Jay doesn’t answer right away. His gloved hand brushes against the inside of his cloak, where the iceglass pendant rests, unseen and cool against his chest.

Finally, he says, “Enduring. Constancy.”

Sunoo smiles a little, remembering their earlier talk in the library. “Like the North Star?”

“Perhaps.”

-❄️-

The first day of festivities almost pass in a blur.

From his window, Sunoo sees the expanse of the frozen lake beyond the outer walls—the second day, he has been told, is for skating and crafts, a celebration of artistry and light before the solstice ball itself.

He dresses with care—in pale ivory robes lined with fur, his sash threaded with silver cords, and gloves soft as clouds. His hair is half tied with a golden clasp shaped like a snowdrop. Compared to the north’s steel and wool, he looks a little like sunlight pretending to belong in winter.

The frozen lake stretches wide beneath the northern walls, its surface clear and gleaming like a mirror made by gods. Streamers of cloth hang between the trees, and bells tinkle when the wind passes. Minstrels stand on the small wooden platform at the lake’s edge, their lutes and pipes weaving bright, quick tunes that carry across the open air—music so light it almost seems to keep the skaters from falling.

Jay has never seen the grounds this alive. Every year, the Winter Festival brings the people out from the city, but never this many. Children skate in circles, nobles glide hand in hand, and even the guards abandon their posts for a turn on the ice.

Sunoo stands beside him, staring at the frozen expanse with a look that is half terror, half wonder. “It’s so… wide,” he murmurs. “And so clear. I can almost see my reflection.”

Jay raises a brow. “If you stare too long, it’ll stare back.”

Sunoo shoots him a scandalized look. “You jest.”

“Mostly.”

“You look like a snow lantern,” Jay says, lips twitching as he finally takes in Sunoo’s attire.

Sunoo blinks. “Is that an insult or a compliment?”

“Whichever irritates you more. You’ve never tried it, have you? Skating?” Jay asks, already knowing the answer.

Sunoo shakes his head. “There’s no ice where I come from. Only sand, and the sea. I don’t think it freezes quite like this.”

Jay offers the skates wordlessly after taking them from an attendant, then kneels to secure the straps himself, his gloves brushing against the prince’s ankles. The gesture isn’t supposed to mean anything. It is practical—courtesy, even. But it doesn’t feel like so.

“There,” Jay says, rising quickly, brushing off his gloves. “Try standing.”

Sunoo does and immediately wobbles. “I think the ground’s moving.”

“The ground,” Jay says dryly, “is very much not moving.”

Sunoo flails once more before catching Jay’s arm. The laughter that bursts out of him is helpless and bright, startlingly alive against the cold. Around them, a few nearby skaters chuckle, offering cheers of encouragement.

“Hold on to me,” Jay says, more command than suggestion.

Sunoo does. “If I fall, you’re falling with me.”

“I’ll make certain not to.”

“Then I’ll pull you down on purpose.”

Jay’s chuckle is low, surprised, real. “You’d risk bringing down the future northern king for your pride?”

“For amusement,” Sunoo corrects, grinning. “It’s a dull fate otherwise.”

He is terrible at skating. His feet refuse to follow direction; his balance betrays him every other step. But he laughs through every slip, every stumble, his joy so unabashed that Jay can’t help but match it. And when Sunoo finally manages a few unassisted glides, his eyes gleam with triumph.

Music swells. Around them, pairs join hands, forming a loose circle. Laughter spills as they turn, a swirl of color and motion—fur cloaks, velvet, glinting steel. Jay finds himself drawn in, his hand still steadying Sunoo’s waist as they spin in uneven rhythm with the others.

It isn’t a dance, not truly, but it might as well be.

“I’ll fall.”

“Almost certainly.”

He means to sound teasing, but when Sunoo wobbles again, Jay’s hand shoots out by instinct, steadying him by the waist.

“I said I’d fall,” Sunoo murmurs.

“And I said almost,” Jay counters, though his fingers linger longer than necessary before he lets go.

Jay reaches up absently to brush a flake from Sunoo’s hair and realizes too late what he is doing.

When Sunoo tilts his head back to watch, his lashes catch the snow, his cheeks pinked by the cold. Jay thinks, absurdly, that he has never seen anything so beautiful. Stop looking. 

“Are you still cold?” Jay asks, almost without thinking.

Sunoo’s voice is breathless when he answers. “Not anymore.”

Jay doesn’t realize until later that his own hands have warmed too.

When they finally step off the ice, breathless and laughing, the sky has already begun to fade toward dusk. Torches are lit around the lake, and the musicians play a slower tune now. Children carry baskets of pinecones strung with ribbons, tossing them onto the snow.

They follow the crowd toward the riverbanks as dusk gathers, where hundreds of lantern frames await their makers. Sunoo settles at one of the long wooden tables, folding his sleeves neatly before beginning to work. Before him lie strips of pale silk—one dyed in soft amber, the other in deep blue—and a small jar of golden paste.

Jay stands beside him, arms crossed, quietly observing as Sunoo handles each piece with meticulous care.

“You’ve done this before,” Jay says.

Sunoo shakes his head, smiling faintly. “No. My mother used to make them, though. She said the lantern’s light helps lost souls find their way home.”

Jay crouches beside him. “And what kind of lantern will you make?”

Sunoo hesitates, then reaches for the blue silk. “A sun,” he murmurs, then glances at Jay. “And a north star to guide it.”

“You’re pairing them?”

“They belong together, don’t they?” Sunoo’s fingers brush the golden paste along the frame. “The sun burns, the star endures.”

Jay doesn’t answer. His gaze lingers on the curve of Sunoo’s cheek as the torchlight traces along his skin. He shouldn’t be staring. And yet, he does.

It is the moment he realizes the quiet truth he has been evading: he is falling.
He is falling for the boy who smiles like morning sun.

Sunoo turns back to his work, unaware. “Would you make one too?”

Jay forces a small laugh, masking the weight of his thoughts. Despite lanterns being a part of the Northern traditions, Jay has never once made one. “I don’t think mine would float.”

“It doesn’t have to. Just make it.”

So he does—awkwardly at first, his large hands not suited for delicate work. But Sunoo laughs softly and guides him, their fingers brushing as they tie the silk knots together.

(Sunoo would jest, "Are you sure you're a Northern prince? The way you hold the lantern is..." 

And Jay unexpectedly lets him tease him.)

When the bell rings to mark the release, the crowd carries their lanterns toward the water’s edge. Jay watches as Sunoo kneels, lighting the wick inside his own—the sun and the north star glowing together, gold and blue twined.

Hundreds of lights lift into the dark, floating gently over the river like new constellations. The reflection shimmers in Sunoo’s eyes.

Jay finds himself smiling. “It suits you,” he says quietly.

Sunoo tilts his head. “Why?”

“Because it’s the brightest one out there,” Jay murmurs. And he can’t look away.

The lantern drifts farther, until it is only a faint speck in the night. Jay’s hand lingers in the pocket of his coat, brushing the small pendant he bought the day before.

He thinks of giving it to him then. But he doesn’t.

Not yet.

-❄️-

In his chamber, Sunoo sits by the window, the hem of his robe brushing the floor, watching the last of the lanterns drift like golden fireflies across the starlit sky.

His fingers still smell faintly of pine oil and smoke. He rubs them together absently, remembering how Jay’s hand had brushed his earlier—warm even through the cold air, sure where his own had trembled. 

It had been such a small thing. A touch. A laugh shared when Jay’s lantern frame had broken, when he’d stubbornly tried to fix it without asking for help. But it lingers now, unbidden.

He thinks of the way Jay had looked at him—that unreadable gaze, heavy and intent. Not cold, as he had imagined northern princes to be. Just… watching. As if trying to memorize something that will disappear. Does he remember my hands, too? Or the way I laughed like an idiot on the ice?

Sunoo leans against the window frame and exhales, the breath fogging up the glass. Beyond it, snow begins to fall again, soft and slow, cloaking the courtyards below in pale silver.

“Foolish,” he murmurs to himself, smiling faintly. “To think of him so.”

He presses his palm to the cool pane, as though reaching for the night beyond it.

And yet…

He can still hear Jay’s voice, and it stirs something beneath his ribs, something light and dangerous all at once.

The world has never felt this alive. Not in the south, where the days are long and golden. Not even when he first saw snow fall from the sky.

Perhaps it isn’t the snow at all.

Perhaps it is him.

-❄️-

By dawn, the northern palace is alive.

Servants flit down the corridors like startled swallows, their arms full of brocade and crystal, their voices hushed and urgent. From the kitchens comes the scent of roasted chestnuts and sugared pears; from the great hall the echo of hammers as garlands are strung between pillars carved with wolves and stags.

The ball—the final night of the Winter Festival.

Jay stands near the grand stairway, the chill of the marble railing biting through his gloves as he watches attendants unfurl a painting of the Northern sky—Polaris gleaming brightest at its heart. His father, the High King, descends the steps beside him, a mountain of furs and silver rings.

“Your southern guests seem well-rested,” the old king murmurs, tone dry. “Their empress praised the feast, though she said the wine could be warmer.”

Jay’s mouth twitches. “If it were warmer, it wouldn’t be northern.”

The High King gives a soft grunt, eyes following the bustle below. “They arrive with all their colors and ornaments, but I wonder if they remember how easily gold melts in frost. Do not mistake courtesy for loyalty, son.”

Jay says nothing at first. He’s grown used to the north’s suspicion, to its belittling of the South, to the way his father measures every visiting noble like a blade against his throat. But when it comes to him—to the youngest prince of the South—Jay finds that politics hardly enter his mind.

He tries to see strategy in the boy’s laughter, deception in his awe. Tries to convince himself that curiosity is just another form of calculation. Yet the more time he spends in Sunoo’s company, the less those thoughts hold. The boy seems too unguarded, too quick to wonder, too sincere in his joy to be anything other than what he is: sunlight that refuses to dim, even here where winter reigns.

“Do not mistake curiosity for weakness,” the king continues, mistaking Jay’s silence for thought. “Their south may glitter, but they know how to secretly tie politics in silk.”

Jay inclines his head, jaw tense. “Of course, Father.”

But when he looks up again, he sees the southern royals entering the hall—a vision of warmth amidst the cold.

The southern emperor walks ahead, tall and regal, his crown of sun-forged gold gleaming under torchlight. His empress glides beside him in robes the color of marigolds and dawn, each fold embroidered with threaded suns that catch the light like fire. Behind them follow their heir, and at the very end, their youngest.

Sunoo.

He moves as though the light follows him, the sheer gold silk of his robe trailing like melted sunlight across the marble. A mantle of crimson drapes over his shoulders, fastened by a knot of jade in the shape of a blooming lotus. Tiny golden tassels shimmer with each careful step. He looks every inch the south.

Jay exhales slowly.

He’d worn his own finery for the night: a double-breasted coat of midnight blue, trimmed with pale fur at the collar, his cloak clasped by a silver star brooch.

When the two princes’ gazes meet across the hall, something unspoken flickers, a spark caught between frost and flame. Stay composed, Jay thinks, though his chest tightens. Just… stay steady.

“Go,” says the High King, tone curt but knowing. “Do not keep our guests unwelcomed.”

Jay inclines his head, then descends the last few steps.

Sunoo’s attention is half on the sky painting, half on the ceiling glittering with icicles like chandeliers. But when Jay comes near, he turns, and that same smile—that infuriating, gentle smile—curves his lips.

“My prince,” he greets softly. “You look less frightening tonight.”

Jay’s brow arches. “And you look… less southern. Perhaps it’s the cold finally claiming you.” Somewhere above them, the musicians begin to tune their lutes and harps; the hall slowly fills with nobles and courtiers cloaked in winter hues. The night is about to begin.

The Solstice Ball begins the way most northern nights do—slowly, quietly, and then all at once.

Sunoo has never seen anything like it.

In the South, the air is always perfumed with heat and spice; their feasts spill into gardens, laughter carried by cicadas. But here, everything shimmers with quiet grandeur—the restraint of winter masking beauty beneath control.

He stands near the base of the dais, his robe of gold and red a soft contrast to the ocean of pale blues and silvers. Nobles bow as they pass, offering polite greetings and thinly veiled curiosity for the boy who seems to bring summer into their cold.

And then the first invitation comes.

A young lord of the western isles, bowing with a courteous smile. Sunoo, too kind to refuse, takes his hand. The music swells, and they spin across the marble floor. When the song ends, another comes—this time an earl, then a cousin of the royal family, then a general’s son. Each more eager than the last, each walking away dazed, murmuring of the prince with sunlight in his eyes.

Why must he draw them all in? Jay thinks. 

Jay watches from the edge of the hall.

He’s spent most of the evening stiff beside his father, offering nods and half-hearted conversation to northern nobles, but his gaze keeps drifting. He tells himself it’s duty—keeping an eye on their southern guest—but even he doesn’t believe that anymore. Jay is good at many things, but never at lying.

Sunoo laughs now, cheeks flushed from the cold and the dance. A curl of hair has escaped from the jeweled clasp at his temple. Every time he moves, his mantle catches the light, scattering gold across the floor like dawn spilling over ice.

Jay hates how his heart stutters at the sight.

When the next noble approaches Sunoo, Jay moves before he can think. His boots echo against the marble as he crosses the hall, cutting through the swirl of dancers and silk.

“Prince Sunoo.” His voice is low but steady.

The music softens. Sunoo turns, surprise flickering across his face before it melts into that familiar, disarming smile. “Prince Jay.”

Jay extends his hand. “If you’re not too weary from entertaining half the North, may I have this dance?”

A few nearby courtiers murmur, interest piqued, but Sunoo only nods and places his hand in Jay’s gloved one.

The touch is feather-light—yet Jay feels it burn through leather and skin alike.

They move together, slow at first, Sunoo matching Jay’s lead with a grace that makes it seem as if he’s danced in these halls all his life. The world dims around them until it feels like only the two of them exist beneath the trembling lights.

“You dance well,” Sunoo murmurs, glancing up.

Jay allows a small smile. “I had no choice. My tutors would have had my head if I embarrassed the royal line.”

“And now?”

“I’m trying not to embarrass myself before you.”

As the song slows, the hall seems to fade further. Jay’s palm rests lightly against Sunoo’s waist; Sunoo’s hand lingers at his shoulder. The distance between them feels measured, deliberate—and yet their gazes meet and hold, steady as Polaris itself.

When the final note falls, Sunoo does not step away immediately. He hesitates, eyes glinting in the candlelight.

“In the South,” he says quietly, voice almost lost beneath the applause that follows the end of the song, “we have a saying about the last dance of the night.”

Jay tilts his head slightly. “And what does it say?”

“That the last dance,” Sunoo says, smiling faintly, “is the one you give to the person you’d let see your heart.”

He doesn’t speak, can’t speak. The words settle between them like a secret. Sunoo, perhaps sensing the weight of silence, laughs softly and steps back, bowing in the southern way before another noble can intrude.

Jay only watches him go.

-❄️-

The courtyard is quieter than before, though the traces of the ball linger still.

Jay stands apart for a while, watching. The warmth of the crowd doesn’t quite reach him, but the sound of it does—the soft murmur of voices, the rustle of silk, the occasional bark of laughter from the northern lords too far into their cups. The festival has gone well. The alliance has gone well. He should be relieved.

And yet his eyes keep finding one person.

Sunoo stands not far from the water’s edge, his fur-lined cloak drawn close around him, a small lantern held between his palms. The flame inside trembles faintly as though eager to be freed. His head tilts slightly upward, gaze fixed on the sky, lashes heavy with melted snow. He looks… content.

It’s a simple thing—the way he stands, the soft parting of his lips, the quiet curve of his shoulders—but it catches Jay off guard. He’s seen this expression once before: when Sunoo first stepped out into the snowfall, barefoot and unbothered, smiling like he’d found something sacred.

Jay exhales, a faint mist forming in front of his lips.

He crosses the courtyard slowly, the crunch of his boots against frost the only sound he makes. When he stops beside Sunoo, the younger prince glances at him briefly, eyes reflecting the firelight. He doesn’t speak, only offers a small smile that vanishes as quickly as it comes.

Around them, the murmurs grow softer. The crowd has begun their count—the final ritual of the Winter Festival, the ringing of the bells.

“Three,” someone calls.

Jay lifts the small handbell he holds, its metal cool against his glove. The faint chime vibrates in his palm, ready to echo across the courtyard. Beside him, Sunoo holds his own bell, engraved with delicate swirls of gold and silver. He adjusts his grip slightly, the warmth of his fingers brushing Jay’s ever so slightly.

“Two.”

Jay feels the subtle shift—Sunoo leaning closer, their shoulders almost brushing.

“One.”

They lift their bells together and release a single, crystalline note. The sound rings across the snow-covered courtyard, echoing against the walls and into the night. The others follow, a cascade of soft, harmonious chimes that mingle with the whisper of falling snow. 

Once the bells have silenced themselves, he starts hearing the faint hum of young voices. Children, mostly—gathering near the base of the tower. Then, like a current moving through the crowd, the choir begins:

Dies Nivis, dies illa…

The ancient northern words tumble into the courtyard. Jay knows each syllable, each pause, each solemn beat. The hymn is older than the palace, older than any of the noble families present tonight. It tells of the Day of Snow, the longest night, the endurance of light through frost and darkness. 

Sunoo leans slightly toward Jay, curiosity and awe mingling in his eyes. “It sounds… like the snow is speaking,” he whispers.

Jay swallows, listening to the words he knows by heart: dies pura, lux manet…—the snow is pure, the light remains. He wonders how to explain this to Sunoo, whether he should try, but the boy doesn’t need the meaning. Not yet. The music, the resonance of bells and voices, carries it all. It touches him without needing translation.

Sunoo watches the choir, cheeks pinked by the cold, lips parting in wonder as the melody wraps the courtyard like a tide. His small hands clutch the railing, knuckles whitening, as if he could hold onto the sound itself.

Jay moves closer. “They’re singing of constancy,” he whispers. “Of what endures, even in the coldest places. Even when everything seems lost.”

Sunoo glances at him, eyes bright with understanding—or the beginnings of it. “Even… when no one can see it?”

“Even then,” 

He gestures subtly toward the sky, where the aurora starts to ripple faintly above the castle towers. “The North names everything in the heavens,” he says, almost to himself. “Lunareth for the returning of snow, Polaris for the guiding star… Every light has a name, a story. Naming it is how we remember it, how we let it endure.”

The bells toll now, one after another, large and resonant, echoing across the walls of the castle. The choir’s voices rise to meet them, and together, they fill the night:

Dies Nivis, dies pura, Lux manet, iterum oritur…
In tenebris, lumen vincit, semper maneat fiducia…

Sunoo closes his eyes, letting the vibrations sink into him. The language is foreign, the full meaning elusive, but the feeling is immediate, visceral—hope, endurance, light preserved. He leans against Jay slightly, unthinking, letting the warmth of the prince anchor him as the hymn swells around them.

Jay’s eyes track Sunoo’s face, lit by torchlight and flickering candle reflections. He remembers the first time he saw the boy standing barefoot in snow, the fragile awe mirrored now in the sound of the ancient hymn. Every note, every toll of the bell, seems to mark a path between them, an anchor across their differences—North and South, past and present, winter and sun.

The final bell tolls.  The choir ends, voices tapering into silence. For a moment, all is still.

Sunoo opens his eyes, gazing at Jay. “I don’t understand all of it,” he says softly. “But… I feel it.”

Jay nods, a small, tight smile tugging at his lips. “That’s all you need.”

For a long while, neither of them moves. The air is still, save for the sound of distant laughter and the soft hiss of snow falling over the lake. Jay finds himself thinking about the story of Polaris again—of the heart that stays behind so others might find their way.

He has always thought it a tale of duty. But now, with Sunoo beside him, he wonders if it is something else entirely. Perhaps Polaris doesn’t stay because it is bound. Perhaps it stays because it has found something—someone—worth staying for.

-❄️-

Jay should be asleep. The High King has long retired, the guests have been sent to their chambers, and his duties are finished. And yet—his steps lead him toward the same path he walked nights ago. The one that opens to the lower courtyard. The one where he once caught sight of a southern prince standing barefoot beneath the snow. Why am I walking this way again? I should turn back. I should be warm in my chambers.

And when he reaches it, he sees him again.

Sunoo. Alone. Wrapped in a fur-lined cloak too large for his frame, the hood sliding off his shoulders, his breath spilling white into the air.

The aurora arrives fully now.

It begins as a faint shimmer—a pale green rippling at the horizon. Then it deepens, stretches, and unfurls across the dark expanse like ink dissolving in water. Streaks of rose and violet bleed through, slow and silent, until the entire sky seems to breathe.

Jay has seen the aurora every year of my life. But never like this. Never like him.

The light moves across Sunoo’s face—the curve of his cheek, the soft part of his lips, the delicate lashes that catch the glow. He looks as though the sky itself bends to see him. How can the world hold someone so small and still make it feel infinite?

When Sunoo finally turns, startled to find someone else there, his voice is soft, uncertain. “You’re here?”

“So are you.”

Sunoo smiles a little, sheepish, his breath fogging in the cold. “I couldn’t sleep. It felt wrong to, when the sky looked like this.”

Jay steps closer, his boots pressing faint prints into the snow. “You’ll freeze again.”

“I’m dressed better this time,” Sunoo says, a faint laugh escaping him. “Mostly.”

Jay’s gaze flicks downward—the prince’s slippers, though fur-lined, are dusted white with snow. Mostly. “Mostly,” he echoes, almost unconsciously.

They stand side by side, facing the horizon. The aurora stretches higher, casting the courtyard in shifting light. 

Sunoo whispers the name under his breath. “Lunareth,” he says, as though tasting the sound.

“It marks the longest night,” Jay murmurs. “And the promise that light will return.”

“In the South, we call it Solvane,” Sunoo says quietly. “The Turning of Light. It’s when the sun reaches its highest and the days begin to shorten again. We celebrate it with warmth—feasts, offerings, candles in the windows. It’s… the same idea as Lunareth, isn’t it? A reminder that the dark will end, that life and light keep coming back.”

Jay nods slowly. “It does. A wish for return. A wish for something worth returning to.”

“When I was younger, I used to think the gods lived in those lights,” he admits. “That they watched us from there, keeping count of every soul.”

“And now?”

He pauses. Now… now it feels like something else entirely. “Now I think it’s just the sky remembering what it loves.”

Sunoo smiles faintly at that. “Then may it remember us kindly,” he says. “Blessed Lunareth, Prince Jay.”

“Blessed Solvane, Prince Sunoo.”

For a while, they say nothing. The aurora sways and shimmers above, and the courtyard seems wrapped in its own breathless stillness. Then Jay reaches into his coat—fingers brushing against something small, cold, metal. Now or never.

“I have something for you,” he says, suddenly, as if afraid the words will vanish if he delays.

“For me?”

Jay nods, pulling out a small bundle wrapped in dark silk. He unwraps it carefully—and there it is, the silver pendant he bought at the market days ago. The one Sunoo lingered over, fingers tracing the design but never daring to buy.

The metal gleams faintly under the aurora’s glow. A sun enclosed within a star—southern warmth bound to northern constancy.

Sunoo’s breath catches. “You—when did you—” He looks up, half-astonished, half-embarrassed. “You noticed?”

“You weren’t subtle. You stared at it as though it might sing.”

“I thought no one saw.”

“I saw,” Jay says simply. He sees everything about him.

The words hang between them. Quiet. True.

Sunoo reaches out, hesitant, fingertips brushing the pendant. “It’s beautiful,” he says. “But why give it to me?”

“Because it belongs to someone who looks at the world as if it’s still worth believing in.” 

Sunoo swallows, the cold stinging the corners of his eyes. “In the South,” he murmurs, “we give gifts for remembrance. To tell someone that, even when the year turns cold, they were not forgotten.”

“Then let it mean that.”

Somewhere, at the back of Jay's mind, the voices of the children earlier is singing back at him.

Dies Nivis, dies claritatis
Spirantes flammae laetitiae,
Noctis silente, caeli splendore,
Corda humana lucem amplectuntur

Silence again. The kind that feels almost holy.

He lifts a gloved hand, brushing a strand of hair that has fallen across Sunoo’s face. “You’ll melt the snow like that,” Jay says quietly.

Sunoo blinks. “Like what?”

“Looking at me,” Jay replies. 

“Then perhaps it’s the sky you should blame.”

Jay’s thumb traces his cheek, lingering at the edge of warmth. The space between them shrinks until the breath they share fogs the air as one. He can feel him—he can feel everything he tried his best to deny.

When he leans in, it is not hurried. Not desperate. It is steady. Deliberate, as if the world itself has slowed to watch them meet halfway.

Their lips touch. Tentative, searching, then sure.

Jay’s hand finds the curve of Sunoo’s jaw; Sunoo’s fingers clutch the pendant between them. For this heartbeat, all the distance between North and South ceases to exist.

Sunoo smiles after they lean away. Breathless, he says, “Blessed Lunareth.”

“Blessed Solvane,”