Early Snow

"So this was unexpected," Stig commented, observing the scene before them.

Hal nodded. "Just a bit," he agreed, turning in a slow circle to make sure that this wasn't all some strange illusion. It wasn't.

Stig watched him with mild amusement. "I don't think even Jesper could have set this up," he pointed out.

Hal hummed a vague acknowledgement, then sighed. "Of course, this is going to make getting back home all the harder."

Stig shrugged. "You'll come up with something. You always do," he said simply. Hal had to smile at his friend's faith in him.

"Should we wake the others up, then?" Stig asked. Hal's mind was distant, his brow furrowed in a slight frown as he observed the fallen snow, mind racing.

It wasn't that any of them were unused to snow (being Skandian), or that they even disliked it. It was more the difficulty that would be posed if winter, and the storms that came with it, decided to swoop down on them early.

Stig, guessing the reason behind his friend's distraction, followed Hal's gaze to the Heron. He smiled. "She'll be all right, Hal. The Heron's tough."

Hal gave his friend a quick, grateful smile before the frown of concentration returned as he turned to face the rest of his sleeping crew, doing some quick calculations. All of them were covered by the unseasonable snowfall, and the clouds over the landside horizon suggested that the snow hadn't fallen more than a few hours ago. Last watch had been Stig's, the seaward horizon was clear...if they got moving, they should get to the edge of the Stormwhite without getting caught in any bad weather.

He nodded decisively. "Let's wake them up. No sense in wasting daylight."

Stig gave his friend an odd look at daylight. "He says 'daylight', and yet..." Stig trailed off and shrugged, letting the darkness do the talking for him.

One corner of Hal's mouth quirked up in a half-smile. "I was hoping to make it to the edge of the Stormwhite by tonight," he explained. "Best if we get moving at dawn. I'd rather not get caught in any weather if we can help it."

"It is night," Stig muttered, but he nodded in understanding. It had been a pretty heavy snowfall. "That's why you're skirl, and I'm just the muscle," he said with a grin.

Hal snorted and crossed the distance to the closest crew member - who happened to be Ingvar - and crouched next to him to wake him up. Stig didn't give himself enough credit.

Hal's eyes kept darting towards the horizon. The early snow had spooked him into being extra cautious in regards to storms. He was well aware that the Heron wasn't as sturdy as a typical wolfship, and he didn't particularly want to test her in a storm if he could help it. But the wind was with them, and she had the edge in that regard.

Of course, this also meant any storms would get blown in their general direction, but it was better than having to row the entire way to Hallasholm.

He glanced back at the horizon again. Thorn caught the movement and raised an eyebrow. Hal shrugged. The sea didn't seem to think there was a storm approaching.

Of course -

You're going to have to take something on faith, he told himself. If you don't, you'll drive yourself mad worrying about every little thing. He forced himself to relax a bit. They'd made good time today. The small inlet he'd been planning to make camp in tonight wasn't far away.

He glanced back at the horizon anyway, and a muscle in his cheek twitched at the sight of the thin gray line that so often heralded bad weather.

But the sea still sang her fair-weather song, so he allowed himself to hope they might outrun it. If their luck held, they would. If it didn't...well, they'd be a very wet and grumpy crew that sailed into Hallasholm (and Thorn wouldn't let him hear the end of it).

Their luck held just long enough for them to land and make camp before the storm broke over them.

It was snow again, of course, and Hal spent most of the time shooting glares at the sky because seriously you're going to do this to me now?

The storm lets up just as the sun goes down, and Hal's teeth-grinding could probably be heard somewhere in Nihon-Ja.

That lasted until a cold, wet something hit him in the back of the head. He spun, frayed nerves making his hand drop to the hilt of his sword -

And realized that Thorn was grinning at him, another snowball in his hand. The old seawolf prepared to throw it, and Hal dived out of the way, hearing the impact of tightly-packed snow against the tree he hid behind. He scooped together some snow of his own to prepare a retaliation.

Ingvar got there first. Thorn yelped as a giant ball of snow hit him square in the chest, sending him crashing to the ground. Lydia flung a high-speed snowball that hit Ingvar square in the shoulder, and all hell promptly broke loose in the form of a free-for-all snowball fight. Even Kloof joined the fray, chasing after the multitude of snowballs that were flying through the air, getting smacked countless times, and bowling over the others (and Hal himself) to many times to count.

Hal watched his crew with a grin on his face. Let tomorrow come, he thought. Tonight was theirs, and woe betide anything - man, beast, or god - that tried to take it from them.

Hal's intense protectiveness over his crew has been a longstanding headcanon of mine. He doesn't care much about anything else (excepting his mam, and to some extent his crew's families), but the Vallas help you if you hurt one of his, because he will hunt you down and make you pay. Ullr ain't got nothing on a vengeful Hal.