The lake was the only thing that remained frozen all year. It always had. The townsfolk never went near it and only mentioned it in whispers when warning the children. ‘Beware the Lady of the Frozen lake, she lies in wait, your soul to take.’ Most children kept their distance, but Aeyn was not most children.

She had been born in a field in the middle of the coldest winter anyone could remember, the field that bordered the lake. Aeyn’s mother had used her body to shelter her daughter from the relentless falling snow. Her father had dug them out a few hours later, and she alone had survived.

Aeyn’s father had repeated the old line and had added that it was the Lady of the Frozen Lake who had taken her mother. Aeyn grew up with a burning hatred for the lady and the lake. She listened to her father’s warning until the spark of hatred had built into a roaring blaze.

When she turned thirteen, her father warned her once again as the snow began to fall. ‘Beware the Lady of the Frozen Lake, she lies in wait, your soul to take.’ She could be still no longer and began to plot her revenge.

That night, dressed in as many layers as she could put on while still being able to move, Aeyn made her way silently towards the lake, flitting from shadow to shadow, ensuring that no one would stop her.

She had expected something, anything, to happen, but she reached the edge of the water with ease. She took a small step and then another and broke into a run until she reached the centre of the frozen sheet. She fell to her knees, landing softly on the freshly fallen snow, and cleared it away in front of her until she reached the ice. Clear ice. And beneath it a horrible sight awaited. A pale face with mouth agape.

Aeyn fell back in utter horror, but she had come this far, and the heat reignited inside her as she began to smash the ice. She used the back of the hammer as an ice pick and gathered all the might her fury could conjure up. She intended to keep hitting right through the pale face, but the moment she cracked through the ice and the water seeped through, the whole lake splintered like a mirror, and Aeyn dropped like a stone, her many layers pulling her deeper into the water.

As she started to lose consciousness, she heard, ‘Beware the Lady of the Frozen Lake, she lies in wait, your soul to take.’ With this, her rage rushed again, and her eyes flew open. Through the murk, a face became visible, the face she had seen beneath the ice. She had come here with a purpose, to destroy the lake lady, and as she still had the hammer in her hand, she swung. The lady slid easily out of the way. Aeyn cursed her many layers and how sloth-like her movements were on account of them. She felt herself growing tired again and her inner furnace petering out.

Then she felt a hand take hers. A voice whispered as she ascended, ‘I am the Lady of the Lake, a man long ago my life did take, and many tales have been told of me, but only you have set me free.’

Her head broke through the surface near the edge, where it was easy to escape the freezing water. She could hear the villagers calling as she surfaced. They took her home, and she did not speak of what she had seen or heard.

But through the rest of the cold winter, the lake did not freeze again, and when spring came, it thawed completely, life flourishing at its banks.

When Aeyn was old enough to have her own children, she told them, ‘Remember the Lady of the Lake, for she ne’er a soul did take.’

Alia Jenkins