The Glass Coffin

by Thyme In Her Eyes

Author's Note: It couldn't be a more inappropriate time of year to feel like writing a bit of Victor/Nora, but I'm strange that way. And as always, I'm just an overgrown fangirl and own neither the characters or the franchise. Enjoy the read, and remember that all feedback is appreciated.

-- THE GLASS COFFIN --

"Victor... No matter what happens...I love you."

Softly, she murmurs the words. Her husband's hand is still stroking and smoothing her hair and she nuzzles into the warm touch, kissing his palm. His other is holding hers, his thumb intermittently brushing gently, so gently, over her knuckles. Her voice is strange to her own ears, so faint and far away, and her lips so slow in moving, and for a brief moment, she wants to laugh. He loves to hear her laughter; the soaring sound of her happiness. He loves her...so much.

She smiles for him even as she drifts away, because she can still feel his caress and the way his hand tightens around hers with sudden feeling, so she knows that he heard her. Her fragile whispers are light as a first snowfall, but he hears her. Like the snow, she wants her words to blanket him. She may be falling away into frozen sleep and strange dreams, but the words help her hold on a moment longer. They're so keenly felt, and absolutely enduring. There's a spark of life in them that no disease can take away from her, that not even death could extinguish.

Whatever may happen, she'll always have this. She only wishes she could hear his quiet reply, so that she'll be able to hold the precious words for as long as she needs them; cherishing them like a treasure.

The world is growing distant and cold, but she's still warm in his arms. The pain that's been burrowed inside her for so long can't stand such cold, and it leaves her at last, as does the last of her fading strength. A hundred years might pass by now. They'll refuse to touch her, they'll recoil from the cold of her skin. Nothing can endure the climate she's falling into; nothing but his love, and her own.

He kisses her lips so carefully, with such melting gentleness, that she can't bear to leave him so alone. He has given her this chance, and she can never thank him. She wants to cry for him, and keep him safe while she slumbers. More than she wants to cry, she wishes she could hug him and say so many things.

Instead, she gives another lazy and curling smile, as though on the brink of falling asleep after a warming night of love, because although she's more than familiar with the procedure – Victor, I'm not a complete novice – and her heart burns with faith in him, he still explains everything to her over and over again. He needs for her to know that everything will be alright. This is the only path left to them, but it will save her, and she'll be free from pain and safe at last, he tells her. There's nothing that could go wrong. Nobody knows the machine like he does. And after it's done, he'll watch over her. He won't abandon or forget her. Never.

He makes these vows, and she hopes his burdens will ease once this is done. Worrying over her has taken years from him, and she resents herself for that. And again, he ignores his own anguish and desperation and focuses on her instead; explaining and re-illustrating the finer technical details as he makes the final adjustments and system-checks and tries to comfort and reassure both her and himself.

He doesn't want her to be afraid, she realizes, and she wishes she could be strong enough again to touch his face.

I'm not afraid, she tells him without words, and prays he hears her somehow. Not anymore.

He gathers her in his arms and lays her to rest inside her glass coffin, not like a corpse never to know human warmth again, but like an enchanted princess simply waiting for the icy spell holding her in its grasp to someday be broken. She isn't lost yet – her heart still beats for him, for the dreams that haven't come true yet, for all she's yet to see, and for the future they might still share. She'll always live, always like this. Her warmth is nursed deep inside her and her radiance glows underneath the shroud of her frozen skin, her closed eyes, her dreaming mind. Nothing can put out her fire as long as he's there and still with her.

She remembers that this casket of glass, ice and machinery is only a prototype, and that perhaps she really should worry. It's all Victor's work, and so he's likely the only one capable of operating it correctly. So, if anything should happen to him, she could be trapped forever in this transparent coffin; half-dead, half-alive, always dying.

But what's so much worse is the idea of surviving such a scenario, and waking up in a world without him – a world where, even after all they've been through and suffered, they still can't be together. A world that denies them the happy ending they need so badly. She'd rather be trapped for eternity behind the glass, frozen forever in a floating tomb and always dreaming of him, than be awake, free and alone.

He leans close to her for the last time and she can barely feel it as he brushes flake-feather kisses across her forehead and closed eyes, each one given with heartbreaking tenderness, and then presses a final trembling and searing touch to her cold lips – one last kiss – as he whispers gentle goodbyes and solemn promises.

No, she thinks, defiant. Not the last kiss.

Only the last for a while. Yes, that's right. There's more to come, one bright and brilliant day. The sun never stops.

As he pulls away, fumbling with his glasses, something that feels very much like a drop of water hits her face from somewhere above. It trickles down the curve of her cheek as though it's her own, and she thinks of the thaw, of melt-water, and finally, of tears. Her body is so chill now, and so very alone, but the tear he sheds for her is still trailing down her face, and it is beautiful fire on her skin.

Victor, darling... No matter what...

She knows she'll dream of him now; of their past and their future, of what couldn't be and everything that still may be, and those dreams will keep the most precious part of her soul eternally warm and peaceful. The bitter cold won't touch her. Frozen in an ageless sleep, like a figure from a winter's fairy-tale, a part of her is still free to wait and hope for a day when her curse of stasis and disease will be lifted and their joy restored; a time when she can finally come back to him and live again.

No matter what happens...

And even if the very worst unleashes itself on them, devastating all their dreams, she'll find him in the end. Even if she has to live forever, shut away from the world and sealed in unending cold, she'll still have the world behind her eyes. She'll dream of him for all time, and so a piece of him will always endure, and be with her.

...I'll always love you.

The chamber is sealing shut now, separating them, but not forever. There's no power that could separate them forever. Snow is on her lashes, and she feels so sleepy.

And so Nora finally sleeps, and waits for Victor to wake her with a kiss.

-- FIN --