Author's Note: Thank you guys for your reviews! I really needed them. Something terrible happened! I wrote an entire, detailed 25 chapter outline for this story. I was super proud of it. Then I merged my cloud accounts. GONE. NONEXISTENT. I was so disenchanted I considered just not continuing. But I am going to try and rebuild the outline and hopefully the story is solid enough. I'm still in grieving!


"This is no reason to slack, Yuuri," the stern female voice chided him from the other end of the phone. "A dancer still has to dance."

"Yeah," he muttered absentmindedly into the receiver, still sprawled out over his bedsheets in pajamas as he had been all morning. "I know, Minako."

"Then why haven't you been out of the house in weeks?!" Her tone razored and Yuuri flinched away from the speaker. He'd forgotten just how quickly his dance instructor could go from dainty ballerina to ferocious tiger. Minako was a Primaja in her heyday and his parents swore that she still looked every bit as young and graceful as the day she first stepped onto the ice of the Goddess's shrine. Her tenure as Primaja had been cut short due to injury, but once she'd recuperated, she continued to work together with the capitol and countless promising, young dancers. She'd even worked with Victor for spells, always sure to bring Yuuri pictures and tokens of her time with him back from the capitol. Minako swore fierce fealty to the Goddess through her actions alone and she expected the same from everyone else.

"You still have a duty to the Goddess, Yuuri. You might not be called to the capitol, but you can do just fine right here. Hasetsu needs you. You know that."

"I know…" He ran his fingers through his bangs, staring blankly at a ridge of torn fabric in his pillowcase. Unlike the capitol in the Westlands, Hasetsu didn't have the best placement. The Eastlands were the farthest from the capitol and, in the past years, the ice began to melt in Hasetsu's surrounding areas, leaving dark, cracked earth in its wake, fire brimming beneath its surface. Some said the change was owed to the remnants of the Fire God supporters who'd been multiplying like insects over the years, growing stronger. The fire people had taken to roaming the area, plotting in the dark and peaking out every blue moon to commit unspeakable atrocities. Yuuri shuddered. As a dancer, he didn't possess the power to ice over the lava and blackened rock as the Primaja did, but he could at least aid in keeping it controlled.

"Have you talked to Celestino at all?" she asked.

"Yeah," he muttered, not caring much to elaborate. "For a bit." His eyes trailed to the little black box on his night stand.

"Hm…" Minako sounded as though she were deep in thought for a moment. "You haven't been eating pork cutlet bowls everyday have you?"

He swallowed hard.

"I swear if you got fat again—!"

"Minako!" Nervous laughter bubbled from his lips as he pinched at his thickening gut. "I'm not! Really!"

"Yuuri," she said and he could hear the edge seeping from her tone. "You might not be Primaja, but only a small percentage of the population is even gifted with the power of the Goddess. That is still an honor."

"Yeah," he whispered, eyes floating toward his wall of posters. He wondered if Victor would see it that way.

"It's just too bad," she groaned. "If his mother is any indication, that Plisetsky kid is a little shit."

Yuuri's lips curved up into a smile. "Didn't you train her, Minako?"

"I didn't have the chance after my accident." The regret was palpable through the phone. "I tried to help once I was able again, but I don't think she ever forgave me," she sighed. "Plisetskys."

Yuuri snorted, remembering the defiant demeanor of the young blond, arrogant and quick to pounce. Like a wildcat. Victor had his work cut out for him. That was for sure. "Plisetskys."

They shared a short laugh followed by a pause.

Minako's voice was soft when she spoke again. "You know you can still meet Victor, Yuuri. He does shows in the capitol city every month."

"Yeah, you've only invited me a dozen times," he replied with a smile. "Thanks, Minako, but I didn't want it to be like that." He turned onto his back, eyes trailing back and forth between the collage of Victor and the framed pictures of his own skating and dancing career sitting neatly on his bookshelf. "Not as a fan."

"Can't always get what you want."

"Yeah," he blinked, dozens of unfulfilled daydreams vanishing with the motion. "I know."


"So how come the Goddess didn't pick Yuuri?!" Lutz asked, scrambling out of Yuko's reach, her sisters fast on her tail. "What is she? An idiot or something?"

"Hey!" Yuko finally caught her by the collar and glowered down at the three. "Don't talk about the Goddess that way! Do you want to get smote?!"

Yuuri just chuckled at the exchange. At the very least, he supposed he always had cheerleaders in the Nishigori sisters.

"Come on!" Yuko attempted to wrestle all three of them by the waists at once, finally achieving the feat after three laps around the coffee table at the center of their dining room. "It's way past your bedtime!"

Loop managed to wrench free, plopping unceremoniously on Yuuri's lap. "Yuuri, what happened to your stomach?"

"Eh…" Yuuri trailed off, immediately yanking his blue tee down over his gut as far as it would go.

"Did the Goddess not choose you because you got fat?" Axel plopped on the other leg.

"Does the Goddess not like fat people?" Lutz finished, catching him around the neck.

"Hey!" He pulled away, attempting to relieve himself of them. "I'm not fat!"

Yuko sighed in defeat, walking across the living area to sit down beside them on the carpet. "As much as we wanted Yuuri to be chosen, you shouldn't talk about the Goddess like that. Who else is going to protect you from the Fire God?!"

"Oooh! The Fire God!" Axel cried theatrically, her mouth going slack, rigid arms lifted forward in zombie-like fashion. "I'm the Fire God! Ooooh!" They all paraded about the coffee table chanting nonsense, pretending to be fire people.

"Stop that!" Yuko growled.

Yuuri grinned fondly, nostalgia blooming in his chest. Hadn't they played these sorts of games when they were younger? Imitating the beautiful Ice Goddess and the Fire God at battle.

All the children of their world had heard the story at least once. Fire and ice had coexisted in peace once. But the Fire God's people grew mad and hungry with power, transforming the land into a volcanic hellscape. Seeing her own people in distress, the Ice Goddess tricked the Fire God into a lull and then trapped him and his powers within his own cooled lava before encasing the world in ice and snow. Her powers lived on through her dancers and, of course, the Primaja who performed the sacred ritual every three months, keeping the Fire God imprisoned in the shrine.

"It should have been Yuuri!" Axel droned in her zombie-like fire demon voice.

"We choose Yuuri!" they all chanted.

Yuko swatted them all over the head with a newspaper and they scattered away, giggling. "That's enough out of you! All of you! Go to bed!"

Yuuri chuckled, pushing himself from the carpet as the three scrambled into the hallway and away from the offending newspaper. "It's late. I should probably head out too."

He scratched the back of his head, eyes lowering to the ground. It was nearly midnight. He and Yuko had always let time run away from them when they were together, but things were different now. She was a married woman and he had to respect that. He'd tried to put more space between them while he was actively training as a Primaja hopeful. Practicing extensively, traveling to pilgrimage with other dancers for months at a time. But in the past month he'd been too depressed to focus and found himself wandering back to old habits.

"You sure you don't want to stay the night?" Yuko frowned. "Takeshi wouldn't mind and it's dangerous for a dancer to be wandering around at night."

"Ah… well…" Yuuri stammered, wringing his hands. He stared down at his backpack on the carpet, where the tiny black box peeked out of the side pouch. "I was actually gonna head to the Ice Castle…"

"The rink?!" Yuko's eyes immediately lit up as he knew they would, life spilling onto her features. "Yuuri! You're going back! That's so exciting!"

He couldn't help the grin from spreading over his lips at her reaction, but still he hushed her. The last thing he wanted was for the girls and Nishigori to hear…

"Yuko," he paused and took in a deep breath, eyes trailing downward. "I want to show you something."

Her brow creased, features sobering. "… Yuuri?"

"Celestino sent it to me." He pulled the bag from the ground and tossed it over his shoulder. "Will you come see?"

A wide grin broke out across her petite features. "Of course!" She winked. "Besides, you'll need someone to protect you from rogue firestarters!"

His quivering smile mirrored hers as they headed for the door, unable to keep the blush from creeping over his cheeks.


The Ice Castle stood eerily quiet in the dead of night— a stark contrast to the daytime when children pranced over the ice in imitation of the beloved Primaja and generous dancers on pilgrimage came from all over to join in service with him. To protect Hasetsu. Of course he hadn't been dancing recently, to honor the Goddess or otherwise. That would change tonight, he thought.

Yuko hit the overhead lights and they flashed on with a resounding clap, one by one. The light's glare upon the ice made Yuuri squint and energized him all the same. He dropped his backpack against the stands and moved to pull his skates out.

"Yuuri!" Yuko cooed from behind him, her eyes watering as she clapped. "I'm so happy! I thought you wouldn't skate again for months."

"I didn't want to," he admitted, finishing the lacing on his skates. "But then I…" he trailed off and looked up to give her a smile. "Wait till you see."

She beamed excitedly and he was suddenly overcome with gratitude for her being there. Yuko had always been there from the beginning. As a child, he hadn't quite understood his gift or why he should care so much about it. He could have easily thought of ten other things he'd rather be doing than learning dance rituals and perfecting his pirouette. Then Yuko joined his lessons, so bright and eager, and they suddenly didn't seem so dull. Yuko was the only one who cared to make his destiny as a dancer something other than a vague and ominous responsibility that loomed over every formative moment of his childhood. She was the first to show him the footage of Victor, the Primaja in training, soaring across the ice at 16, a ribbon in his hair and all of the universe in his eyes. In all of the ancient texts he'd been forced to page through, in the most detailed of Celestino's elder teachings, the most spartan of Minako's lessons, he'd never seen or felt anything like it. With Yuko's ardent support and full-time use of her family's rink, he began to practice his dances on the ice as Victor did. He began to see the beauty in them— in his purpose as a dancer. He built his loyalty to the Goddess on Victor. His motivation. His devotion. Yuko had first given him that. Now it was his turn.

"In here." He motioned Yuko into the tech booth where they broadcast the rink's music and housed emcees for special events. With trembling fingers, he plucked the thumb drive from the black box and plugged it into the main computer. With a few clicks, a new window opened and the ice rink suddenly filled with the ambience of ice and wind. A lonely backdrop of white covered the entire screen, the ground a thick sheet of ice, flurries drifting throughout the terrain. It went on that way for a while and Yuko's lip started to crease downward when color bloomed onto the screen in one sweeping motion. Sheer gossamer robes of plum and gold billowed in the wind as the flower took its stance at the center of the white sea. It pressed its palms together, head bowed, eyes closed and then slowly, gently, the wind began to sing.

"Yuuri," Yuko choked, eyes so wide he thought they might bulge out. "Celestino sent you this?"

"Yeah," he replied, eyes still drawn to the figure on screen, arms lifted gracefully above its head, expression somber. "I guess he wanted to cheer me up." He chuckled nervously, his breath hitching as Victor began to glide over the ice, the wind's song swelling with each motion.

"H— How did he get it?" she stammered, leaning in so close to the screen that her nose nearly bumped the monitor.

"He sits on the elder council," Yuuri shrugged. "He can probably get anything if he really wants it."

"But should we be watching this?" She asked, her eyes never leaving the screen, where the Primaja had picked up speed, completely oblivious to the roaring winds of the shrine. Icy tendrils and flakes seemed to sparkle into being around him, following him like a protective cloud. "It's fine when he's performing offsite, but the actual ritual?" She bit her lip. "Isn't it illegal?"

Yuuri nodded absentmindedly. The thought had occurred to him the first time he'd seen it. And the second time. By the dozenth time it had resigned itself somewhere in very back of his mind and now, he couldn't look away if he tried. Typically, novelties lost their appeal after each repeated experience, but this was different. With every viewing, Victor drew him further into his ice frosted web and he didn't want to be freed yet. Not when he was so close.

The dance was nothing like his usual performances. Victor typically played to his fans, grinning and winking at them through out his skate— the perfect thespian. But now his features were completely somber, his movements melancholy and deliberate. Almost sad. He outstretched one arm to the sky, his eyes following the motion, as if pleading for something before turning and leaping into a flawless quad flip. The wind applauded him in its volume, catching the snow and careening it into a whirling funnel with Victor at its center, his pale hair and robes drifting upward in the wind's flow. He opened his arms, letting it take him, sweat tinging his forehead, breathing heavy. And yet, he'd never appeared more beautiful to Yuuri than he was now. The screen cut to black and a short silence filled the booth.

"I think I'm ready to dance again."

Yuko still stared at the blank screen, hands gripping her mouth, tears in her eyes. She finally turned to him with a shaky smile and a thumbs up, her voice obviously failing her. But Yuuri had already stepped out onto the rink, the familiar sound of blades against the ice invigorating him. He placed his arms first at the sides of his sweatpants and then lifted them before him, one hand completely extended, the other gripping its bend — the starting pose of the peace dance.

This was the first dance he'd ever truly wanted to learn, despite the countless routines Minako and Celestino had drilled into him prior. He'd watched Victor's televised performance of the dance with Yuko and it was all they talked about for days. Then they grew tired of just talking about it and he begged Minako to teach them, begged Celestino to approve him to perform it in ritual. He dreamed of dancing it at Victor's side one day, protecting the land from the Fire God together, sparing secret winks at the cameras.

Typically, dancers performed with drums and string instruments. Other times, they performed with vocals alone. Tonight, Yuuri did not need any accompaniment. Eyes shut, he lifted his arms from his sides, imagining a soft cello and a steady drumbeat, the wind whistling gently in the background. He moved backwards and rolled his shoulders along with the phantom music, the movement arching to his back and rippling through his hips. He launched to the side and spun gracefully in a circle, one leg pointed outward.

The familiar rush of power rose within him, its strength numbing his skin and straightening the hairs at the back of his neck. The music grew louder, the wind rushing. The Goddess was here now using him as a conduit to channel her magic deep into the earth, preserving the ice, keeping the fire at bay. Her power flooded him until his body no longer moved of its own volition. She bent and twisted him like a puppet, his limbs recreating her every whim. His skin tingled with the gift just beneath it and he pleaded with her, as he always did, "Please. Please let it come back."

It didn't. It never did. So he continued to make believe. He imagined the glittering gems of ice and frost sprouting from his fingertips, misting around his skin. Hovering protectively around him, a bejeweled cloak. Victor looked so beautiful surrounded by ice. He used his gift so effortlessly that Yuuri should have been jealous, but he was always just awed and hungry for more.

Victor.

He placed his palms together, eyes closed, the wind roaring.

I'll reach you someday. I swear it.

He soared into a spin, arms open.

Even if I only have my will to guide me.

He raised one arm toward the ceiling as though a string tied his wrist, his gaze following it.

I'll get to you.

"Yuuri…" Yuko called worriedly from the sidelines, but her voice blurred into nonsense. It was so loud, he couldn't even hear the music anymore. Just the wind. Screaming. Screeching.

He wasn't sure when he stopped performing the dance for peace. He wasn't even completely conscious of dancing at all, his head buzzing, vision clouding. It was as though he watched someone else gliding across the ice, performing the Goddess's most sacred ritual in a simple ice rink in Hasetsu.

The stranger moved with a fluidity unknown to him, his eyes alive and burning with a passionate resolve that had never greeted him from a mirror before. The stranger flashed him a grin and he knew that he couldn't stop him if he tried.

"Yuuri!" Yuko's voice broke through as he prepared for the grand finale. How long had she been screaming now? "You have to stop!"

Too late. He flew into the air, managing to get in two rotations before it happened. The world exploded around him as he tumbled to the ground, landing on his side. Large, angry cracks shot out across the ice where he landed, the glass from the overhead lights shattering everywhere before the lights themselves dimmed and went dark. The ground rumbled beneath them and he knew it was more than just the Ice Castle that had been affected.

Yuko screamed from the tech booth and he scrambled for her, kicking his skates off and fighting his way through a mess of overturned stands and ceiling panels. The computer had rebooted and it spilled luminous blue light over the tech room, helping him to recognize Yuko hiding underneath the counter, surrounded by window shards. The computer monitor died and went black as he crouched down beside her, hissing as his foot pressed into glass.

"Yuko!" He took her hands, hoping he wouldn't hurt her. The Goddess's power still buzzed through his fingers. It usually vanished the moment he left the ice…

"Yuuri…" She squeezed at his hands, her own trembling. "This is…" She gazed around at the wreckage, the remains of electricity buzzing overhead in the bursted ceiling lights, ice and glass shards scattered over the property, benches strewn everywhere. "This is…"

This was it, he realized.

This was his awakening.