#snowdrift cider

[guildwuff2]

🍁🍀💥☕️🎭 for both Mu and Zoxu! 💖

@mystery-salad

hi hi!! ty for the asks ;; <3

🍁:

Mu's absolute favorite season is winter. She's quite literally built for it! It takes a pretty steep temperature drop for her to feel the cold, and she'll probably still be frolicking through snowdrifts and building way-too-big snowmen by the time everyone else is too cold to stick around outside.

Zoxu prefers late spring, early summer, just when things are warm enough to not have to bundle up, and things are still pretty green and still blooming! They hate feeling cold and would rather just be comfortable without needing to bundle up. Thankfully Mu is super warm so this is less of an issue for 'em nowadays!

🍀:

Mu believes in luck I think? She's only fairly recently been introduced to a word populated with ghosts, spirits, gods and godlike entities, so why wouldn't a thing like luck exist? Mu considers herself quite lucky, because she's in a much happier place in her life now 🥺💞

Zoxu! Is fucking hilarious actually because their luck is atrocious. Peek behind the curtain: in the RP group I have them and Mu in, we have a dice bot that we'll roll for certain actions that'll dictate how the action goes... Zoxu specifically has had Such bad luck with dice rolls, it's a running joke that they've been constantly injured or super incompetent with their magic, to the extent that their common nickname is Lucky. So yes! They do believe in luck, and though they've lucked out in a few ways in their life, they're apparently paying for it now 🤣

💥:

Mu deals with a lot of self-consciousness, and how that juxtaposes with how people treat her. She sticks out like a sore thumb and has had to deal with some pretty rough circumstances for most of her life up until meeting Zoxu and eventually joining the Priory. She wants to help people, but often that puts her in risk of getting injured, which puts her at risk for Raging, which puts her friends at risk. I'll talk more about how that clashes with how people see her in the Masks section, but suffice it to say, she sometimes has a lot she deals with and sometimes finds it difficult to express 😔

Zoxu: They've struggled quite a bit with feeling... I guess incompetent? In over their head? Generally just unprepared for what life flings at them and they worry about letting their loved ones down/failing them, and that turns into "well, if I just keep that pool of people small, that's less people to disappoint/lose". Therefore, they tend to keep most people at arm's length, unless they really worm their way into their life. Their confidence in themself isn't phenomenal! And their need to be Enough can sometimes cause them to neglect their own needs, but thankfully Mu's there to scruff them when they get too much and dunk them in a pile of pillows to relax!

☕️:

Mu likes any ol' drink! She's been really enjoying tea now that she can get it reliably, but she likes anything sweet, including alcoholic drinks (her size and metabolism means that it's gotta be eye-wateringly strong for her to feel Anything, so things like ciders and meads and fruity drinks in general are just a flavor thing for her). Her favorite drink is a nice black tea with lots of honey in it.

Zoxu's a tea-drinker too, but they just add a little cream, sometimes they just drink it plain. They're not a big fan of sweet things usually (or at least that's what they say after years of prioritizing Mu's sweet tooth), so they don't usually go for much of anything interesting, though they'll enjoy a nice cider or liquor from time to time. They'd also pick tea as their favorite!

🎭:

Mu does indeed act differently around different people, but mostly out of a matter of making them feel more comfortable. She's often perceived as the soft, fluffy, sweet n' innocent (big) little sister type, and she's happy for the affection! But, like I'd mentioned before, this can clash with how she perceives herself as potentially dangerous to others. She saves the sweetness for most anyone in public, but she has certain people she trusts she can be earnest with, or not balk or dismiss her concerns or issues. Zoxu, of course, is in the latter category!

Oh, Zoxu. They quite literally wear a mask around people. In public, they glamour themselves, changing up their looks often, and use aliases out of fear of getting caught. To acquaintances and general coworkers/people they're friendly with, they don't often hang out or socialize much, whatever's necessary (or whatever they get roped into by Mu). Bare minimum small talk, and off they go. People that they trust or actually like get a little more emotion out of them, more laughing, joking, meaningful conversation, etc etc!! They're willing to be a little more vulnerable. Peak Zoxu Friendship is finding out they're actually kind of a cuddlebug and they like giving small gifts.

Thanks for the ask! folks are more than welcome to throw more my way 💜

[kavyaorganicfarm19]

KavyaOrganicFarm: Embrace Snowdrift Crabapple's Beauty and Benefits

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[figofswords]

“The Thing In The Woods”, illustration and story I did for the fall chapbook produced by my university’s student literary and art mag.

You were only eleven the first time you saw the thing in the woods.

You were out with your father in the wintertime, shivering in your hand-me-down coat and your soaked-through boots. You did not want to be there; you wanted to be at home by the fire, curled up at your mother’s side and lulled to sleep by the gentle sussarus of her voice. But fire needs wood to burn, and according to your father you were a man now, and you wanted to prove it. So, into the woods you went, into the snow and the looming shadows of fir trees. Your lungs ached from the cold of the air and the ax you carried was too heavy for you, but if you stopped moving forward you might lose sight of your father and the dark branches overhead looked almost like claws, so you kept trekking.

You were amusing yourself with composing songs under your breath—rambling ditties with little form or direction to them, but entertaining for your young mind—when your distraction caused you to miss the gnarled root that rose from the snow before you. Your boot caught on it and you tripped and fell face-first. Now all of you was wet and cold, even your hands in the new mittens your mother had knitted you. You started to cry, but when you looked up to call out to your father he was no longer there.

But it was.

Your cries stopped mid-breath at the sight of it, just inches away, watching you with horrible eyes like bottomless pools, ageless and deep and aching to swallow you up. Everything was frozen in that moment—even the snowflakes seemed to have stilled in the air—as you stared at it. As it stared at you. Mist formed around its muzzle from the wheezing huff of its breathing, and you knew just looking at it—at the gruesome crown of jagged bone-knives reaching from skull to sky, at the armored feet just the right size to crush your hand into nothing inside your new mittens—this monster could kill you. Easily. And looking into those ancient eyes you knew that it wouldn’t even care.

You willed yourself to reach for the ax where it had fallen, thinking desperately that perhaps you could at least scare it off, but you found you were paralyzed by sheer terror of the thing before you. You simply could not will yourself to move. You could barely breathe. You were certain, suddenly, that this is where you would die, eleven years old and soaked through and alone.

And then, miraculously, by grace of God or luck or some mercy of sheer indifference, it turned and walked away, leaving you shivering in the snowdrifts.

Later, your father did not believe you. Your mother smiled gently and patted your head, but you could tell she did not believe you either. She bundled you up in blankets and handed you warm cider and rubbed your frozen toes until the color returned to them. Your father put the new logs on the fire and sighed as he looked at you.

“I guess you’re not quite ready yet,” he said, rubbing his beard. “We’ll try again when you’re older.”

And you knew: you were not quite a man after all.

For years, you feared the woods. You refused to enter them alone, staying only on the outskirts and sneaking anxious glances into the mess of gnarled branches. The memory of it plagued you; every gust of wind was the horrible rasp of its breath, every dark branch moving on the outskirts of your vision was the tip of its bony crown. For years your sleep was restless, and you often woke up sobbing from fear of the dreadful beast you had seen. The specifics of the memory faded over time, leaving only the afterimage of terror, and you found yourself resenting your younger self for being so afraid of what you grew more and more certain was just an ordinary deer or an oddly-shaped tree. Eventually, you started to wonder if you hadn’t just made the whole thing up entirely; if you’d ever actually seen anything at all.

Until the second time.

You were seventeen then, older and more mature. Your voice had recently dropped several octaves and the acne on your chin had started to look more like stubble, and so you thought yourself a man. You went into the woods alone for the first time since the encounter to prove this manhood to yourself and to the world and to anyone who scoffed at you for your childish fears. You walked among the dark branches and looming firs, and the crunch of your boots in the snow and the pulse of your own breath seemed so loud to you, but you told yourself you were not afraid.

And then you saw it again, there in the glade. Again, time froze, and it looked at you. It loomed before you and it was just as your nightmares recalled it: its eyes were black as depthless pools, just as you remembered, and just as you remembered its crown of bone stretched up and up, branching into sharp points, perfect for goring. Its legs were as you remembered them as well; long and knobby, too spindly to hold such a massive creature, and yet there it was, standing atop the snow which somehow did not give under its weight.

Alone in the forest, you looked at it: the thing from your nightmares, the thing that you knew in the pit of your stomach could so easily be your death. It wasn’t a deer like you’d hoped—you’d seen deer, and felt chills down your spine at their almost-resemblance—and this wasn’t that. Deer are slender and graceful; the fur on this thing hung off it like moss from trees, and its chest was thick and muscular like the trunk of some great oak. Deer are also docile creatures, skittish and easily frightened, but this thing—whatever it was—stood still and strong and stared you down without a hint of fear in its horrible, horrible eyes. There were stains of rust flaking away on the sharp points of its bone-crown and you knew: this thing had killed. As that thought came to you, the creature lifted its head up towards the grey sky and cried a high, haunting bugle, and the sound of it rose every hair on your body and chilled you down to the bone.

It looked at you, with those horrible eyes, and it finished its battle cry. And it took a step forward.

You were not a man, after all. You were the same little boy you’d been before, alone in the woods with this ghastly, wretched thing.

So you did the only thing you could do: you turned, and you ran.

[lathalea]

Day 25: Blame it on Cider, part 5

Here's today's fic for the Writer’s Month 2021 challenge (see @writersmonth for more info).

Hello, my beloved readers! Kudos for sticking around for nearly a whole month with me and my silly stories! 💙

Did you miss Thorin and Yrsa? Good, because they are back! I hope you remember how the last part ended: while the Orcs attacked Thorin’s merchant caravan, Yrsa and the baby escaped. Unfortunately, she didn’t meet Thorin again at the agreed time and place and started suspecting the worst.

I wrote this part in a real hurry, so I’m sorry about any errors etc. in advance.

Today's prompt: word: obnoxious

Fandom: The Hobbit Relationships: Thorin x Yrsa (Dwarf Female OC) Rating: T Word count: 3,5 k words Warnings: um, cold, mentions of bodily harm (just a tiny bit, nothing gorey), winter, and you’ll get a glimpse of how a typical Viking quarrel looks like (yes, this is a self-deprecating joke, ha ha, not funny) how the exhausted and almost completely frozen Dwarves try to quarrel, also: freezing cold

A special author’s note for @bitter-sweet-farmgirl: This part is longer especially for you, so you won't forget it so easily next time ;)

As usual, you can read this fic here and on AO3.

Have you missed the previous parts? Here they are:

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8

Khuzdul: Lulkh - fool Inbarathrag - goat Ursarusê - my tiny fire Khaglâ-dûm - Blue Halls (name of a Dwarven settlement shamelessly made up by me) Thorinuldûm - Thorin’s Halls (the place in the Blue Mountains where Longbeards lived after Sack of Erebor)

* * *

Blame It on Cider, part 5

Two months later

It has been over a year since Yrsa last drank cider, but she promised herself one thing: when this miserable escapade of hers was finally over and she was safely back at home, she was going to get herself seriously drunk. But first, she would make sure that there were no men around. She learned that lesson well.

The greatest flaw in her plan was that she found herself several days away from home. There had been barely any snow in the Blue Mountains in November and Yrsa was convinced that she could easily make one quick trip to a nearby village and back before the winter blizzards made the mountain trails impassable. Her dear childhood friend, Haldis, was about to have a baby and asked Yrsa to assist her when the time came. Yrsa was more than happy to oblige. The delivery was easy and without any complications. Haldis gave birth to a strong baby boy and her husband threw a feast to celebrate the blessed event. While everyone drank ale, Yrsa drank water, and now she regretted it deeply. If she drank anything else, even a cup of mead, she would probably have a hangover. Which meant that she would stay in the village for a few days longer. But a stupid encounter with a stupid king a year ago (who, later on, probably was stupid enough to lose his life fighting off the Orcs while she stupidly escaped instead of helping him) made her abstain from alcohol. Ugh. Not thinking about the king, not now. Frozen tears are not fun. Moving on to the downsides of being sober. Anyway, when that stupid snowstorm came all of a sudden, Yrsa (instead of laying in a comfy bed in Haldis’ home and complaining about a headache) was caught in the middle of it, completely unprepared. Thus, the stupid frozen tears that were absolutely not welling in her stupid eyes at all as she marched home.

That stupid snow covered the stupid mountain trail and she had to plow her way through the stupid snowdrifts while ignoring the stupid snowflakes getting stuck to her face. And on top of that, there was that stupid freezing wind. It felt as if her cheeks would fall off any moment now. She wrapped her thick scarf around her face, leaving only her eyes uncovered. That helped a bit. But there was something that made her situation worse. Curse her bad luck! The sky was darkening rapidly and it seemed that the wind was becoming even stronger. And if that was not enough, the stupid snowflakes decided to magically turn into miniature icicles at that very moment, viciously prickling her skin.

Yrsa tried to speed up, but how fast can you walk with snow reaching up to your thighs and merciless headwind trying to topple you over? Even so, she soldiered on and climbed arduously up the slope, trying to ignore the tiredness in her legs. She had to reach that ridge ahead of her before the last light of the day disappeared. There was a small shepherd hut in one of the caverns and she wanted to stay there for the night. It was only used in summer so it stood empty and cold now, but it would provide her with shelter from the weather. And who knows, maybe the shepherds left some of their food there? Shut up, Yrsa’s stomach, there was still some leftover food from the feast in her travelling sack. She just had to get to that hut, get the fire going and all would be well.

It wasn’t. Of course. She should have expected it. Bad luck struck again. Yrsa was halfway to the cavern, barely seeing anything through the relentless waves of icy snow directed at her by the stupid wind, when she stumbled over something and slipped, falling face down into the snow. It hurt when she tried to get up. It hurt when she tried to stand on her right foot. With a helpless grunt, she slumped down on the snow. Multiple layers of clothing, including her thick leather trousers made it impossible to check her leg, but she was almost certain that her ankle was sprained. It would start swelling soon. She wouldn’t make it to the shepherds’ hut now, unable to stand on her leg and walk, not mentioning crawling in that snow, with the blizzard becoming more and more aggressive. Yrsa knew she didn’t have much time. She was still warm now, but she stopped moving a while back and her body had already started giving her some not so subtle hints about the biting cold. Think, Yrsa, think… She needed to do something. Otherwise, when the snows melt in spring, the shepherds would find her frozen body and then write on her gravestone: “Here lies Yrsa, daughter of Yri. Died a pathetic death because she was stupid enough not to drink ale at a feast (and she didn’t drink because she was terrified of doing another stupid mistake like the one involving that stupid cider and that stupid blacksmith,no, a king and his stupid lips… and his other body parts, and she stupidly ran away, and now he’s gone, and she’s freezing to death, but nevermind, there’s not enough space on this gravestone to write it all anyway)”.

“Get up!” Perfect. Now she was hallucinating from the cold. The wind was howling above her, and she was imagining things. How did the wind learn Khuzdul anyway?

“Get up, you lulkh! You will freeze to death here if you don’t!” The wind roared at her angrily and then something appeared in front of her. A hallucination. A hallucination that gripped her coat and lifted her up from the ground, as if she weighed nothing more than a feather. She cried out in pain, instinctively resting on her stupid right leg.

“I have injured my ankle, you inbarathrag! I can’t walk!” Yrsa shouted at the dark silhouette in front of her, trying to be louder than the wind. Funny how the hallucination wore a dwarven coat with a hood, just like hers, and how hard its chest felt under her gloved hand as she tried to steady herself.

The hallucination grunted, “Are you traveling alone?”

“Yes, I was on my way to…” Yrsa started.

“I’ll carry you,” the hallucination interrupted her. A pair of arms wrapped around her. She was lifted unceremoniously off the ground, thrown over a shoulder and across his back. Yes, it was a “he”. Judging by the timbre of voice, even though barely audible in the howling wind, it definitely couldn’t be a Dwarf-woman.

“Hey! It hurt!” Yrsa protested.

“Good, at least we know that you do not suffer from frostbite yet, boy,” he grunted and moved ahead.

“I’m not a boy!” she mumbled into his arm and shifted. It felt definitely too corporeal to be a hallucination.

“Be quiet and stop moving!” the corporeal… someone snapped at her.

“If you go towards the eastern ridge, there is a…”

The Dwarf stopped in his tracks.

“I said: be quiet!” He let out a roar. “Save your strength!”

Yrsa huffed, but decided not to grace this obnoxious brute with an answer. The obnoxious brute in question started walking again, climbing up the slope roughly towards the direction she had been going. All she could do was wait, clench her teeth, and try to get her mind off the pulsing pain in her leg.

He was a Dwarf, that was obvious. She hoped he wouldn’t turn out to be some kind of a bandit. No. He couldn’t be. She would already be dead by now. But who in their right mind would travel through the mountains in this weather? Except for her, of course.

Just then the Dwarf stumbled, but regained the balance quickly. When she asked whether he was well, he didn’t respond. As he marched ahead, he stumbled several times more. It seemed that his left leg was more prone to fail him and so he favoured the right one.

“We are here!” He finally stopped and placed her against a wall so she could support herself.

They were at the shepherds’ hut. The mysterious Dwarf helped her inside, and bolted the door behind them, shutting it in the face of the howling wind and snow outside. Good riddance. Ysa rested her back against a wall and sighed in relief, taking off her scarf and hood. She was shaking out the ice from her hair when she heard a shout and then something hard and heavy bumped into her.

“Yrsa!”

“Ummpf,” she responded eloquently, unable to breathe as a pair of arms wrapped around her in an iron grip, and her face was pressed against a coat.

“Thank Mahal, you are alive and well!” She heard the Dwarf speak, his voice strangely muffled.

“Th… Thorin?” Yrsa finally recognized him as his hand cupped the back of her head, pressing her into him.

“I thought I would never find you...”

“Is that really you?”

They spoke at the same time, and Yrsa suddenly noticed that her hand was pressed against his bearded cheek. She could feel the shards of ice under her palm. He definitely didn’t feel anything like a hallucination. Thorin was really there.

“It is me,” he murmured huskily.

“I thought you were… I thought the Orcs…” she started.

His azure gaze rested on her, making her heart flip, his hood was off, revealing his reddened cheeks, the noble line of his nose, and that sable mane of hair she remembered so well, and her knees weakened, and then she forgot about everything else and kissed him, ignoring the ice against her skin that covered his moustache. It didn’t matter. His touch was warm, oh so very warm, and his lips scorched her with passion as he claimed her mouth, and she responded with equal fervour, and there was that pleasant buzzing in her head, as if she was drunk on cider again.

“Yrsa… Yrsa...” her name left his lips between his intoxicating kisses, but she didn’t care, her whole body tingling with a mixture of disbelief and joy. Thorin was here now, alive, safe and sound, and she didn’t feel the cold nor the pain anymore, because she was in her blacksmith’s arms. No. In the king’s arms. She froze. And it had nothing to do with the blizzard outside.

“Yrsa, I need to know…” he muttered, their lips finally parting.

Her eyes traveled to the soft curve of his lower lip. The king’s lower lip. Words deserted her. What was she doing? Kissing the king, of all people?! Again? Was she out of her mind?! “Ursarusê… Where is she?” His words reached her, a soft murmur.

Oh.

“The babe is safe with my family,” She spoke carefully. By the way, how had it happened that she was now stuck between a certain Dwarf and the wall? Suddenly, Yrsa needed more breathing space.

“Thank Mahal the merciful!” Tho… the king, the King of Longbeards exclaimed.

“But what does it matter to you?” Yrsa frowned. Yrsa was sure she should have used some decorous kingly title at the end of that sentence, but she was too exhausted to come up with one. Oh, and by the way, her leg was starting to hurt even more.

“Yrsa…” he purred and gently pressed his forehead against hers. “How can you ask that? The babe is our gift from Mahal. I am going to take you to my halls and take care of you and the little one. I wish to…”

“What are you talking about?” She moved away.

“I am talking about Ursarusê, who else?”

“But it is I who found her in that forest, not you! What do you want with her?” Yrsa crossed her arms across her chest.

Now it was his turn to freeze. And pale slightly.

“Found… her?” Thorin uttered carefully. “So she is not…?”

His voice trailed off and then she finally understood both his puzzling concern from before, his insisting on making sure she would be safe together with the babe.

“Oh, by Mahal’s hammer,” she chuckled nervously, bringing her hand to her lips. “You didn’t really think that she was your child? And mine? What a silly idea!”

He responded with a grunt and stepped back, looking away. Without his support, she swayed, letting out a gasp of pain.

“Allow me,” the king said gruffly and made Yrsa lean against him. He quickly transported her to a bed near the well-lit hearth, making sure she sat down comfortably. She stole a glance at his face, his features schooled into an impenetrable mask. Stupid Yrsa. Stupid words, stupid nervous chuckling at the most inappropriate moment. Stupid leg. Stupid snow. Stupid blacksmiths that turn out to be kings. Stupid cider.

“Would you…” she cleared her throat and spoke in a tiny voice, studying the grey blanket on the bed. Suddenly, the woven pattern looked very interesting. “I… I think my ankle is swollen. I don’t think I can remove that boot on my own.”

He only nodded, crouching and helping her with the boot, never speaking a word to her. In different circumstances, with a Dwarf who was, for example, a blacksmith, only a blacksmith and not a king, she would probably turn the whole situation into a flirty joke, teasing him about bringing him to her feet, and they would both laugh, and everything would be fine again. Now however, shame burned her cheeks. An offended king on his knees (a king, for Mahal’s sake!), pulling a boot off the foot of some commoner, was not a funny story, not at all.

Yrsa had no other option but to focus on what she knew best and instructed the Dwarf (trying to forget that this was, in fact, a king) on how to take care of her sprained ankle. His movements were careful and efficient. The way he bandaged her told her that it wasn’t the first time he did a similar thing (even though he was a king and he probably had servants to do it for him!). When Thorin was done, he asked her about any other possible injuries and discomforts in a detached tone of voice, but she only shook her head.

“Get some rest now,” he rose, speaking to the wall above Yrsa and then turned to the hearth. With his broad back in the way, it took her some time to realize that he started preparing a meal. As her body warmed up, exhaustion caught up with her rather suddenly. The last thing she remembered was wrapping herself in her thick coat and resting her head on the pillow.

Thorin woke her up sometime later and presented her with a bowl of stew, a deep frown still etched on his face. As they ate, the silence painfully rang in Yrsa’s ears. It hurt more than her ankle.

“Ursarusê is a foundling. When I met you, I was on the way to Khaglâ-dûm. I wanted to find a good family for her there,” she tried, her words echoing against the walls of the cavern.

“But you did not,” the sounds he made resembled the grunts of a wild animal. A wounded animal. Stupid Yrsa. “Just as you did not go to the Longbeards’ Halls.”

“To… where?” That place was completely unfamiliar to her, and she thought she knew the Blue Mountains quite well.

“To the halls of my people.”

“Ah, you mean the place where your sister lives…? Thorinuldûm?”

The king flinched, “Not the most fortunate of names.”

“Then why did you name it this way?” Yrsa understood less and less. Wasn’t he supposed to be that vain, prideful king who established a city in his own name?

“I am afraid that I had no say in this matter,” Thorin shrugged uncomfortably, his voice rising slightly, like a murmur of thunder. “You, however… You never went to see my sister. I believed that… no matter. Do I understand correctly that you simply chose not to visit the place at all? Not to meet me again?”

He shook his head and focused on his stew.

Yrsa poked at a chunk of meat with her spoon.

“I waited for you at the gates of Khaglâ-dûm for as long as I could,” she put her bowl away, even though it was still half full. Her stomach was tied in a knot.

“We were delayed. The wagons needed to be repaired after the attack,” he spoke after a pause, his eyes on the food. “And there were wounded.”

“Your leg?” she recalled. “Was it…” “It is fine,” he interrupted her harshly.

Once again, that horrible silence filled the cavern, torturing her.

“I did not go to your sister, because…” Yrsa paused, gathering all her strength and trying to find the right words. “Because I had to think of Ursarusê. I wanted to reach home as soon as possible. I didn’t want to impose on your family. An unknown woman with a babe in her arms - that would mean two more mouths to feed. Besides, why would your sister, princess Dis, help someone like me? I’m a Firebeard, and only a simple herbalist.”

Thorin studied her for a long while. Yrsa shifted nervously under his gaze.

“She would help any person in need. My family knows hardships all too well,” he finally spoke.

Stupid, stupid, stupid Yrsa. Why has she forgotten all about the Sack of Erebor? He was a proud Dwarf, a descendant of Durin, and she had just hinted at his family being not only too poor to help her, but also too cold-hearted.

“I’m… I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to offend you. Your majesty,” she finally recalled the correct title.

“Stop mocking me, Yrsa,” he gritted his teeth and stood up, empty bowl in his hand, his knuckles white.

“But… I’m not.” She was at a loss. It seemed that whatever she did on that day was wrong.

Thorin gave out a resigned sigh and approached her, stretching out his arm towards her.

Handing him her bowl, she stole a glance at his stone face, but his gaze was focused on the bowls in his hands.

“I do not understand you, Yrsa. First you… you choose me to spend a night with, and you seem to enjoy it, but afterwards, you disappear without a trace. Then we meet again, and you smile at me the same way as you did before, you promise to meet me, but you never do. Now you embrace me, teary-eyed, you kiss me, and then you push me away. What do you want from me, woman?”

Mahal, if he only knew. Shut up, Yrsa’s brain. There is nothing you should want from him. Thorin is a king. A king. Not a village blacksmith.

“Thorin, I’m… I’m sorry. You must think me a fool. You see, well, I didn’t want to put you in an awkward position,” her voice trembled slightly and she cursed herself. Stupid voice. “When I realized who you were, I didn’t want you to feel… obliged to anything.”

A sad chuckle rumbled in his chest, closer to a cough than a laughter.

“Is that why you left that wedding feast in such a hurry? Because you did not want anything from me so very badly?” Thorin spoke slowly and sat at the edge of the bed with a grunt, straightening his left leg.

Yrsa nodded, her ears burning. Why was he so bloody calm about it? Any other Dwarf would now shout, or growl, or stomp, or try to convince her to marry him because honor demanded it or something along these lines. But he just sat there with a frown, unmoving, like a piece of giant rock. And then he chuckled. How dare he? Giant rocks don’t chuckle!

“Is it so very funny?” she asked timidly. Her ears had to be on fire at that point.

“Oh, Yrsa. You are one of a kind. It seems that you always have to have it your way, doesn’t it?” he lowered his voice to a murmur. Low, velvety purr, like that dark wildflower honey she adored so much.

She gave out a helpless ‘hmph’ in response.

“If you do not wish to talk, at least allow me to speak the words I wished to say to you in Ash Creek,” he turned to face her, and there was a glint in his azure eyes, and it was so very not fair of him to have eyes like her favourite gems, sapphires.

“No!” She protested, backing away into the opposite corner of the bed. Oh sweet Mahal, it couldn’t be happening, not now! Couldn’t this Dwarf take a hint? This was not the time for THAT question, there was never a time for it! “No, there is no need to speak of anything! I do not need to hear it! Everything is fine! And besides… Besides, I'm tired!”

Yrsa gave out the most spectacular yawn in her life. She should have joined a theatre troupe with her skill.

Thorin rested his hand on the grey blanket that covered the bed. His fingers twitched.

“Very well, then. Let us sleep,” he rumbled. Yrsa didn’t understand why there was an amused spark in his eyes.

And then it dawned on her. There was only one bed in the cavern.

To be continued...

* * *

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8

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[incorrectbatfam]

Batfam/Superfam/Flashfam thanksgiving headcanons?

To prepare, Alfred bought ten turkeys and Clark brought three extra ovens from Metropolis. Lois also brought extra helpings of the vegetarian alternatives

This means they have ten wishbones, which Steph and Cass set out to find while the turkeys were still raw

Despite everyone’s protests, Clark laser-roasts one of the turkeys—and it’s not half bad

Ma and Pa Kent come with a pickup truck full of stuffing and knitted sweaters for everybody

With Zatanna’s help, they get enchanted cider bottles that never run out

The Flashes arrive late. As usual. But they brought pie

Except Bart, who came with chocolate bunnies because he’s a future boy who gets his holidays mixed up

Bruce and Clark like to time how long it takes for Barry to finish an entire casserole. The current record is 0.4 seconds

Dick and Wally made Chris Kent an honorary Titan

Nobody even notices when Kate brings the entire Birds of Prey because what’s a few extra people?

Alfred, Lois, and Iris just give each other a look anytime anyone does anything

The kids' table was originally just Damian, Jon, and the pets. Alfred sent Carrie there when she wouldn’t stop playing with her vegetables. Bizarro joined because he wanted to play with Krypto. Bruce made Tim, Kon, and Bart go shortly after. Dick joined because the adult table ran out of pie. Wally was sent there as a punishment because he ate all the pie at the adult table. Steph heard the word “pie” and ran over. Cass followed Steph. Harper sent Cullen there because he wouldn’t quit talking about Destiel being canon, only to join herself because she felt bad. Duke got curious and wanted to see why there were so many people. Jason joined because the conversation was more interesting. Barry was sent to check on them but never came back

It began to snow fairly early in the evening so they went outside. It wasn’t cold and the snow wasn’t heavy by any definition, but Lois still made Jon bundle up in seven layers and Damian gave him the new nickname “Marshmallow Boy”

The only thing Jon can do in his Jet Puff garb is make stiff snow angels. Damian laughs at him but joins

Meanwhile, Kon was allowed out with just his leather jacket

... Until Clark made him come inside and put on winter gear

The Flashes don’t have to worry about the cold because they’re a bunch of walking space heaters

So while the rest of the Bats have to gear up, Bruce let Tim and Dick off the hook on the condition that they stay close to Bart and Wally

Bizarro made a laser ice sculpture of Red Hood beating the Joker with a crowbar and it’s the most beautiful thing Jason’s ever seen

Steph, Cass, Harper, Babs, Carrie, and Kara come up with the perfect snowball strategy, whereby Harper creates endless snowballs with a machine, Babs does tactical work from behind the fort, and the rest destroy the competition from every angle (including above)

Their “competition” is Duke, who’s just trying to build a snowman

Tim, Kon, and Bart find a nice rooftop with a snowdrift beneath and they play their favorite game, “Give Our Parents A Heart Attack”

There is now a Wally-shaped hole in the fence because running on ice is such a wonderful idea

While the kids are playing, Bruce and Kate suit up and deliver food to people in Gotham who need it, including the Rogues

On their way, they catch Chris and Cullen sneaking out to Batburgers

[on-a-lucky-tide]

Day Twelve: Snow Fort

A/N: Lambert watches Ciri curl in on herself as the pressures of training weigh heavily. They risk losing their bright, bubbly Ciri; full of life and hope. But it's not fucking happening; not on his watch.

“Straighten your shoulders girl!”

“Hold that sword higher!”

“You call that a pirouette? Again.”

“You need to finish this chapter by lunch time, or we’re skipping it to run drills.”

“Focus, Ciri. This isn’t a game.”

Ciri’s training was going… well. Ish. Lambert took over her footwork drills on Geralt’s request, but listening to Vesemir berate her, and then Yen call her “ugly duckling” while critiquing her concentration, and Eskel put pressure on her to learn these recipes off by heart, put him in a shitty mood. By the end of every day, there was a small, dejected girl sitting by the fire, picking at the scabs on her hands. She didn’t talk much in those late hours and he carried her up to bed draped over his shoulder most nights; he tucked her in and told her stories that he remembered from Kaedwen.

But he knew that look. He felt that look in his very bones. It was the ‘I’m not good enough, and I’ll never be good enough for these people’ look. He’d worn it himself every damned day of his training. Ciri never bit back. Not properly. Sure, she was cheeky, and sometimes she skipped out on reading the few dusty tomes they pulled from the chaos of the library to run the scaffolds, but she was a good kid. Driven. And the weight of destiny on her shoulders was heavier than the damned mountains themselves.

She deserved a break.

So, when it came time to practice her footwork on the poles, Lambert led her outside the walls to a huge snowdrift in the shadow of the keep. It’d snowed heavily the night before, so an entire indent in the rocks was filled with snow. “You’re going to make me shovel snow?” She asked, her shoulders already sagging. “This meant to strengthen my arms or something?”

“Well, we will be shovelling some snow,” Lambert squared his fingers as if to present a portrait, drawing them away from his eyes and zooming in; measuring up. “Ever built a snow fort?”

“A snow what—?” She squinted at him quizzically.

“A snow fort,” Lambert planted his hands on his hips and gazed down at her with quirked eyebrows. “You know, a fort made of snow. Keep up, Ciri. The witch said you were sharp.”

She growled. “No, I haven’t… there was never a lot of snow in Cintra. Not like up here. Hasn’t really come up in Vesemir’s training manual either.”

“Huh, well, I—as your instructor—will seek to remedy this heinous oversight,” he stooped, grabbed an armful of snow and dumped it over her head. The snowball fight that followed was brief, and soon they got to work plotting out, and then building, their snow fort. Lambert taught Ciri some dwarven working songs, replete with rude words and slurs left in, and she chuckled every time he translated for her.

They fashioned bricks out of compact snow and ice, and reinforced their walls by patting more into the cracks between each uneven oblong, and began plotting their fortificans. “Battlements and arrow-slits, Ciri. They’re a must.”

“Do you think we could do a moat? With a drawbridge?”

“Hmm, I’m not sure if we could get the snow to raise and lower, but—fuck it, we’ll give it a good ol’ Temerian Try.”

They were so engrossed in their task that they didn’t notice the lack of… intervention. Ciri’s alchemy class, her meditation instruction, her sword drills; no one came out to collect her. The only other presence that appeared briefly was Eskel, with a tray of food and some cider—watered down wine for Ciri—to tide them over for lunch.

As the sun began to set—it always happened early during the winter—they put the finishing touches on their project. It was easily half a person taller than Lambert, with an “open plan” interior. There were several small mounds that allowed Ciri to peek over the top of her battlements. The drawbridge hadn’t quite worked, but there was definitely a bridge over the moat they’d dug.

They sat back on Lambert’s cloak—Lambert sipped at his cider, while she munched on a sweet bun—admiring their handiwork. “What now?”

“Huh?” Lambert raised an eyebrow.

“Well, what do we do with it now? Like… it has a purpose, right? Are you going to show me, uh, I don’t know… some tactics, or—?”

Lambert sighed. “Ciri, sometimes, you just gotta’ do shit for the giggles, you know?”

“Do shi—.”

“No, you hear the words, but you don’t repeat the words,” Lambert cuffed her on the back of the head. “What I’m trying to say is, if your life’s all about doing things to achieve some higher goal, you’re always going to feel… incomplete. Occasionally, you’ve got to do things for fun. Just because you can, just because you want to. Otherwise you turn into Geralt and Eskel," he paused, leaving off the 'and me'. "Did you have fun?” She’d certainly smiled more today than he’d seen in months. And laughed. And swore, but we’re ignoring that.

“Hm,” she considered this, her mind floating back to her time spent in the streets of Cintra playing dice with urchins, the games she used to play around the castle with the chambermaid’s daughter. How had she managed to lose that girl in all this? Fun used to be her main purpose in life. “Yeah…”

She left the cloak and ducked into her fort. Lambert listened to her rustle around inside, and then a platinum-blonde head popped up above the battlements. In one hand, she held a snowball aloft. Lambert smirked. “Ciri, if you throw that, no amount of snow-fort is gonna’ protect you.”

“Bring it, stinky rat man.” She threw the snowball. Lambert rolled out of the way just in time, and it shattered over the frozen ground.

“Holy fu—you are so dead, squirt,” Lambert rolled to his feet, dived behind a nearby unused mound of snow and assembled his ammunition.

Eskel watched at Geralt’s side from one of the castle windows, his arms folded. "Hm."

"What?" Geralt looked over.

"You were right, she needed it; a day off. I can see our Ciri again," Eskel rubbed idly at his scars.

"Yeah. They both did. Any more murderous glances from Lambert, and I was gonna start checking my ass for knives every morning."

Eskel's booming laugh filled the room and Geralt smiled as he watched his daughter at play.

Thirty-One Days of Decembert

[hcm92literature]

Chapter thirteen - Ladybug and Chat Noir Under the Mistletoe

A Cat and A Prince Master Page

Read on AO3

My Miraculous Ladybug blog

Author’s Notes: No, i did not structure my posting schedule just so this chapter would be posted on Christmas day… Okay, maybe i did… Happy holidays!

“Watch out, milady!”

Marinette turned around just in time to be hit in the face by a snowball and Chat Noir cackled before ducking behind a tree. She pulled an unimpressed face as she wiped the snow from it, then she raised an eyebrow and crouched down behind a snowdrift to gather her own ball, smirking as she did so. Peeking above the drift, she could see exactly where Chat was hiding, as even in the dark his black “tail” belt whipping around the tree stood out like a sore thumb against the white snow. She waited a moment for him to peek around his tree, then threw her snowball at him with no small degree of force, managing to knock him over, and did some cackling of her own.

“Wow, Ma- uh, Ladybug, I have not heard you laugh like that since joining the army!” Nino grinned at her until he got a couple of snowballs to the stomach from both Marinette and Alya for nearly letting her name slip.

If Chat had noticed, he didn’t show it. Instead he continued to lie in the snow, moving his arms and legs up and down to make wide indents. As Marinette stepped closer, he leapt up and held out his arms as though he was presenting something. She looked down and saw his silhouette in the snow, but sort of bigger. She cocked her head at it. “It is… lovely, Chat…” He grinned at her, then pulled her backwards so they were lying in the snow together and they both laughed.

Alya and Nino wandered over and looked down on them both with a mix of amusement and confusion. Alya’s expression then changed into something mischievous and she pulled Nino away to whisper something to him. Marinette raised an eyebrow as she watched them move away and turned to ask Chat what he thought they were up to, only to find he was staring at her with a funny look on his face. She raised her eyebrows at him and he grinned back at her sheepishly. He then propped himself up on an elbow to look at her properly, gently biting his lower lip. Marinette could guess his thoughts as he stared down at her, and decided to change the mood back to playful. She grabbed a handful of snow and shoved it into his face, laughing as he sputtered. She then leapt up and started running away with Chat hot on her heels.

“Hey! We are supposed to be heading to the main campfire soon!” Alya put her hands around her mouth to shout at the two of them as they tore passed her and Nino, kicking up snow behind them that sprayed at the pair, and she shook her head. “You are acting like a couple of children!”

Marinette stopped, causing Chat to run into the back of her, and she grabbed his arm to bring him close and whisper something in his ear. He smirked and they both disappeared behind a large snowdrift. They could hear Alya calling out to them and getting closer. “Alright, very funny, you two. Come out now so we can-” She got a mouthful of snow as Marinette and Chat both jumped up and shoved handfuls in her face, then they ran off, cackling as they did so.

They ran between the tents, kicking up flurries of snow in their wake and turning the heads of the soldiers they passed. They only slowed as they neared the centre of camp and saw that it was decorated with fir trees, holly and mistletoe, and magic illusion decorations sparkled in gold and silver stars all over the place. The soldiers who had brought instruments to the front were playing cheerful festive music and revellers danced by the main campfire, nearly spilling their hot spiced wine, cider and mead. The fire itself seemed to have had spices thrown on it as the smell drifted over to the pair and made them feel warm. Marinette loved this time of year. She looked up at Chat whose eyes were wide taking in everything before him. Had he not celebrated the winter festival before?

He looked back down at her and grinned with excitement. “Want to get some food?”

She laughed. “Absolutely. I would love to see if the kitchen has made some winter logs! Though I do not know if they would be allowed to due to the rationing…”

“Winter logs? Why would the kitchen deal with wood?”

Marinette looked up at Chat in shock. “Have you not had a winter log before? It is a chocolate sponge cake rolled up with cream and ganache to look like a log, not an actual wood log.” She watched as Chat’s expression went from confusion to hunger. “I suppose I probably take these sorts of things for granted… I have lived in a bakery my whole life, after all.”

Chat looked down at her with a raised eyebrow and mischievous grin. “You live in a bakery, you say?” He laughed as she gave him a stern look, then took her hand and began dragging her over to the kitchen tent. “Let us go and see if they have these winter logs, I am dying to try one now!”

The cooks had been working hard to prepare for the winter festival and had managed to make a box of festive goods for each individual in the army - possibly to raise the morale of the troops - and it included a mini winter log each. Marinette couldn’t help but laugh at Chat’s expression as he carried his box out of the kitchen tent. He was almost drooling! She steered him over to a space by the fire as he was too busy marvelling over the treats in his box to look up and watch where he was going. Alya and Nino had finally caught up with them and requested they save them seats as they excitedly went to collect their own boxes.

Once they were back, Marinette stood up. “Shall I go and get us some drinks?”

Alya gave Nino a look. “Why don’t you take Chat with you? You could not possibly carry four drinks at once!”

Marinette raised an eyebrow at her, wondering what she was up to, but Chat happily jumped up with a small pie in his mouth and began walking over to the temporary drinks stall that had been set up next to the kitchen tent. After asking what Alya and Nino wanted, Marinette followed him and laughed at how excitible he was as he looked around wide eyed at everything, joining the back of the line. “Have you not celebrated the winter festival before?”

Chat seemed surprised by the question as he swallowed his pie. “Oh, I have! Just… it has never been anything like this. Before my mother…” As he paused, Marinette wished she hadn’t asked, but he took a breath and continued with a smile. “We had different festival traditions as my mother’s family came from a much warmer country. They were never as bright and as…” He breathed deeply through his nose as the scent of the warm spiced drinks wafted by. “Sweet and spicy.”

Marinette smiled as he laughed and continued to look around at the decorations. She turned back to see Alya and Nino waving at her, and she waved back. Alya then began pointing up. Marinette looked above Alya but shook her head as she had seen nothing, then Alya pointed in her direction and then up. Frowning, Marinette looked above herself and Chat… and her heart skipped a beat. Mistletoe. Hung on the outcropping attached to the drinks stall. She glanced at Chat who was still busy looking at the magical decorations that had been placed on the nearest fir tree, then she turned back to Alya and glared at her. Alya grinned and shrugged then motioned towards Chat.

Putting her palm to her face and stifling a groan, Marinette turned to Chat and, with her heart beating at a ridiculous pace, tapped on his shoulder. He looked at her and grinned before she pointed above them and he tilted his head up to see the mistletoe. His expression was that of confusion when he looked back down at her and she realised he probably didn’t know of the mistletoe tradition. “Um… mistletoe… There is a tradition that… well, you may not have heard of it… it, uh…”

Chat watched her carefully as she tried to get the words out, then seemed to notice something behind her and his eyes widened. “Oh… I think Rena has just explained it to me.” Marinette looked up at him as he did a motion with his hands; bringing one clawed finger up, then another, then bringing them together. He laughed nervously. “I am assuming the tradition revolves around… uh, kissing?”

Marinette felt her face going bright red and she couldn’t stifle the groan that came out this time. “I am sorry, I think she planned this… The tradition states that if two people who stop under the mistletoe do not… kiss… and pluck a berry before moving away, they will suffer bad luck…”

“I do not mind, I mean… kissing you… I, uh… Well, you know that I… um…”

She couldn’t help but imagine that Chat was going as red as she was under his black cat mask, and she made the mental note to murder her friend when she got the chance. “Chat, let us just take a berry and kiss and we can move on.” Chat’s expression fell somewhat and Marinette waved her hands at him. “Not that I would find kissing you repulsive or anything! But if it is a choice between kissing you and bad luck…” She could tell that stumbling over her words was absolutely not helping as Chat’s expression became somewhat pained, and she turned to glare at Alya once more to find that her friend had a palm to her forehead.

When she turned back, she found that Chat had plucked a single white berry from the mistletoe and stepped closer to her with it held up between them. Her breath caught in her throat as he leaned down with his eyes closed, and she slowly let it out as she closed her own eyes and leaned up. She suddenly felt a jolt of lightning spread through her body as their lips touched and she instinctively gripped onto his arm for stability. She felt his free hand gently grab her shoulder and he deepened the kiss, opening his lips ever so softly. Placing her own free hand on his chest, she felt his heart racing in sync with hers. She caught something in the back of her mind wishing that this was what had happened a month ago instead of her attempting to remove his mask… Then Chat stopped kissing her and moved his face away.

Marinette blinked and opened her eyes to see Chat looking down at her with an unreadable expression. Then they both became aware of their surroundings again and took a step away from each other, laughing nervously as the people around them watched with amused expressions. The line moved and Chat stepped up to ask for four drinks from the grinning vendor, while Marinette tried to process what had just happened. She glanced over at Alya and Nino who were grinning widely at her, then turned to take two drinks and shook her head.

They rejoined their friends by the fire, handing Alya and Nino their drinks, and Alya nudged Marinette with a raised eyebrow as she sat down between her and Chat. Marinette said nothing, instead fixing her friend with a glare which caused Alya to start laughing nervously. Nino looked up from his seat on the floor and seemed to sense the tension that had settled over the group. He started telling a story from a winter festival before he had met Alya and Marinette, about how he had accidentally set his family’s fir tree on fire, and before long he had everyone laughing again. Marinette was grateful to her friend, but she couldn’t help feeling that she could no longer look Chat in the eyes, and he seemed to feel the same as he turned away every time she had reason to look in his direction. She sighed and sipped her spiced mead to bring back some of the warmth that this situation had drained from her.

[gerbiloftriumph]

The Silence Between Snowflakes

(also on ao3)

His name was Gwydion--but that wasn't his name. He lived in Llewdor--but that wasn't his home.

Alexander escapes Manannan's grasp and flees to Daventry, hoping he might find a place that he might call home after years of loss and loneliness. While Daventry embraces him, loves him, shows him all the stories it has within it, the country is also suffering under the worst winter in memory. But it might not just be a hard season: there might be something out there, something chasing the lost prince. Something malevolent, intent on destroying the kingdom snowflake by snowflake, spreading a curse across the lands and infecting its king.

(Or: I don't like how King's Quest 2015's Chapter 4 played out, so I've rewritten the whole thing to fit my headcanons and character desires.)

~*~*~

1/8

(1: Found Family)

~*~*~

Gwendolyn was smiling when she walked into his room, but Graham, after decades of being king, could tell when someone’s expression was false. It wasn’t especially hard in this case. He could see tears glittering in the corners of her eyes. She kept up the brave face right until the point when he spoke his first words to her that day: “Do you want to talk about it?”

She froze, one foot in the air. “Talk about...?” she said, with forced nonchalance.

“Whatever you like. But I think you have something specific on your mind.”

And that was all it took for her carefully drawn face to crumple.

“I just don’t get it. Everything seems to make Gart mad these days,” she said, sinking into the chair by the bed. “I can’t seem to do anything right. He keeps yelling at me.”

“Oh, is that what I heard this morning?” Graham tried to get her to smile with him, but she was looking away, twisting the strings of her hood through her fingers like a little net. “Sweetling, can you tell me what he’s yelling about?”

“I don’t wanna say,” she said, her face buried in her knees now as she drew herself up into a ball on the chair. Her voice was muffled. She looked like she was shrinking into herself, like she didn’t want to take up any space at all, like she wanted to hide. She looked so much like Alexander in that moment that Graham felt his breath catch: he could so easily see his son curled up in a corner of the ice cell, shivering and wanting to disappear, certain that he had led the kingdom to destruction just by existing.

"Here, now. Have I ever told you a story about your father?”

~*~*~*~

It was snowing both outside and inside Daventry castle.

Outside: that was perfectly normal. It was the end of the year, the lazy autumn finally reaching its end and the snows starting to build up. This was the first proper, heavy storm. Flakes pelted the windows, which were shuttered against the cold. Colorful tapestries had been drawn over the frames, darkening the corridors but keeping the place relatively cozy and comfortable despite the bone deep cold ache seeping out of the exterior stone walls. Wind whistled through the high crenellations, furiously whipping the flakes high against the towers before letting them fall gracefully into heaps that the royal guards would have to shovel out of the way later.

Inside: well, after eighteen years, that was kind of normal, too. Paperwork snowed up in its own sorts of drifts, covering the floor and audience chairs in the throne room. Paperwork that Graham had been ignoring.

He’d been doing okay. Eighteen years was a long time. Or, at least, so he told himself. The hole that Manannan had left when he’d ripped Alexander from his cradle eighteen years ago, stolen the prince of Daventry, leaving the taste of a broken lullaby on Graham’s lips—that hole never filled, but sometimes it was easier to ignore. If he didn’t think about it. And Graham had Rosella to take care of, his beautiful clever daughter, and Valanice to take care of him, his wise, confident wife, and he in turn cared for her, and for his country, to help the land and the people on it grow, tending to it just as the farmers tended the fields. Daventry needed him to be strong.

And he was strong. Mostly.

But, at the end of the year, when the seasons ticked over and the date changed with a finality and a clang...it all came rushing back. The sharp loss. The searches. The failures. Again and again, the failures. Eighteen years come and gone and nothing to show for them. The wizard had just vanished from the earth with his captive as far as the royal family could tell.

Somehow, at the end of every year, Graham’s arms felt weak, and his head ached, and his heart hurt. Even though Valanice understood, even though she held him close and they wept together for what they had lost, around them the demands of the kingdom kept endlessly pressing. After eighteen years, they had to finally accept that Alexander would never come home.

Rosella, his dear sweet princess daughter, carried them through the winter seasons. She learned closely from her tutors, always asking why the kingdom was doing something one way and not doing something another way. She had suitors to meet, plans to make. She, more than the council, more than the guards, more than anyone, seemed to keep Daventry on track when the year ended and the next year (the next year of failure) began. When Graham felt at a loss, overwhelmed (how could he lead a country when he couldn’t even protect his family), Rosella picked up some of the loss.

She had started attending council meetings too young. At first, it had been cute, even a little funny, to see her golden hair bobbing at the table. She had carried a stack of heavy addenda books to her chair herself so that she could sit on top of them and stare imperiously over the councilors. Graham hadn’t the heart to tell her to leave, and she made her attendance a habit. She started figuring processes out, and over the years she started to offer tolerable ideas, and then impressive ones. Sitting at council so young, so fanciful and creative, she was able to twist policy with fantasy with abandon. Without the careful thought that adults had to put into every sentence. It gave her wild confidence. Planted ideas in her head that Graham was mildly sure weren’t exactly princess-like.

But after all, the Cracker family was new to royalty. Who was to say what a Cracker Princess should be?

It wasn’t fair, perhaps, like it was taking away part of her childhood. But Rosella was determined to do what she wanted, and what she wanted was to be a part of Daventry in every single way like her father. Ruling and adventuring in almost the same breath. She went to council, and then she went tree climbing. And then she came to council the next day with her arm in a sling after daring to climb too high. Royal Guard Number One despaired, unable to keep her in check.

But this year was different. She would be turning eighteen soon. Eighteen was an important age. Eighteen was the age Graham had joined the royal knighthood of Daventry, found his path, changed his future.

Eighteen.

She was distracted, and understandably. She was going for walks more and more often out in the tangled forest paths. Sometimes the family came with her, especially in the springtime when the new year’s fear wore away and fresh life started poking out from the cold dirt. Although, her birthday (her twin Alexander’s birthday) was in the spring, and that brought its own pain.

She was probably on a walk somewhere now, Graham thought. He wandered through the sheaves of paperwork piled high as his nose in some places, flipping a sheet here, reading one there, sticking another in his cloak pocket for closer examination later. He wished he was with her too, with Valanice at his side, breathing that crisp Daventry winter chill.

He daydreamed about the route. The promise of hot chocolate and snowberry pie from Wente’s bakery, maybe a new order of cozy woolen socks and blankets from Acorn to stave off the chill, with a detour to Amaya’s warm smithy to sit by the forge and talk about the latest order of rust-resistant armor on order for the royal guards. And then, maybe, by himself, a longer turn by the old well, past the plaque commemorating a brave knight lost, listening to the crunch and crackle of snow under his boots. Just because. Just in case someone had returned to the underground caverns. A boy (a man, now) with hair as dark as Graham’s had been at that age.

He chased the thought away, settled down in his throne, skimmed another page without reading it, wondered if he could order another cup of cider or if Valanice would swat him for putting more sweets in his rounding tummy. She was here, too, somewhere in the hills of paperwork. It was Valanice who had insisted that they clear some of the work before the year end, who insisted they couldn’t sink into the usual sorrows. She herself had hauled the papers into the throne room rather than his office so that he couldn’t ignore them. She would give him a solid (albeit playful) smack if she caught him with one of Wente’s oversweetened ciders. Maybe later.

“Dad?”

Rosella was back from her walk. She had dragged in some boy with her, some scruffy teen half covered in frozen mud, with snowflakes melting in his hair. The lad was staring at the throne, at the crown on the pedestal nearby, at the magic mirror (fuzzy and dark these last eighteen years as though cursed, although Graham realized with a sudden start that the colors had returned to it sometime recently when he hadn’t been paying attention). The boy was swaying dizzily. He looked exhausted, poor thing. Graham stood, stuffing the addenda back in his cloak pocket. “Welcome, young man, to Daventry Castle.”

“Dad?” Rosella repeated. Her voice cracked.

Valanice’s head poked up from somewhere in the stacks, like a rabbit in a burrow. “Oh! You look dead on your feet, dear boy. Might we offer you some tea, or maybe even a blanket?” She struggled out of the snowdrifts of paper, dress catching on piles and pulling them after her in little avalanches.

“D-Dad?”

That one...that wasn’t Rosella speaking. That was...the boy. The scruffy filthy lost looking...eighteen-year-old boy...with raven black hair....

The smile froze on Graham’s lips, faded. His heart beat in his ears so hard that it hurt, that he couldn’t hear anything else. Couldn’t hear the paper sliding out of its heaps as he knocked it over in his haste to get by, couldn’t hear his footsteps pounding over the carpet, couldn’t hear the sudden burbling laughter pouring out of his own mouth, couldn’t hear Valanice’s shriek and scramble over the rustling, slippery sheets, couldn’t hear Rosella’s frantic explanation, couldn’t hear Alexander’s voice for the first time in eighteen years.

But he felt the boy in his arms as they went for an embrace. Valanice’s arms wrapped around his own as they gently, so gently, afraid of crushing the boy, afraid of frightening him away like a bird, like a ghost, like a dream, held him together.

Alexander squirmed under their grip after a few seconds, apparently not used to contact no matter how soft, and the family backed away, gave him space, let him breathe, and they all stared at each other, unable to think, unable to talk.

“I think...I’m back,” Alexander said, and then his knees buckled beneath him and he went down in a heap, and the whole family reached out and caught him, and everything was different and everything had changed, but the weather didn’t pay any attention, and the snow fell even harder, swirling into drifts and making the royal guards, as unaware as the weather, sigh and clutch their shovels.

~*~*~*~

Days whirled past relentlessly.

Questions, answers, suspicions. Joy, relief, apprehension, fear. No one knew quite what to do. This was unprecedented.

Graham and Valanice hovered anxiously over the boy as he regained his strength. They were impossible to tear away from his bedside, huddled together while the boy slept, fielding more questions from staff and citizens themselves than the boy himself answered. Valanice even took to strapping her old short sword around her hip as though she would have to take up some defense of him (from Manannan, or goblins in the night, or assassins, who could say?). But the more the color returned to the boy’s sallow cheeks the more he looked like his parents. The nervous whispers in the halls about imposters faded away.

“As though I wouldn’t know myself,” Valanice fretted, twirling the ends of her hair on her fingers. “Completely unfounded rumors.”

“Yes, but they don’t know you as well as I do,” Graham said, and he kissed the tip of her nose.

Once he was deemed well enough to talk, Alexander answered everything posed to him, though often without the detail they sought. He said where he had come from (Llewdor) and how he had gotten to Daventry (hidden amongst the crates and baskets of a pirate ship). He said what he had been made to do (keep house for the wizard), but he wouldn’t explain more, and no one wanted to push him.

Except on one detail, a detail that hovered over their heads like a black cloak. The most important detail.

“Will the wizard be coming back?” Royal Guard Number One pressed. He still remembered the attack, still remembered the violence. The fear of that night, and of all nights after.

“If he does, he’ll have a hard time doing much more than scratching,” the prince replied. And he didn’t (or maybe couldn’t) explain more than that. Not yet. No1 seemed frustrated, but a sharp glance from Graham made him subside, for now.

Alexander—sometimes he responded to his name, more often he didn’t, still used to that Gwydion name Manannan had forced on him—was quiet, and tried to take up as little space as possible. But he seemed to want to be helpful. As soon as he was allowed to leave his sickbed, he started searching for chores. He was often found outside trying to feed the chickens, and the servants had once caught him pawing through the broom closet looking for a bucket and mop.

“You don’t have to earn your place here,” Valanice told him gently. She reached out as though she wanted to sweep his unruly forelock, so like her husband’s bouncy curls, out of his eyes, but she held back when he flinched ever so slightly.

“Of course not, Ma’am—er, Mom. Still, though, do you think they need help sweeping the throne room?”

At his first presentation to the public, hastily gathered together as a means to silence rumors still floating around the kingdom, he stood uncomfortably next to his family, shifting awkwardly and blushing at the attention, candlelight glinting off his wary eyes. He ducked out at the first moment possible. No one saw him again for the rest of the night—he was good at finding little nooks and alcoves and burying himself in them, entirely out of sight.

Rosella, though, was determined. The Feys had brought Alexander hot chocolate during his days spent recovering from that terrible sea voyage, and while Alexander wouldn’t admit it, she could tell that he loved it. One chilly evening not long after the presentation, she invited Wente to the castle kitchens. She helped him mix up a fresh batch, getting melty chocolate chunks everywhere in the process (accompanied by No1’s barely muffled groans of annoyance when he walked past and saw chocolate halfway up the walls). She plonked two steaming mugs on a tray, covered them to keep them hot, and went in search of her brother.

Always searching, even after he’s been found.

As it happened, he was in his room.

It was a lovely room, near hers. It was always meant to be his, but it had sat sad and empty and dusty for eighteen years. They’d swept it, cleaned it, and let him have it as a blank canvas to do as he wished with. Which...he hadn’t done much. Guest rooms were richer with cozy decor than the crown prince’s room.

She knocked gently, pushed open the door, and found her brother kneeling on the floor by the bed, looking at something. He twisted to face her, shoving whatever it was behind him, yanked the bedspread down, smiled unevenly. Fear gleamed in his eyes. She leaned sideways, peering around him. A scarf trailed out from beneath the bed.

“Isn’t that the scarf Acorn made you?” she asked.

“Is what?” Alexander said with false cheerfulness. He kicked out behind him, and the scarf vanished under the bed.

“Are you hiding it? You don’t have to, I’ve seen it, it’s a nice one. He makes tons of them, says it helps him relax. You should wear it, it’ll be warm.” She put the tray on the (bare) desk and knelt beside him. She reached forward under the blanket, not actually bothering to look where she was reaching, and he made no move to stop her.

But instead of the scarf, her fingers felt something hard. A box? She gripped it, tugged it, but it was stuck, so she pulled harder. It popped free and caused an avalanche of clattering, rattling, dinging noises under the bed.

She glanced at Alexander, who now looked hopelessly guilty, and studied the box in her hands. It held a silver inkwell and quill, delicately engraved with looping vines. “Normally, people put these on their desk,” she said.

“Do they? I mean. Of course they do. Because they’re normal people. And I’m a normal person, too.”

Rosella pushed the blanket aside, revealing a veritable treasure trove. Gifts glittered in the candlelight, things the kingdom had cheerfully given to its lost prince. Welcome home cards, and cups, and papers, and embroidered pillows, and small tapestries, and hats and gloves, and a cloak, and an ornate dagger, and pressed flowers from warmer times, and other odds and ends that didn’t seem to have a use except in some esoteric way that only Alexander understood. His crown was under there, too, a slim golden circlet he was supposed to wear during official occasions but could otherwise be ignored. She dropped the blanket, hiding the inventory again.

Alexander was twisting his fingers together. “Please, don’t tell...I...”

Rosella took his hand in hers. It was cold. She pulled him so that he sat on the bed next to her, and then she pressed one of the hot chocolate mugs into his shaking fingers. Then, ever so carefully, she leaned against him. Lightly, so he could shrug away if he didn’t want her to touch him. He tensed, and then, just as carefully, leaned back, so that they propped each other up. The twins sipped their hot chocolate together. The torches in the hall snapped and popped, but otherwise the room was quiet.

Once the mugs were empty, Rosella said, “I can help you decorate, if you like. There’re some nice tapestries under there. It’ll be warmer in here with them up. If you don’t like the designs, I can help you swap them.”

Alexander didn’t say anything. He held his empty cup in both hands, swirling the dregs of chocolate.

She stuck her finger in the bottom of her own mug, dragged it through the remnants, and licked it away. Alexander shyly did the same, and then smiled. The first one she’d seen from him, she was sure. His eyes were still a little uneasy, a little guarded and suspicious, but he nodded. “I would like that. It does get a bit cold up here.”

“I think I saw a blanket from Acorn under there, too,” she said. “Maybe we could get that, if you want. It might be more comfortable in here with it.”

Alexander hesitated, then reached under the bed and pulled out the box with the inkwell in it. “And you can show me where to set this up? Like I’m supposed to, like a normal person.”

“Normal in this castle is relative,” she said, putting her hand on top of the box. “It can go anywhere you like. Which can include your desk.”

He thought about it, and then nodded. “That makes the most sense for it. On the desk. And. And, maybe...we can put out the pillows.” He swallowed and backtracked, glancing at the door as though expecting someone to be watching, judging, ready to take away his few treasures again. “Um. Tomorrow, maybe.”

“I think that would be a nice idea. Are you still okay with putting up tapestries tonight?”

“Um. Could...?” he stopped, looked down.

“Could?” she prompted.

“Could we have another hot chocolate, first, and then...you help me pick out the right ones?”

“Absolutely.”

[yungidreamer]

Pampered

Summary: Finals are finally over and its time to relax a little before heading home, but not everyone really has a home to go to. 

Word count: 2k

Content warnings: none, this is basically a little hit of domestic fluff

Finals time passed like a flash. On Monday morning, while Mingi prepared to go and take his test and Yunho continued to study and finish his take home tests, she took San out for a walk to get some extra food and supplies. They walked to the store close to them to get the few things that they needed, having fun in the very clear cold morning air. The storm had cleared and left a crystalline world in its wake. The sky was clear, the snow was a bright and pure white sheet that covered and softened every surface. Everything looked like a Christmas card, clean and white.

They successfully bought all the things that they needed and had a little bit of fun along the way. Fields of snow were too tempting, too perfect, to be left alone. She was the one who started it, lobbing a soft ball of snow at the back of San’s head as he walked ahead of her. When it hit him with a soft whoof sending a burst of powdery snow over his head and shoulders the battle was begun. By the time it was over and he had tackled her into a snowdrift they were both laughing, exhausted, and covered in snow. It was the most fun San had had in months.

They arrived home not long after Mingi got home from his final and his spirit was much improved by the sight of both of them entering the house looking like they were snow monsters more than people. He greeted her with laughter and kisses, cupping her cold pinkened cheeks to warm them.

“You know, I’m cold too,” San laughed. 

“Of course,” Yunho broke into giggles, joining them at the door to use his large warm hands to warm San’s cheeks much like Mingi was doing with their girl, but skipping the kisses, which he wasn’t particularly sure he would have appreciated. The scene left everyone in stitches and raised the mood of the house in general. Yunho and Hong Joong returned to their studies while she, Mingi, and San spent the evening watching movies in the bedroom room to keep from distracting the others.

When Tuesday afternoon finally rolled around Yunho was finally done and Hong Joong headed back to his dorm to get ready to head home. They were all done and all free and it was time to relax and pamper themselves. Yunho felt like he had done well on his exam and started the holidays on a positive note. He came home to find that they had gotten the spa day prepared for his arrival. In the living room a calming natural soundscape was playing and the steam diffuser was filling the air with a mix of lavender and chamomile. They had drawn the curtains and lit a few candles around the room to create the mood. 

“Welcome home,” Mingi greeted him with a hug and passed him a warm cup of cider. “You should hop in the shower and get clean so you can get on with your pampering.”

“Okay,” Yunho gave his cheek a kiss and took the mug from his hand. “Where is our girl?”

“She’s in the shower but she’ll be out in a minute,” Mingi smiled.

“I’m going to see if I can’t catch her,” Yunho’s eyes sparkled and he hurried back to their shared bathroom. Pulling off his outer layers as he walked down the hall, he hurried to the bathroom, catching her just as she was about to step out. With a mischievous grin, he pulled her back into the shower, insisting on washing her hair, which she had skipped, figuring she could do it before bed instead. But Yunho enjoyed taking the moment to take care of her, even if it was just a small thing.

Feeling clean and warm after their shower, they threw on some comfy clothes and headed out to join San and Mingi in the spa prepared living room. Mingi had laid out their favorite masks and beauty products on the coffee table and had put out cookies and cakes for everyone to snack on. San was seated on the couch, dressed in some comfy shorts and a t-shirt he had borrowed from Mingi. Beauty could get messy after all, Mingi had said as he gave him the clothes to change into after his shower.

“Where do I start?” San asked, grabbing a cookie and taking a bite.

“Let’s start you with a mask,” She suggested. “I have just the one I want you to try.”

“I don’t trust that smile you have,” He narrowed his eyes at her as she pulled a container off the table.

“It’s fun, I promise,” she laughed.

“Carbonated clay bubble mask,” San read off the side of the container. “What on earth?”

“Just wait,” Yunho assured him.

“Okay sit facing me so I can put it on you,” she instructed, sitting next to him. He narrowed his eyes suspiciously but did as she asked. She pulled out a tiny silicone spatula and opened the container. San peered inside at the shiny grey paste, still not sure what he thought about it. She spooned out a little on the spatula before bringing it up to his face. Over a period of a minute or two, she spread a small layer of it onto his face. 

When she was done, she closed up the tub and set it back on the table, then chose one for herself and let Mingi put it on her face. The two boys took sheet masks that smelled like lovely fresh fruits. San waited and sat, letting the mask work on his face. At first it just felt cool and slick on his face, but after a few minutes it started to tickle.

“Here, look,” Mingi gave him a hand mirror to look at his face. San made a sound of surprise as he caught sight of himself. He looked like he had stuck his face in some sort of grey cloud. The slick mask had bubbled itself into something like a fluffy, airy poof.

“It’s cool, isn’t it?” Yunho asked.

“It’s weird,” he commented, poking slightly at one section. 

“You can wash it off in like 10 minutes,” She told him from where she had stretched out in front of the fireplace. San sighed and leaned back in the loveseat, trying not to give into the urge to just sit and pop the layer of bubbles on his face.

“Ummm, is your dad going to be home for Christmas?” She asked him. 

“Not really,” San sighed. “He’ll be there for a couple of days after I get there but…”

“Then you are coming over for Christmas dinner at my parents,” she replied, more as a statement than as a question.

“I don’t know,” he sighed. “I don’t want to be an imposition or something. You’re supposed to be with family and...I don’t want to intrude.”

“You aren’t an imposition,” she dismissed. “I already asked at Thanksgiving. Like, if you want you can just come over and stay for the whole break with us. But you can also just come when your dad leaves.”

“I don’t know,” San sighed. “I just feel like I am going to be a bother and just because my holidays are messed up, doesn’t mean yours should be.”

“Pfft, please,” she scoffed. “Oh my God, if we adopt you, I wouldn’t have to be the oldest anymore! Yooooou can be the oldest kid and I can be a middle child!”

“Love, I don’t think that is how it works,” Yunho laughed, casting her a look that was mostly obscured by the fabric of the mask on his face.

“Shhhhh, let me have my dream,” she shushed.

“I wish I could stay at your place for Christmas,” Mingi sighed, not looking forward to spending the holiday at his own home.

“Someday we can just do our own Christmas.” She shrugged. “I’d hate to think we have to wait until we graduate or something but...yeah. Anyway, San, you are coming for Christmas.”

“I don’t know,” San sighed. “You need to ask your parents again at least. And really I would be fine at home. I can take care of myself and you guys have already been so nice to have me the past few days already. It was like Christmas even without presents. You have the tree and everything.”

“I’ll call them later so you can hear the invitation from them,” she agreed, not willing to let him just be fine over the holidays by himself. “If you really don’t want to come, I won’t make you, but like if you think you shouldn’t come because you would be a bother, then you’re being stupid and you are going to come for Christmas.”

“We’ll see,” San gave her a smile. He appreciated the invitation even if he didn’t end up going. “Maybe after Christmas, or for New Years.”

“Oh that, too,” she spoke with such confidence that he almost believed her.

***

“Hey mom,” she said, stepping out onto the back porch after San had gone to bed in Mingi’s room.

“Hey honey,” her mother said cheerily from the other end of the phone. “It’s pretty late, is everything okay?”

“Yeah yeah and we are still coming home tomorrow,” she replied quickly, not wanting her mom to worry about why she was calling. “I asked at Thanksgiving already but...is it okay if San comes and stays for Christmas?”

“Is his dad going to be gone again?” Her mother sounded appropriately annoyed by the thought.

“Yeah at least for a good part of it,” she confirmed. “Can’t we just, like, adopt him...for a while at least until his dad realizes he is an idiot?”

“Of course he can come,” her mother assured her. “He is always welcome to come over.”

“I am sure you’ve probably already bought most of my presents but…” she sighed and shivered. “Can you take some back and get a few things to put under the tree for San?”

“Oh honey,” her mother could not have been more proud of her daughter. “When you get here we can go shopping and get a few things for him. You probably know better what he might want than I would.”

“Okay, that works, thanks mom,” she was relieved, not that she ever doubted her mom would say yes. “Can you have dad call San soon and invite him. He doesn’t believe me that he has an open invite.”

“Of course, I’ll tell him now,” her mother was quick to agree. “Was there anything else you needed to talk about?”

“No, that was it,” she said easily. “I’ll call again tomorrow when we are ready to leave. Tell dad I said hi, too.”

“Okay honey,” Her mother’s smile could be heard through the phone. “Sleep well, I love you.”

“Love you, too, mom,” she said earnestly.

“Bye.”

“Bye.”

She ended the call and headed back inside the warm house. Locking the back door, she went through the house, making sure that all the doors were locked and turning off the Christmas tree lights and the other lights in the living room and kitchen. Mingi and Yunho had already headed to the bedroom when she had waved them off, holding up her phone to silently indicate that she had a call to make.

Assured that the house was safe and shut down for the night, she headed down the dim hall she could have walked down blind at this point. As she passed Mingi’s bedroom door, she heard San’s phone ring and then heard him answer it, saying her dad’s name as he did. Though she couldn’t make out exactly what they were saying, a smile spread across her face. She headed into the bedroom, deciding she didn’t need to eavesdrop, as she was pretty sure she knew what it was her father would tell him.

Masterlist

[septic-skele]

US - Heed The Signs (Part 5)

[Part 4]

“Papyrus!”

Terror springing to his eye sockets, Blue rushed to his fallen brother, pawing helplessly at him as he convulsed raggedly across the ground. He wouldn’t be held, limbs twisting and skidding under Blue’s fingers as they were coated in slush and ice.

“Papyrus! Brother, what’s happening?! Stop, stop it, stop it!” Choking on a sob, he shoved away the nearest rocks embedded in the snow before Papyrus could smack his skull against them. “What do I—?! Please, somebody help!”

But nobody came. Blue glanced madly around at the empty street, shuttered windows and locked doors of the town. Dusk had fallen, citizens retreating to their homes and beds—

There! Several yards—what seemed like miles—away, bluish-violet light streamed from a single shop’s windows, but how could he carry Papyrus there in this state? He could barely hold him down, much less up and across that distance as he tossed and turned.

I’m sorry, I’m sorry!

He left him behind, plowing through the snowdrifts with reckless abandon toward that one hope. Every scrambled, stumbling step away felt like a stab to the soul. Breaking his promise and for what? What if he found someone in there but they returned too late? What if he found Papyrus—? His only family, his only love in this world, his poor, sick, precious charge, he was supposed to protect him—

He could barely see the shop door’s handle through his tears as he clambered to haul it open, slipping on the smooth linoleum tiles the moment he rushed inside. Though he landed roughly, the pain that shot through his bones only spurred another surge of desperation into his screams. “Help! Help me, please!”

“Oh, my!” Blue barely had time to register the voice before a pair of arms—two pairs?—were grabbing at him, pulling him onto shaking legs. An arachnid woman loomed over him, all of her black eyes baffled. “What has a bone hatchling bursting into my café? Who are you? I am about to close!”

“Please, my brother! He’s out there and he’s really sick and I don’t know what to do!” Heaving a strangled breath, he grabbed at her hands. “H-He’s shaking, he’s shaking so badly and he won’t answer me! You have to help him!”

“Did you hear what he said?” Another free arm lashed out at the coat rack near the door for her jacket. “Take me right there to him. Sick in Snowdin’s cold is nothing to spit at!”

Eight legs crossed the distance far faster than two. Papyrus was still thrashing as they reached him, though not with as much violence. Did that mean he was getting weaker? Blue sobbed as he snatched for his hand, only to be swatted away by the stranger.

She wasted no time in rolling Papyrus over on his side with two hands, steadying his skull with a third and prying open his mouth with the next. He choked, muffled, jaw straining as she dug out the half-packed snow he had inhaled so far.

“Is he—Is he falling down?!” Blue demanded wretchedly, his soul burning with the words as he hovered beside them.

“He’s fallen down already, dearie; he’s on the ground, you see,” she shot back, her literal sense startling him. “But that doesn’t mean we can’t get him back up again! How long since he began this dance?”

“Um, I don’t—Minutes? Just a few minutes! I-I couldn’t carry him, I couldn’t get to your shop fast enough!” Guilt and shame flooded his tear-streaked face. Failure, weakness. “Ma’am, what do I do?!”

“Nothing, nothing. He needs to end this on his own.”

“What?!”

“Just what I said! There’s no ‘doing’ for us until he shakes it all out himself,” she insisted, scooping up another stone that Blue had overlooked under the ice. “Can you count, child? Count the seconds down until it’s over.”

Almost every fiber of his being fought to argue, to reach out and pull Papyrus in to hold him steady. Instead he wiped furiously at his eye sockets, counting and praying. Four, five…Stop it, Papy, please! Seven, eight, nine…I need you; you’re all I have! Eleven, twelve…

By the time he reached forty, Papyrus’ spasms were slowing to feebler tremors, followed by an unnerving stillness that made Blue stiffen. The spider woman, however, seemed satisfied.

“A round of applause now,” she tsked, carefully petting away the sweat marking Papyrus’ skull. “His dance is over.”

“But…he’s still not awake…”

“But can you blame him? He is exhausted now! It’s no easy feat to wake up fine and dandy when your whole body throws a tantrum against you.” As a whistling breeze stirred, she shuddered, curling a pair of arms around herself and another around Papyrus. “Oooh, huhu! Enough of this. Even if I can stand the cold, I don’t want to stand in it! A heated parlor is what we need! Come with us.”

Again Blue struggled to keep up with her, leaping in long attempts to match her stride as she marched back toward her café with Papyrus dangling loosely in her grasp. She was hardly a tall or overtly muscular monster yet Blue had never seen Papyrus look so…bare and undersized against someone in comparison. He swallowed hard, feeling even smaller himself, and hurried to get ahead so he could open the door for her.

Now that his panic had settled into a more contained shellshock, Blue was able to take in his surroundings more clearly: checkered white-and-lavender tiles, cushioned purple booths, padded stools, and more cobwebs than the wall or table corners could contain. There were two doors to the back, large and small; he blinked numbly at the smaller.

You can’t go through the spider exit because you’re not a spider.

The larger door had a thick mat of webbing at its base. “A guest wipes their feet before coming to my parlor,” the woman pointed out, tittering as Blue shuddered at the sticky texture under his toes. Impolite as it was, he then scuffed his feet on the carpet he found further inside.

Her parlor was dimmer than the front, dotted with small lights on the walls that looked strangely like her eyes. She had no bed, merely a webbed, curtained hammock that she settled Papyrus into before gesturing to a nearby stool.

“I—I can stand, ma’am,” Blue offered hollowly.

“Don’t be silly! You have only two legs.”

The adrenaline was dying down at last. Blue took a breath, opened his mouth to continue protest—and a crushing cascade of exhaustion shook through every bone. For a moment it felt as if his magic blinked off and then back on, like a dying lightbulb. When it returned, he was planted firmly on the stool and the spider woman was scuttling back to the front room.

When she returned, all of her hands were full. A bucket of water, sponges, a jug and a tray gave off a multitude of mingling aromas that made it hard to suppress a sneeze.

“Thank you,” Blue mustered instead, voice cracking. “Thank you so much for your kindness. I don’t know what Papyrus and I would have done without you.”

“Something wrong, no doubt,” she remarked without malice, ignoring or perhaps unnoticing Blue’s flinch. “You would have made his dance so much worse trying to help!”

“I…” If that was the case, he didn’t want to think on it. “Thank you.” He wasn’t sure what else to say.

“Mmm, I can give you more to thank me for!” As she began dipping the sponges in the water, she swept the tray and the jug toward him on either side. “Would you care for a pastry? Spider cider?”

The rubbery donuts and croissants were glazed and powdered with exorbitant amounts of honey, frosting and sugar that could make even a child blanch. Indeed, Blue’s first instinct was to decline; his gloves would be sticky and his teeth would suffer, but the water sausages seemed so long ago that he was getting lightheaded. Moreover, it would be rude to turn down her hospitality.

“Yes, I knew you would!” she exclaimed as he pried a donut from the pile. “That will be thirty G.”

He choked halfway through his bite, unsure if it was worse to spit it out or swallow it as he stammered, “What?! I—no, I’m—We don’t have that kind of money!”

“Oh, stingy, are you? Tsk. Well, how about this? Since you are a new customer, I’ll give you a discount: You pay by telling me what two little bone hatchlings are doing here, where they’ve never been seen before. Where do bone hatchlings come from?” Papyrus mumbled and twitched as she patted one of the sponges against his neck, the others under his arms. “Hotland? This one burns hot enough.”

Fidgeting, Blue reached for the cider to chase down the donut’s sickly sweetness. “Um, maybe? I know we had a house but…we lost it. Or maybe it lost us. We don’t remember where it is so we decided—” I decided. “—it would be better to make a new home here.”

“My, oh, my! Who is this ‘we’? You call the brother Papyrus, so what do you call you?”

“Oh, I’m sorry. I didn’t even think of introducing myself. That’s awfully rude. My name is Sans. What…What do you call you, ma’am?”

“Ahuhuhu, I must need a bigger, brighter sign out front! I will budget for that. I call myself and my café Muffet. Welcome!”

[a-mellowtea]

This Love We Share

This love it is a distant star, guiding us home wherever we are...

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

The evening before Solstice, staring out the frost-laced window of Atlas Academy, Oscar realized just how far from home he really was. If it hadn't been painfully obvious from the moment he arrived in the Kingdom, here, now, it certainly was. This wasn't like Anima. No one leaped to the windows at the first sign of snow; it wasn't anything special in the frigid tundra. There would be no train trips into the nearest major settlement -- sometimes as far as Kuchinashi -- to wander through the bustling, brightly-lit market stalls teeming with the sweet smells of pastry and cocoa and cider. He would wake up to silence, and lose himself to training while the others -- proper Huntsmen now -- tried to keep the Amity Project on-track. He wondered if they felt the pang too, but they had each other, and he... well, he supposed he had them too, but it wasn't the same. Would they even want to celebrate, or would they be too exhausted to remember? There didn't seem to be any celebrations at all beyond those arranged by students, and those were generally small, cozy gatherings he didn't want to intrude upon. Neon had come by earlier to invite him along to the festivities of Team FNKI and their friends, but without the others, Oscar wouldn't have known what to do with himself, so he'd politely declined. Humming, he set his chin on his palm. It had stopped snowing about two hours ago, and no one had come or gone from the Academy since, leaving the blanket of fresh fluff undisturbed in the moonlight. It was beautiful. It coated everything, shimmering in millions of cool rainbows, like magic. A huff of laughter escaped him at the thought. Pushing himself back from the window, he snuck to the door and out of the dorm room he shared with Jaune, Ren, and Nora. The halls were empty and awash with soft blue glows; it was well past curfew. No one saw him button up his coat and head for the elevator, tucking his chin into the high collar as he went. There were no guards to stop him from taking it all the way down to the grounds, and no one was by the doors to keep him from pushing them open and stepping out into the gentle night. The crisp air hit him in a wonderful, stinging rush. He closed his eyes on a sharp breath. A breeze whistled through the pillars and alcoves, brushing painter's streaks across the snowdrifts. Oscar let it carry him forward, through the snow that threatened to spill into his boots, to the helipad. A glittering Kingdom sat stretched out before him, the oranges and yellows of homes and heating systems wandering off to pinpoints that dropped off before the mountain peaks. The constant green-blue curtain of Solitas' northern aurora flowed above him, and he craned his head back to watch. He thought of his Aunt, at home on their farm. She would be asleep, by now, waiting for another morning without him. He wondered if she missed him. How angry must she have been, when she found him missing? Had any of the reports from Mistral made it to her yet? Had his letter? He didn't regret leaving; not really. But he was sorry for it all the same. He missed her. He missed the farm. He missed knowing that he could wake up Solstice morning and sit and have coffee with her, and unwrap the gift -- small, but heartfelt -- that was always slid across the table. Blinking the bristling from his eyes, he crouched and dug a ball out of the snow. She would like Atlas. Not the people, maybe, but the splendor. The grandeur. The way the spires and towers shone like silver, and caught fire in the light of the sunset. He thought, maybe, one day when this was all over, he could bring her to see it. The hope cinched in thorns about his heart. Behind him, the snow crunched. "Oscar? What are you doing out here?"

Ruby's voice was tired and exactly as welcome as it wasn't. In daylight hours, it would have had him spinning on the spot, fumbling for an excuse. Now, he just straightened and smiled to himself. “Just wanted to have a look,” he said without turning 'round. “It's... really pretty.” She stepped into the space next to him. She'd drawn a jacket over her Atlas-issue thermal pajamas. "Yeah, it is. We never got this much snow back home." "Neither did we." Something snuck into his mind, then, as he tossed the little ball of snow from palm to palm. Something delightful and childish and unbearably bright, filling his chest with warmth and lifting his shoulders. He glanced at Ruby. She was watching the sky. "Hey... You know what snow like this is good for?" "Huh?" Oscar pivoted, teetering back a step on the ice with a little less grace than he'd been aiming for. The snowball flew true. Fluff exploded on her arm. Ruby gasped, and Oscar ran. "Oh, you- Get back here!" He managed a grand total of five steps before something cold hit the back of his head. It stung. He laughed. So did she. She used her Semblance to dance circles around him. He hit her twice anyways, doubling over at the look on her face as she swept the snow from her bangs. She took cover behind a docked airship. Oscar pressed his back to a particularly high drift, throat dry and half-soaked. Their chorusing giggles and shrieks echoed in the cold night air, drifting off in clouds of fog. He was aware of how much Aura they were burning, but it wasn't accompanied by the usual fear of danger. It felt good. It felt wild, and alive in a way he hadn't felt... He couldn't remember feeling. "Your move, farm boy!" Ruby called, breathless. Oscar packed another snowball between his fingers. "No fair! You've got a more fortified position!" "Excuses, excus-" A yelp broke her jeer. For a moment, Oscar's heart stuttered, and he froze. Her name was on his lips as he scrambled to peer over his shoddy cover. General Ironwood had said Grimm couldn't fly as high as Atlas; had said they were- Something hit the snowdrift, throwing it back in his face. More voices started laughing. "Starting a snowball fight without us? I'm hurt, sis." Yang tossed another snowball into the air, prosthetic fist resting on her hip. Blake was next to her, mouth quirked and drawn up in a smirk; one that was mirrored by Weiss, who was already dipping low to activate a Glyph. Oscar rolled his eyes. Semblances were cheating, but no use telling them that. Especially not when- “Hark! Oscar is in mortal peril! We must save him! Charge!” -another shrill voice hit his ears from the steps of the Academy, and the next thing he knew there were three bodies beside him, and somehow Jaune produced a tray from the cafeteria to use as a shield, and Oscar's toes and fingers were tingling numb, but he just couldn't stop laughing. The next morning, he rolled over, aching and bruised, and smiled. And, as Nora linked her arm through his and tugged him off to their short pre-briefing breakfast, he thought maybe his aunt would’ve been happy for him if she knew he wasn’t alone.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

No matter where you are, how far from home, who you're with or without; know that you are loved. You are being thought of, by someone. 

Merry Christmas, everyone.

[omnivoroustree]

Snow

909 words. Signe gets homesick on Wintersday. Contains swearing. Based on a prompt from @tyrias-library.

Signe was lost. The Crystal Desert was massive, and the small sylvari she had been following for the past few days had dismounted their raptor next to a cliff face, then a massive rabbit had appeared out of nowhere, and they had jumped on its back and shot into the air. Signe had made a small panicked noise, running backwards until she could see them sitting on a ledge, around halfway up. Then she had waited for them to come back, but when night came and sweltering heat rapidly changed into bitter cold, she had given up and led her own shivering raptor to the outpost.

After that, she bought a helmet and made her way back to the cliff, and a few hours later, she was sitting on a ledge, lost, looking down at the speck that was her raptor, and realising that a helmet would not stop her from dying if she were to fall.  On top of that, the sylvari was probably long gone, and not coming back for her. “Fuck…” she sang to herself softly. She didn’t feel confident continuing upwards, but she felt even worse about going down.

The raptor paced up and down for a few minutes before it started walking away. “I guess there’s not much point in going down now,” Signe muttered. Her voice was comforting to her, cutting through the silence that often tainted the air. “And that means I have to keep climbing.”

It took some time to get to her feet, clinging to the side of the cliff. She had to stop looking down. The heat was already making her feel nauseous, and it didn’t need any help. She found a place to put her hand, and one to put her foot, and pushed herself upwards. Found another handhold and another foothold, and repeated the process. It was simple, and would have been relaxing were it not for her impending doom.

“I’m not doomed,” she told herself. “I’m just… probably going to die.”

Her hands were shaking, and she glared at them, willing them to stop. She wanted to look down to see how much progress she had made (probably virtually none) but didn’t want to confront how high she was again, and she wanted to look up to see how much further she had to go (probably a long way) but didn’t want to decide it was way too far and give up. That left her focusing on taking one step at a time.

She started humming to herself after a few minutes, lost her voice after a few hours. Her arms stopped shaking, and as the day dragged on and the clouds blanketing the sky grew dark and ominous, they started again from exhaustion instead of fear. Signe found another ledge large enough to rest on, and looked down, half proud, half terrified.

It started to rain. Signe saw the first few drops falling around her, and smiled, ready for cool, blissful water to hit her face, wash away the sweat and soothe the sunburn. Then she realised it was warm. “Lovely,” she said. “The sky’s pissing on me. What a wonderful Wintersday gift.”

Wintersday. She had forgotten about that. The holiday was her favourite time of year, but the concept of time had slipped away from her shortly after arriving in Amnoon. She paused to think for a moment. “It is Wintersday.”

She was crying subtly, tears merging with rain, a dreamy smile spread across her face as she remembered days spent sitting in banks of snow, dressed in a gloriously ugly sweater and sipping spiced apple cider while she watched people try to navigate the Winter Wonderland. Divinity’s Reach had been cold, but cozy and loud and festive, and... she missed it.

Here it was hot and quiet and lonely. She hated it.

It was time to get moving. The rain would make climbing dangerous, but if she stayed where she was, she’d freeze once night came. The sun was already dangerously low, and the temperature would plummet within the hour. Signe continued her ascent.

She was right about the temperature dropping. It happened every day, and she’d been there to experience it for the past few weeks, but it still shocked her every time. It was growing colder as she went higher too. Her breath started to rise in plumes, and her gaze followed one upwards and saw the end.

A burst of energy drove her the last few feet, and she scrambled over the edge, collapsing, eyes closed and panting heavily. The ground was colder than the air, and had a familiar, but unexpected texture. She opened her eyes.

It was coated in an inch of snow.

She lifted her head and drew her gaze skywards, seeing snowflakes fluttering around, settling in a tree which sat roughly in the middle of the small plateau. And there was a person sitting at the base of the tree, wrapped in several blankets, near a fire heating some sort of stew, looking at Signe, bemused. Signe got to her feet and trudged over to him. Warmed her hands over the fire.

He gave her a red blanket, and a bowl of stew, and she spent that Wintersday sitting in a snowdrift, wrapped in a bright red blanket and eating stew, which was rich and warm and wonderful, while she watched the snow fall. She smiled. For that one night, she felt like she was home.

[nycbento]

This Week in Bento - Wednesday:

About as Western a Japanese lunchbox as you get: the last of the beef stewed in cider nestled on a snowdrift of mashed potatoes.

[nwbeerguide]

Bailey’s Taproom shares details for the 12th Anniversary Party & Barrel Aged Beer Fest

Press Release

It’s that time of year again! Join us on Saturday, July 27th at Noon to celebrate another year at Bailey’s Taproom! We will be continuing our tradition of featuring a collection of our favorite barrel aged offerings collected over the past year! In addition we worked with Pinthouse Pizza out of Austin, TX and Aslan Brewing out of Bellingham, WA. Cheers!

PM To The AM Funk – Aslan: In January we visited Aslan brewing and tasted through their wide range of barrel and foudre aged beers to come up with the perfect blend that represented some our favorite elements in beer. PM To The AM Funk is a rustic saison conditioned in neutral oak barrels and then finally dry hopped with Nelson Sauvin.

Swankeny Street Purps – Pinthouse Pizza: Last month we had the opportunity to fly down to Austin, Texas to work with our friend Tom Fischer at Pinthouse Pizza. We came up with a beer loosely based around their GABF and World Beer Cup award winning beer, Green Battles. Swankey Street Purps is a west coast IPA brewed with a heavy dose of Chinook and Mosaic.

In addition to our collaboration projects we will be featuring the following barrel aged beers on draught both at Bailey’s Taproom and The Upper Lip:

Cider Riot – 1763

Wildcraft – Whiskey Aronia

The Commons – Flemmish Kiss

Logsdon – Peche N Brett

Casa Agria – Saison Sobrantes

Beachwood – Careful With That Aprium Eugene

Hill Farmstead – Anna

Crooked Stave – Nightmare On Brett

Upright – Fantasia

Springdale – Art Dekkera

Pelican – Mother of All Storms

Fremont – B-Bomb: Coconut Edition

pFriem – Imperial Stout

Oakshire – Hellshire VIII

Fort George – Matryoshka

Goose Island – Bourbon County

Breakside – Grandmammy

Culmination – Multnomah County Stout

Firestone Walker – Parabola

Beachwood – Earthbound Misfit Cherum

Block 15 – Framboise Black

Cantillon – Grand Cru Bruscollea

The Ale Apothecary – Ralph

Fremont – Brew 3000

Du Di Ciel – BA Peche Mortel

Snowdrift – Cornice

from News - The Northwest Beer Guide http://bit.ly/2NIAP7c

[i-write-fanfics-to-procrastinate]

NaLu Week: Day Four, Virtuous

You might ask, is this connected to the prompt at all? I could go on several different tangents explaining how it’s so, so, so loosely connected... but the important part is Nalu dancing. That’s all. 

Winter… it was always, always so cold. This year it was snowing for one of Fairy Tail’s winter celebrations. Natsu hated the snow. Well, he didn’t hate the snow, really. He just hated the way Gray acted around snow. The ice mage was sitting, shirtless, on a big snowdrift just beyond the dance floor that they had constructed for the event. Some of the ladies, including his girlfriend, hadn’t arrived yet. Maybe, like Natsu, Gray figured it wasn’t worth doing anything until they got there. Besides, Natsu knew Juvia would kill Gray if he danced with anyone else. As for Lucy… well… Natsu wasn’t sure Lucy would mind if Natsu decided to pass the time by dancing with someone like Wendy, or Lisanna. But, really, he had no interest.

           “It’s too damn cold,” he muttered, rubbing his arms.

           “Natsu,” Happy said, “Maybe you should have worn that jacket.”

           “I’m not wearing that stupid jacket!” Natsu gasped, “Erza already made me wear… augh, whatever this is…” He tried to fix his collar but only ended up frustrating himself.

           “This is supposed to be a formal-wear event,” Gray said, still lounging on the snow drift next to where Natsu stood.

           “YOU’RE SHIRTLESS!” Natsu snapped. Gray waved his dress shirt in front of Natsu.

           “I was just about to put this on. Juvia should be here any minute.”

           “That means Lucy!” Happy beamed, patting Natsu’s leg.

           “I know!” Natsu huffed, “You don’t have to—” Just around the corner of the Fairy Tail guild hall came the three girls—Levy, Juvia, and Lucy. The three of them were talking animatedly, but Natsu only had eyes for Lucy. She was wearing a long magenta dress, a warm fur shrug, and her hair was down. Natsu couldn’t believe it, but he was suddenly grateful that Erza made him wear fancy clothes. The color of her dress matched the color of his dress pants and tie. He wondered if Erza and Mira had planned that. Knowing them, they probably did.

           “You alright, Natsu?” Gray sidled up next to him, fully clothed, and with a smug grin.

           “Lucy’s here…” Natsu murmured.

           “Yeah,” Gray crossed his arms, still smiling. The girls met them in the center of the shoveled path. There was a moment of silence before Lucy broke it,

           “You clean up nice, Natsu,” she said, her cheeks turning a bright pink.

           “You’re….uh…” Natsu swallowed, trying to find words.

           “Alright, we’ll leave you two be,” Gray said, holding out his hand, “Juvia, care to dance?”

           “Juvia… would love to,” Juvia gently set her hand in his and Gray gently pulled her out onto the dance floor, her pale blue dress swishing around her knees as she twirled.

           “Uhm…” Levy, still standing next to Lucy, looked around hopefully. She was in a short gold dress, with long sleeves. “Natsu… have you seen Gajeel-?”

           “L-Levy?!” Gajeel had just rounded the corner and came to a halt when he saw her.

           “Gajeel!” The worry on Levy’s face disappeared instantly, replaced with pure happiness. She held out her hands, and after only a moment’s hesitation the tall dragon-slayer took them. “I’m glad you came! Do you want some hot cider? Mira’s serving, I could go get you—” Gajeel glanced around the outdoor dance floor and then shook his head, a wide grin stretching across his lips.

           “Nah, lets dance.”

           “So cute!” Lucy beamed, as she watched her friends out on the dance floor, Natsu was still at a loss for words. “Natsu? Are you alright?” He slowly shook his head, knowing that his cheeks were bright red.

           “Lucy… you look beautiful.” He watched Lucy’s face turn red.

           “Th-thank you. You look really nice too.”

           He wasn’t sure what possessed his next move, because his thought process was all jumbled. All he could think about was how this was a formal party. People were dancing all around him. That’s what you were supposed to do at celebrations like this, right? He held out his hand to her, and offered her his signature grin,

           “Hey, you want to dance?”

           “Yeah!” Lucy took his hand and Natsu pulled her against his chest and out onto the dance floor. They swayed back and forth, and it seemed to Natsu that all the other couples disappeared. It was just the two of them on the dance floor.

           “Do you know,” Lucy smiled, wrapping her arms around his shoulders, “it’s been almost a year since I first told you I love you?”

           “Any regrets?” Natsu laughed.

           Lucy frowned, “Hmmm… Just one.”

           “What… what’s that?” Natsu said.

           “I should have told you sooner,” she whispered, leaning in closer to him. Under the stars, in the crisp air of winter she seemed even more tempting. Natsu beamed down at her as they shared warmth in the gentle swaying of the dance. He saw her eyes light up suddenly, and she gasped, “Natsu! It’s snowing! Oh, how beautiful!” He never really liked snow, but the way it suddenly made her light up made him happy. She was so beautiful. Snow slowly gathered in her hair, and against her eyelashes. The dance seemed to have paused as everyone marveled at the sight of the snowfall.

           “Lucy…” he still didn’t have the words to describe to her how he felt. She was the most caring, lovely person he had ever met. If things never changed, that would be heaven for him. She glanced up at him at the sound of her name. She looked like an angel, with snow in her hair, and the way she smiled… “I need to tell you something,” he said. “You’re… the kindest, gentlest person I’ve ever met. I… I want to spend the rest of my life with you. Can we stay like this forever?” Lucy laughed,

           “Yes. I think we can,” and then she pulled him in for a kiss, and Natsu wouldn’t have cared at all if it lasted for another decade or two. “I love you, Natsu.” When they pulled away Lucy laughed again, “Ah! You look so cute with all the snow in your hair.” Natsu tried not to blush, while searching for a way to change the subject.

            He spun around to see Gray and Juvia arm-in-arm. “Gray! This is your fault!”

           “I don’t make all ice, you fire-breathing—”

           “Gray-sama!” Juvia sighed, “Please don’t fight.”

           “Come on, Natsuuuu!” Lucy giggled, “We both know you’re just looking for a reason to fight when there is none. Besides… you look cute.” She pulled him into another kiss, but before Natsu could lean into it something packed and wet slammed against the back of his head.

           “HEY!”

           “Owww….” Lucy groaned, “You bit my lip, Nats—”

           “GRAY!”

           “Snowball fight!!” Happy screeched.

           “Oh nooo…” Levy sighed.

           “I’m bleeding!” Lucy said.

           “Come on, Lucy!” Natsu grabbed her arm, “We’re gonna win this one this time! Behind the snowdrift! C’mon!”

           “Natsu, you bit my lip,” Lucy said again as Natsu dragged her behind the pile of snow.

           “I have to defend your honor!” Natsu screamed, frantically making snowballs. Lucy rolled her eyes, but he could see her smile behind her hand. He paused for a moment, “Sorry about your lip, Lu.”

           “It’s fine,” she sighed, “It’s not your fault.” Natsu leaned over and quickly stole a kiss, then he leaped on the top of the snow pile with his snowballs, “GRAYYYY!!!”

           They ended the night in the guild hall, covered in snow. The evening hadn’t exactly turned out as had been expected, but… with everyone’s smiles, the warm light of the hall, and Lucy fast asleep against his chest Natsu supposed it had ended up being a pretty good celebration after all.

[neothebean]

Any christmas-y holidays in kidama or the highlands?

Well the Highlands have the Winterfirst Festival (previously called the Winter Solstice Festival before I did extra worldbuilding lmao), which is a day of snow and lights and good food and general making merry, as they say. You don’t go out and buy gifts for people, but generally people buy little affinity-related gifts for their partners or friends while they’re out celebrating. Other fun activities include: building snow spirits in the front yard, decorating the house with bows and ribbons and lights, drinking hot cider and cocoa, receiving free candies from vendors and shops, watching the shows put on by the kids and amateur performance groups, warming up by the bonfires on every corner, and joining in the loud winterfirst songs being sung around said bonfires. It goes well into the night/early morning and the guard is out in full force doing patrols to make sure no drunken revelers fall in a snowdrift and freeze to death.

Kidama isn’t big on social holidays, mostly because of the way their goverment works, which allows for families to operate independently and also against each other. But their naming ceremonies (when the kids get their jiudahi, full names) are pretty big deals! 

For the upper classes, a naming ceremony marks a time for all allies, potential allies, and non-murderous rivals to get together and eat and talk politics. (They also provide small but fancy gifts to the child/family as bargaining chips or messages.) 

For the lower classes, it’s a time for whole communities to get together and celebrate. Usually it ends up as a potluck type deal, and often people will make small donations to the family, either monetary or in the form of hand-me-down sorts of gifts, clothes and whatnot. Larger communities will often combine several naming ceremonies, though the families will still celebrate independently on the actual day.

Not overly Christmas-y, I guess, but it’s about as close it gets for Kidama.