He goes in and out of consciousness.

When he wakes up again there's a chill in the air that wasn't there before.

Baltor's already sick of this. Of being stuck in Cloud Tower's basement prison cells (that he can't believe survived Cloud Tower being ripped out of the ground in the first place), of the magic-draining cuffs on his wrist that keep him weak and barely able to stand up straight, and especially of Selina coming around looking like a cat stalking a mouse.

The first thing he's going to do when he gets out of here is ram her head into a wall and knock that smirk off her face.

But it isn't Selina here to greet him this time.

"Well."

His eyes snap in the direction of the voice and sure enough, there she is. Sitting on top of Griffin's desk, looking particularly pleased with this turn of events.

Icy leans forward, letting her chin rest in her hand. "A little bird from Isis was going on and on about seeing you. I just figured she finally snapped. My, was I wrong."

Baltor just stares at her. "What in Magix name did you do to your hair?"

The grin she gives him is unfriendly. "If that's the first thing you can think of to say to me, you're more off your game than I thought."

It's a fair point, so instead he says: "What in Magix name did you do to me?"

Because he isn't in Cloud Tower's dungeon anymore. He's up in Griffin's former office, chained up in bonds of magic and real metal against a far wall. The cuffs are still on him, but he doesn't feel nearly as weak as he has the last few hours.

"Like it? We stole it from some high tech lab on Zenith. Nothing but the best for you."

"For draining magic, then? I see." Baltor takes pride in the way Icy's smirk falters. "Though Selina seemed to be handling that just fine. Scared of being upstaged by a teenager, Icy? It wouldn't be the first time you hid behind others doing your dirty work."

"That's rich coming from you."

"I never avoided dirty work. You know that."

"...No. I suppose you didn't." Icy stands up, casually stretching her arms above her head. "Selina asked me to bring you up here and keep you under, but I couldn't resist having a little reunion. Especially because I have so many questions."

"Questions?"

"Oh, don't say it like that." Icy says, and Baltor hates how fully the tables have been reversed - that he's the powerless one without answers now, while Icy is fully confident and at her most dangerous. "Just a little catching up. Staying up going through the archives, talking about how the world has wronged us. We used to do it all the time, remember?"

He does remember. The first week or so after leaving Omega especially, when he refused to sleep out of fear. Icy was a constant, the only person Baltor had ever known to sleep as little as he did, lending her ear to battle plans and spellcasting and, on occasion, debating morality and philosophy. They shared stories with an intimacy that to this day surprises Baltor, and it was more than likely the reason he held her in higher regard compared to the other two witches.

Even now, he knows he could manipulate Darcy and Stormy with enough time if they were around. He knows better than to attempt such things on Icy.

"All that talk," she continues. "About self-governing and the role of magic in an oppressive society and how people willing to risk their beings for darkness deserve the rewards that come with it...you didn't believe in any of that."

"I believed in it once. I still believe in some parts of it."

"Not the parts that matter. You don't even have a quarter of the darkness you once possessed. Because I told Selina your Dragon Fire would need so much filtering for this to work."

Standing in front of him, Icy casually reaches out and runs her fingertips along his wrist. Baltor shivers involuntarily, and she gives the slightest smirk. "But that hasn't been the case at all. Nice, normal magic. Just like…"

"Just like any other wizard?" Baltor asks, noting the resentment that's suddenly come onto her face. "Just like someone from Sparx?"

Icy's fingers - which up until that point had been lazily stroking along his arm, fall still. The pieces click in Baltor's head, and he forgoes his personal safety for the satisfaction of twisting the knife in her chest. "No. Just like Bloom."

She yanks her hand back and stalks away so he can't see her reaction. "That is not -"

"But it is, Icy. You're interested in playing this little game but I think it would be so much more productive to just be honest."

"Fine." She spins back around, her face now devoid of emotion. "When did you two start conspiring to fake your death?"

"We didn't. She saved my life, put a Nullis Lux spell on me, and dumped me on Earth."

Icy laughs. "Oh please."

"It's the truth."

"I thought we were being honest, Baltor. And we both know how much time you spent looking at her through a crystal ball, thinking of ways to torment her or use her to your advantage." She rolls her eyes and makes a disgusted noise. "I should've figured you wanted to fuck her. Just up your alley."

"Sounds like you're more disappointed I didn't fuck you."

That earns him the blast of ice magic he's been expecting from the beginning of their encounter. The air is knocked out of his lungs, and without being able to double over he hangs there, struggling to breathe for twice as long. The edge of his vision wobbles for a few moments at the worst of it.

Icy's talking when Baltor's ears stop ringing. "...found much better than you. Hell, I think I'd even consider Selina a step up."

"Jealousy is...a bad...look for you, Icy." He manages to say between coughing fits.

Her mouth - previously open ready to spit out another retort - snaps shut. Baltor gets his breath back as she stands there, fuming.

"Jealousy," Icy finally forces out, "is not the word I would use."

"Oh really? What word, then?"

"Selina said she found spells in your apartment." She changes the subject, but Baltor knows she's still off guard from her unwillingness to get near him again. "Why would someone with a Nullis Lux spell have them?"

"It wore off. I needed a hobby."

Icy shakes her head. "It doesn't make sense. None of it does. Why you? She hated you."

"She didn't want to be the only survivor of her home planet. You of all people should understand that."

Icy stills again, and Baltor braces for another slap of magic that doesn't come. Instead he sees the mask slip, and catches a glimpse of a woman he's only barely been acquainted with. A woman who told him a long and twisted story of a planet turned to ice and its people to wolves and bears and penguins. Of a king who made a deal with a shaman that couldn't be kept, and paid the ultimate price. The conversation had happened in this same room, over three bottles of stolen liquor from Eraklyon and a book on outdated planetary relations.

Baltor remembers three years before the fall of Sparx, when the royal family on Dyamond had announced the birth of a princess, born on the planet's equinox. He briefly wonders what the king and queen would think if they saw their daughter now.

"You," Icy finally says, "have no right to tell me how I feel about that."

"...No. I suppose I don't."

This seems to snap Icy out of whatever state she's in, and the mask slips back on. "If you're trying to appeal to my humanity in an attempt to let you free, you're not doing a very good job."

"Maybe that isn't my goal."

"Oh? What would be, then? Keeping me occupied so Selina can't come in and hwurt you again?"

"You mean you weren't given that pleasure yourself?"

She laughs. "Oh, you were knocked out weren't you?"

Baltor doesn't like the tone her voice has taken. "...What do you mean?"

"Oh, Baltor. Selina already has enough of your power to open the Legendarium."

His blood runs cold.

"You think you're here for Selina to take more?" Icy continues. "Please: you're supposed to be up here as bait for when your little girlfriend shows up. The damsel in distress, here to watch the show. And before you even try - yes, I believe she'll show up. The Winx don't like to trade lives."

He tries to remain calm, but Baltor can feel himself start to panic. He struggles in the chains, but they hold firm. "Wait, Icy. You need to know that Selina -"

"Will double cross us once she has what she wants?" Baltor freezes, and Icy keeps laughing. "We were students before all of this, remember? Give us some credit. You think we'd take some freshman at her word and not bother looking up her magic book? We know who Acheron is, and that he's inside the Legendarium. And once he's free, it's practically a guarantee he'll throw Selina to the curb just like she would've done to us.

"So look on the bright side," Icy takes some of the books off Griffin's desk and uses a spell to shrink and tuck them away in her clothes. "If you did teach us anything, it's the idea of being trapped somewhere for seventeen years with little hope of escape sounds really, really dull."

Baltor realizes what she's saying. "Darcy and Stormy -"

"Already gone. I think we're going to take a page from your book. Lay low for a while. Let people think we perished when Bloom shows up and more than likely defeats Selina like the little weakling she is. I would've tagged along but," she gestures to him. "You know. Couldn't resist."

"You...you think she'll lose?"

"Don't you?"

He does, without a doubt. Selina is irrational, good at planning in the long-term but not thinking on her feet. If she hasn't even noticed the Trix are gone, it means she won't be ready to face off with Bloom when she shows up. "But then...that would mean I survive too. And you may hate Bloom more than anyone else in the universe, but I'm at least a close second. Why leave me alive?"

Baltor gets his answer moments later with a searing pain, so sudden and forceful he screams. His vision flashes white, and when he looks down he sees icicles sticking out of his leg.

"Alive," Icy starts, pausing only to throw another round of shards into his right arm, "might be an overstatement."

"Icy -"

The witch's name dies on Baltor's lips as the magic encasing him suddenly goes cold, frostbite beginning to burn along his skin. All he can do is yell in pain, hoping that even Selina will hear him. But there's no sound aside from his own yelling, and when that dies out for whimpering, heels on a stone floor.

Baltor feels a hand cup his cheek, and he meets Icy's gaze. "Selina relying on fear to motivate Bloom is smart - it is such a strong emotion. But do you know what I think is more powerful than fear? Anger."

The warmth of her hand leaves him. "So nice catching up after all this time, Baltor. Wish we could do it again."

He forces his head up to look at Icy, but when he does the room shifts to the left. Everything is going fuzzy, and it's more terrifying than the other times he's fallen unconscious over the last few hours. Something feels different, part of his mind warning him that if he falls asleep, he may not wake up.

But maybe, a louder voice says, that's not a bad thing.

Icy is nothing more than a streak of blue and white - Baltor honestly doesn't know if he's looking at her - but he swears he can hear her laughing. But it could also be the sound of wind from an open window, or icicles forming in his capillaries, or just himself screaming. Nothing makes sense anymore, except that something is very wrong, and it's all Icy's fault. His vision starts wobbling again, black closing in, and for a split second he sees the witch.

A single moment of clarity overcomes him, and Baltor says the first thing that comes to mind before he loses himself.

"I hope Sapphire's dead."

If Icy strikes him again, he doesn't know.


lol Rainbow's inability to sprinkle in backstory means I have to pick up their slack and start laying the groundwork 2 seasons ahead. As it should be done, Rainbow.

This is the point I start changing a lot of plot elements, which I'm gonna go out on a limb and say is okay, because so many of you keep saying you stopped watching Winx at this point anyway. So going forward (until S8), cannon will again be taking a backseat.

So, in the month I've been gone things have gotten, uh, bad. I hope this, at the very least, provides you with a moment of a distraction from the rest of the world. I am trying to do some more writing since life has halted, but you know. Stay safe out there.