Once upon a time, there was a lonely fae prince raised by wild berries and ire. Only when his mother was seized by whimsical indulgence would she visit. Dressed in shimmering silk and glittering gold, she leaned over his cradle, reeking of wine and wet earth. Hair of midnight seeped into his cradle where his fingers strained to feel it for merely a moment. She tucked the strand behind her ear, smiling when he cried.

“What a wail, my little winter prince,” she whispered with a smile that warped into a snarl. Stormy eyes, deep and dark and murky gray, hardened into stone.

“You’re cold as a corpse, and yet, you still breathe. Cold as a corpse, and yet, you still breathe,” she repeated like a curse. Her nimble fingers ran over his frail neck, tightened until he bruised and shrieked. Then she left the screaming prince in a cradle rocked only by the wind.

As the lonely prince grew, he had all the sweets he could ever want, but none he needed. The gentle words of a mother, the admiration of a father, or the affectionate teasing of siblings were luxuries he could never afford, steal, or coerce. And so, the lonely prince grew within and around the anger fed to him from birth until it was the only hissing ember within his frigid heart.

To receive a moment of attention, he kicked the nursemaid’s until their shins swelled purple. He glamoured mortals, tied them to strings like marionettes to play with until they faded to dust. He froze ponds and rivers and streams, waiting for swimmer’s lips to darken blue. He studied his vindictive mother for a reaction. Something. Anything. When she threw back her head in a wicked laugh, that was incentive enough.

Ever since, the lonely prince strut through burrows beneath the hills, gnarled vines and mossy floors, with a malevolent grin. All in his path bowed or suffered his bitter wrath. He’d snap a few toes if one dared meet his eye or give the slightest quip. Maybe he would freeze their heart with a touch, or curse their crops to shrivel beneath snow while the summer sun sat high in the sky. At court, he drank until gold faerie wine stained his lips. He told his sisters they were ugly hags that a troll wouldn’t even love, and his brothers were as dull as brainless boars. A sharp and charismatic tongue got him into trouble as often as it got him out.

Never had his father, the High King of Grim, paid him any mind, nor the members of the faerie court. As prince, he had all that he ever wanted and got away with whatever he pleased, dastardly deeds of wonderful villainy. But then the time came when the lonely prince made a grave mistake in his selfish endeavors. A punishment befell him so dreadful that even he couldn’t devise a crueler fate.

For his crimes, they gave the lonely prince a coffin as cold and sturdy as his heart. The coffin sat beneath a solitary white tree in a cavern of ice far from all he ever knew. There, they lay the lonely prince to rest, cursed to sleep for a year, a decade, a millennium, he was never told. But he knew, as the lid shut and exhaustion settled, that there would be no visitors, none to keep him company, and none who cared if he ever awoke.