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Glacier is not magic.
She helps Boa feel better. She makes Boa’s heart frolic over clouds, makes it feel as if the stars are finally waiting for Boa for once. Yes, Glacier knows how to remind Boa to keep that flame of hope beneath her ribcage ignited, and she knows how to soothe her heaving chest when the bad memories overwhelm her.
But she couldn’t fix everything. Even if she desperately wanted her to, Boa knew better than to ever believe that one dragon could make her all fine and perfect again.
Glacier isn’t magic.
And Boa would never ask her to be.
It’s during a quiet night that the cool desert wind of home wraps around Boa’s body to tell her that there is nothing tonight to hurt her. The chill of Glacier’s scales wind their way around her as well, through her wings and over her scales, and they tell her that they will protect her.
It’s also during that same quiet night that Boa asks, words just between herself and Glacier: “What’s it like, over in the Ice Kingdom?”
After all, Glacier had come into her life in a storm of glittering pale scales and cold air, so unlike anything that Boa had ever known before. She had come with patient words and kind laughter, so unlike anything that Boa never wants to know again.
And maybe Boa just wants to get to know her more, to lean more into this new friendship for the future than the violence and pain of her past.
So Glacier speaks. She tells Boa of a pale, glittery landscape, with snow that falls softly when they feel merciful. She describes the feeling of snow and ice beneath claws, the chilled winds beneath a dragon’s wings, the taste of a penguin or seal on a tongue. Boa listens as Glacier speaks, then, of the mass of ice that she is named after, how mighty and strong it is, and Boa can understand then where Glacier gets her name from.
“I would say that I’m faster, though,” Glacier says, her tail swishing lightly over the sand. “Have you ever seen an actual glacier moving?”
“I would say no, since you had to tell me about it,” Boa replies. She digs her feet into the sand a bit more, trying to ignore the small, faded starbursts of pain that flicker over her claws. She grits her teeth somewhat, and Glacier moves in a bit closer to her. Close enough that Boa could lean against her.
I’ll keep you safe, the chill tells her again.
And Boa, to some extent, feels as if she could actually believe them.
“Fair enough.” Glacier snorts as Boa leans in closer to her, turning her face up toward the clear desert sky. “And hey, how about this: the next time I come back here, I’ll bring a penguin for you to try.”
“The seal sounds a bit more appealing.” A giggle almost escapes Boa as Glacier playfully rolls her eyes at her. “I mean, it’s bigger, right? So we could share one too?”
“Fine, a seal then.”
“Only if you want to bring it, though,” Boa says, tilting her head at Glacier. The wind’s howls seem to grow louder around them then, and Boa smiles at Glacier. She can’t describe the feeling that stirs deep within her when Glacier smiles back at her, in such a warm, honest way that Boa wasn’t sure another dragon would ever smile at her again. “But…”
“I’ll be sure to bring some piece of home back to you,” Glacier murmurs to her. Some piece of who made Glacier would be with Boa next time, and Boa would understand her a bit more by then.
She thinks about everything she knows of the Ice Kingdom. Shining snow, beautiful crystals, wonderful critters to learn about, and Glacier herself…so much of it, still blocked from Boa’s claws. She thinks about the wall, something she learned about before, and how it would shoot her down the moment she tries to fly over it.
It’s unfair, Boa thinks, to have those barriers in between them. But at the very least, Glacier is willing to make the distance over to her and make it to her arms and wings once again. To have some dragon so willing to do that for her, in between all of her duties as well…
…Boa cannot hide that she does love Glacier to herself.
How could she not, when Glacier is so willing to do so much for her? When Boa doesn’t have to feel so pained and lonely whenever she’s around?
How could Boa not love her, when she had tumbled into the dragon who would show her a love that Boa wants to know forever?
And maybe, just maybe, Boa could make herself worthy of that love too someday.
So in the following nights, they meet back up beneath the stars, and they exchange words of love, compassion, and worry with each other. When there’s a crack in the ice and all of the worries about Glacier’s duties as princess threaten to flow out, Boa is there to assuage the flow.
They’ve cried for each other, their sobs grating against their chests, slowly turning into sad, sad laughter as the conversation moves from their pain to their joys.
They love each other.
And while some barriers remain in between them, Boa knows that Glacier is willing to fly to see her. Maybe someday, someone would destroy them. Maybe once Glacier becomes queen, she would be the one to do so.
Maybe by then, Boa would have saved the world with her magic, the way Glacier believes she could, even if it’s difficult for Boa to share that same belief. Her purpose. Glacier’s purpose was to serve her kingdom, and Boa…Boa could still wait. She could wait for as long as she wants, and maybe that’s okay. Glacier helps her feel that it’s okay.
Of all the ifs and perhaps and maybes, Boa is fairly certain she’ll never be fully alright again. Sometimes, even when Glacier is there, Boa is suddenly overwhelmed by the weight of a world that had not waited for her and never will, and Glacier can’t do much to help her then.
Glacier isn’t magic. She never was, and now never would be.
And years later, when Boa returns to the same spot they once looked at the desert stars together with, now without anyone by her side, she looks up at the sky once again. She lets out a deep breath, her claws digging into the sand once again, and looks toward the space that Glacier would’ve taken up beside her.
“I’m back,” she says. One last time, she’ll feel Glacier in her heart, feel all of those old memories with her both joyous and painful, and try to reignite that hope in herself again.
One last time, she and Glacier would have a night together.