“Get down—!” she manages to cry out before the glass shatters inwards, and an utterly gelid blows us across the room. My right side complains as I fall on it. Maria too falls with a muted grunt.

It’s cold.

It’s cold.

It’s cold!

Freezing wind howls through the broken window, the frame itself cracking as a layer of frost rapidly encroaches upon it.

It hurts. My skin hurts. My ears feel like they’re on fire, and I have to close my eyes; my eyes will freeze!

I vaguely catch the sounds: someone screaming, a distant car crash. The howling wind smothers everything else. A hand reaches for my own; it is inhumanly cold. Everything is cold.

A second pulse of light from the distant sky is like a hammer to my brain. I can’t think anymore.

I’m gonna die.

I’m dead.

Prologue 04 - Winter Has Come