An Icy Heart

by LolianTriforce

Chapter 4

Snow Ire sat on her bed. Her room was three times the size of the guest rooms that Sombra and Ornate were assigned. Her bed was in the back of the room in the middle. She had a giant desk on one side piled with papers and documents, left and right. The fire place sat on the other side of the room. The chairs and couch in front of it were more lavish than the ones in the other rooms. It was quite warm.

She wore a dark, fluffy, purple robe around her instead of her majestic blue one. She had her long hair down. It had grown to where it dragged on the floor as she walked, but she didn’t believe she needed to cut it. She still wore her crown and her cat’s eye pendant.

Snow Ire had been reading a book for a couple hours now. She had tried to get Sombra to retire to his bed, but he had refused to. It wasn’t long before she had given up on him.

She glanced at the foot of her bed. On a different pedestal stood a crystal ball identical to the one in her brewing room. She also had a small one in her pocket. The other crystal balls allowed Snow Ire to keep Ornate in her sight at all times.

In the crystal ball, Ornate was lying on her side with her back towards Snow Ire. She had fallen asleep during the time Snow Ire had been reading. Her chest gently rose and fell with each breath. Snow Ire couldn’t help but notice how cute she was when she wasn’t yelling at her.

Snow Ire gently put the book down and walked down to the foot of the bed. She sat up and watched her. Snow Ire gently turned the crystal ball around to see Ornate clearly. She tried to do it slowly so she didn’t wake up.

She sat there, holding still. When Ornate did not react, she relaxed and continued to watch. Ornate had been sized down to fit inside the crystal ball. She was only as tall as the radius of the crystal ball itself.

Snow Ire began to wonder to herself. What happened to Sombra that made him love this pony so much? She wasn’t a usual pony. In fact, she didn’t even have a cutie mark. She wasn’t normal for sure, but that only confused her more.

As she lost her focus in thought, she didn’t notice Ornate waking up from her nap. Ornate noticed her and growled. Snow Ire snapped out of her trance and looked at the zebra. Ornate ran around the crystal ball furiously. She ran so fast that she would run up the walls of her prison, across the ceiling, and down the other wall. Snow Ire had never seen anything like it.

Ornate began to shout what looked like profanities, but the glass blocked the sound. Snow Ire mumbled the incantation to allow sound to pass through the glass.

“Why were you watching me sleep?!” she shouted.

Snow Ire was too shocked to speak. She only shrugged.

“Don’t do it again!!”

Ornate laid down on the floor of the crystal ball, facing Snow Ire’s bed. She glanced at her captor and gave her a sharp send off. Her face was all it took to send shivers up Snow Ire’s spine.

Snow Ire stood up and jumped off her bed. She quickly walked through an open door next to her bed. It was a bathroom much bigger than a regular one. On one side there was a long ice bar across the wall. It had fluffy towels hanging on it. At the end of the bar, there was a closet with all kinds of toiletries. On the other side of the bathroom, there was a sink and another door to another part of the bathroom. In the middle of the room, there was a giant bathtub. It, and the sink, was the only thing that wasn’t made of ice.

She walked over to the bathtub and turned it on. Hot water filled it until it was full enough to her liking. She stopped the water and took off her robe, letting it fall to the floor. She slowly climbed in and relaxed. Her muscles were tense after the long day. The hot water relaxed her sore limbs. Her wings stretched out, allowing all the tight muscles within them to loosen. She hadn’t opened them for a while.

She leaned back in the tub and began to think about the day ahead. What was she going to do with Sombra? Certainly, it wouldn’t be too long before he got over the zebra… would it? His love for her was strong, too strong. How could she break a bond so tight?

She sighed, loud and long. All the unanswered questions swam through her mind, making her dizzy without much effort. She wondered about the zebra. She knew that staying in the crystal ball would keep her from needing to eat and burn off energy. But how willing would she be to stay in there just enough to ensnare the heart of Sombra? She wasn’t even willing to stay there for an hour.

Snow Ire finally began to feel relaxed and stepped out of the tub. She pulled the plug on the bathtub and grabbed a clean, fluffy towel from the bar and wrapped it around herself. She walked back into her room to get changed.

As she walked over to her bed, she saw one of the ice pony maids walk out. She walked over to her dresser and grabbed her snow-white nightgown with spaghetti straps. She quickly dried off and put it on over her warm body. She threw the wet towel into a basket by the door and walked over to her bed.

She drew back the covers and found the hot water rubber bed warmers at the foot of her bed. She carefully climbed in and pulled the comforter up. The warm glow of the fireplace was dim enough for it to make Snow Ire weary. Before she closed her eyes, she glanced at Ornate.

The zebra had fallen under the deep spell of sleep that covered her. Her face showed the weariness within her. She was exhausted and she knew it. Snow Ire watched Ornate’s chest rise and fall until her eyes wouldn’t stay open any longer. She, too, had fallen under the spell of deep sleep.