Chapter 1

The dark-haired girl sprawled unconscious in the deep snow, the soft moonlight giving her pale features a fine glow, like an image from a fairy tale. Her hair fanned out around her head like folds of silk as the heavy snow continued to fall. Her clothes were already covered, as was one of her hands. The stark whiteness of the snow was marred only by drops of red that had come from her nose and ears.

Clutching his arm to his chest, as though it were broken, a teenage boy stumbled onto the two-lane road where the girl lay. He had struggled up from the ditch at the edge of the forest. Now he waded through the snow toward the girl, panting for air. Everything was white and silent, the road completely deserted. The boy knelt down by the girl's side and saw how still and quiet she was. Seemingly afraid to hurt her, he put a hand out and gently touched her snow-covered shoulder. Then he started saying her name.

When he first tried to wake her, the girl was still deep in a dream. She didn't want to wake up. Inside the dream she was safe, but she knew that if she woke up, she'd have to face the terrible thing that had just happened to her. She also knew somehow that outside the dream it was bitterly cold. The kind of cold that could suck the breath from your lungs and freeze the hairs in your nose. She would do anything to avoid feeling like that again.

But the boy's intrusive voice wouldn't stop calling for her. Over and over she heard her name, and she fought against it.

Suddenly, the hands touching her became rougher and she felt herself being pulled back into the harsh reality of her present surroundings. She curled up, keeping her eyes tightly shut.

"You're blee