A few days passed, and they hadn't yet arrived. Simina was sure that it had been at least three days since she'd left. The driver had to stop once they'd gotten into the real snowy area, and change the wheels to blades so it would be a sleigh.
She'd been riding in the sleigh carriage three days straight without stopping, and it was too cold for Simina to pee. Luckily, there was a pee pan in the carriage. But Simina was cramped, tired, and her head hurt. She'd eaten a few frost apples, at least one a day. She was trying to ration and not eat so much because she knew that it would be a long trip.
Simina had fallen asleep in the carriage at times, but didn't like it because it jostled around too much, and she woke up with sore muscles. The carriage was completely uncomfortable. A few times, they'd stop to rest for maybe one to two hours, but then kept going. She felt extremely unclean since she couldn't wash, and hadn't washed for three days straight.
Anyways, it was the fourth night of travel, and the night was cold and dark, the sky matted over with a mass of gray, shutting out the light of the stars. A great, howling wind was blowing outside, rocking the carriage back and forth a little dangerously. A flurry of snow billowed through the air. Frost covered the little carriage windows. Simina shivered, her teeth chattering, and pulled her cloak tighter around her shoulders.
They were traveling across a huge embankment of snow and that's all that there was. Just snow upon snow, upon snow. Simina now understood why they called it the Snowy Hills. It was just huge hills of piled up snow. It was basically just a barren wasteland of snow. Nothing was out there, at all.
Simina didn't like the sound the wind made. It sounded like creepy little whispering voices saying things to her that she couldn't understand. She tried to tune it out, but it was just too much. The driver thought about stopping, but he didn't think it would be wise to stop in the middle of a storm. He wanted to get through it.
The wind blew very violently, and there was so much snow going everywhere it was hard to see. The horse moved steadily forward, walking carefully through the snow, following the guidance of the driver, who told the horse where to go.
The Snowy Hills wasn't just made up of snow, however; under the snow, on the lower parts of the hills, was a thin sheet of ice, prone to crack and break at any given time because it was covering a stream. They'd just come down from a steep snowy hill, landing with a thump on the ground of the lesser snow covered area. The horse's hard hoof landed with a heavy thud on the ice underneath.
All of a sudden, there was a ferocious lurch as the horse jolted to a stop, and Simina lurched forward in her seat. The horse neighed with panic and Simina heard an earsplitting crack of ice splitting in two. The sound of it spooked the horse, and the horse started wildly bucking and jerking all over the place. This caused the carriage to sway violently back and forth as the ice under the carriage split, and the carriage fell halfway into the ice water without the support.
The horse caused the carriage to fall and tip over as it broke from its reins and took off into the night. The driver had fallen off, and the heavy carriage had fallen on top of him, crushing him beneath it, between the carriage and the ice. Simina was jostled roughly back and forth within the carriage, hitting her head many times. Stars constantly flickered before her eyes, but she didn't black out. She felt she was about to. While the carriage was jerking, Simina was violently thrown from the carriage, and into the snowy, slushy ice.
She landed roughly on the cold, hard ice, and as she landed, the impact of her body hitting the ice caused it to crack and split under her, revealing freezing water underneath. Simina's body slid against the slick ice, rubbing her skin raw with the burning cold of the ice across her skin. Simina's head smacked against the hard ice; she hit her head so hard, it knocked her out cold.
Instant blackness fell over Simina's mind, and she remembered nothing else.
* * *
A dark shadow fell over Simina's limp body lying on the ice. Her lips were starting to turn blue. The Dark Prince stared down at the girl's limp form. He thought he recognized her. His purple eyes glistened with interest. I've seen her before, he thought to himself. The Prince looked around at the scene. The carriage had tipped over, probably from the jolt of an out of control horse, and the furious winds.
The wind blew violently around him. The Prince saw the ice opening up its wide mouth beneath her, readying to swallow. He crouched down low to the girl's body, and placed two pale fingers on her neck. Her skin felt cold to the touch, just like ice. The Prince felt the gentle thrumming of her pulse, and leaned down closer to hear her shallow, labored breathing.
“She's alive,” The Prince muttered to himself. I should probably get her out of here, she might have already gone into hypothermia, the Prince thought. He picked her head up, placing her head on his shoulder, and slipped his other arm under her legs. The Prince slowly eased her up off the ice, and into his arms, cradling her small, mini frame against his chest.
Staring down at her face, The Prince brushed a gentle finger across her cold cheek. With a swirl of dark purple smoke, The Prince vanished, leaving a trailing puff of purple mist.