Yay!
	It's always a pleasure when a chapter of this story pops up.  
Along with 'Chasing the Wind', I consider 'Hearts of Ice' to be of a type 
apart from most fics - they're of an epic-genre, it seems to me;  
extremely well written and meticulously plotted out, yet not at the 
expense of character (I sure hope I'm right, there - I'd feel 
awfully stupid if you guys made this up as you went along).  Inspiration, 
too - at least, I feel they're the one's responsible for driving me to 
plot out my own epic-tale (which I'll hopefully complete by the end of 
the summer.)

	Anyway, a little C&C:
	-As I already mentioned, it's well written and easy to read.  I 
have no complaints with any of the characterization.  Noticed a few minor 
spelling mistakes, but I can't quite remember where.
	-Some nice, subtle touches: mentioning that the queen's face was 
smooth, in the first few lines of the flashback, immediately lets the 
reader know that this is, indeed, a flashback.
	-On that note, though - as you mentioned in the opening notes, 
this chapter is quite a break from the previous material.  The entire 
middle section delves into the character of the Ice Queen via flashback.  
Adding this depth to the character is a great touch - I'm assuming that 
her arrival at the end isn't a confrontation, but something else entirely 
- but it does break the up the action.  Taken as it is in an individual 
chapter, separated from the previous parts by a month or two, it doesn't 
stick out much; if the story was read continuously, though, it feels like 
it might suddenly seem like an unexpected lag in the momentum you've been 
building up.  I dunno - if, maybe, these flashback had been spread out 
over the course of the, what, last 15 chapters, leading up to the final 
one in this chapter (which reveals why she got so bitter), it might work 
better.  Well, maybe. <shrug>
	-I like the haunted look you've given Ranma.  Probably one of the 
things that'll help him mature enough to match Akane when they 
(presumably) get back together in the end - especially what with her 
being 4? 5? years older than him.
	-Character relations was good, too.  Ukyou/Nabiki and Ranma/Ryoga 
just felt right (although Ryoga's being a bit more reasonable than usual 
- but I gather that that's from his muddled memories due to the blood-spell).

	Hmmm.
	Looks like I didn't have anything very critical to say - guess 
this wasn't terribly useful, but, dammit, it like the story! <grin>  Hope 
the last part comes out soon.

	Later!
	-Mike