BETWEEN FIRE🔥🔥AND FROST❄️❄️

Chapter One: The Sound Between Silence

Isla’s POV

The train twisted through the Alps like a needle through silk, carving its way past ice-blurred windows and forests that looked like ghosts. Isla pressed her fingers to the chilled glass, watching the snow spiral downward in lazy threads. Everything felt suspended—time, breath, purpose.

Ardent Music Academy loomed ahead.

She hadn’t set foot here in over a year—not since she’d fled during winter term, leaving behind a perfect GPA, a shattered concerto, and two people she hadn’t dared say goodbye to.

The train hissed as it pulled into the station. Isla gathered her things, tucking her sheet music between her journals, her hands gloved but still trembling slightly. No one here would see her break. Not this time.

By the time she reached the iron gates of Ardent, the snow had deepened. The campus was hushed, stone towers piercing the sky, banners of crimson and gold flapping stiffly in the wind. She paused at the threshold. Somewhere behind these walls, Leo would be waiting. And Mira.

She wasn’t sure who she feared more.

---

The grand hall smelled of rosin, old wood, and effort. Students bustled past in tailored uniforms, instruments slung over shoulders like weapons. Isla’s boots clicked softly on the marble floor as she moved down the corridor toward her dorm.

“Renner.”

She flinched at the voice.

Leo stood by the recital board, arms folded, violin case slung behind him like always. His hair was longer, shaggier, dark curls falling into his sharp cheekbones. But it was his eyes that hadn’t changed—stormy, electric, always knowing too much.

“Didn’t think you’d come back.”

“I didn’t think you’d care,” she said flatly.

He gave her a crooked smile. “I don’t. But the piano’s been quieter without you.”

Isla didn’t reply. She wouldn’t fall into his games again—not after last winter. Not after the kiss they’d never spoken of. Not after Mira’s eyes had searched hers for an explanation she couldn’t give.

She turned to walk away.

“Your name’s on the chamber trio list,” he called. “We’re competing together. You, me, and Mira.”

Her breath caught. The academy always announced its top ensemble groups the day before term began. It was tradition. And torture.

She swallowed. “Perfect.”

“Just like you,” he said, more bitterly than flirtatiously this time.

---

Her fingers hesitated above the piano keys. Alone in the rehearsal hall, Isla breathed in the silence. It was heavy, clean, expectant. She pressed a single note—a low A—and let it echo. The resonance filled her ribcage like something alive.

Behind her, the door creaked.

She didn’t need to turn around.

“I heard you were back.” Mira’s voice was soft. No judgment. Just sadness.

Isla turned, heart suddenly fragile.

Mira had always looked out of place here—warm hazel eyes, freckled skin, honey-brown hair tied in a messy knot. She looked like she belonged in the woods, not among the marble and precision of Ardent. But when she played, she held the world still.

“I missed you,” Mira said, stepping closer.

Isla’s throat tightened. “I didn’t think you’d forgive me.”

“I didn’t. Not at first. But then I remembered why you left.”

A beat passed. Mira sat beside her on the bench, close enough that their knees touched. Isla didn’t move away.

“I didn’t choose him,” Isla whispered.

“You didn’t choose me either.”

Silence again. The kind that stretched too long.

Mira stood. “We have rehearsal tomorrow. Don’t be late.”

And then she was gone.

Isla stared at the keys. Her fingers hovered above them. But she didn’t play.

She couldn’t.

Not yet.