Prompt: Under the Christmas Tree
Under the Unspecified Conifer: Comfort – G – Kid!fic – No warnings
It felt like Arthur had been wandering for hours. He did not remember why he had run from his nanny earlier, just that he had been very angry. And he could not retrace his steps because the blowing wind had already obliterated all but the last ten feet of his footsteps in the thin covering of snow on the ground.
The whistling of the wind through the trees was everywhere. Sometimes he could hear the sounds of someone crying.
The boy searched for the crying person. His father had told him that it was his responsibility to care for the kingdom. Arthur hoped that he would be able to help. Maybe the crying person could help him too. Arthur was starting to get cold and a little hungry, and if he missed supper with his father, his father would be very angry.
Arthur looked around. Most of the trees were tall and leafless oaks and elms. But a short distance away was a funny little triangular tree, still green and dense, looking very prickly. It did not look like anything that the six-year old had ever seen before. When a flash of blowing blue cloth showed on one side of it, Arthur trudged over to look.
The cloth was part of a dress worn by a girl his size. She was sitting on the ground, face and arms tight against her knees so that she was a little ball. She was crying so hard, she had not heard him approach. Her long dark hair in a braid lay over her coatless shoulder.
Arthur did not know what she was crying about, but he worried about how cold she was. He wore his red cloak, Pendragon crest sewn on the shoulder just like a real knight, and he was cold. Arthur sat down next to the girl and carefully arranged his cloak over her shoulders. It was a little hard to do, because she startled in the middle of his operation, and messed up what he had already done. But eventually he managed to put the cloak over both of them, holding it there with his arm around her back. He rubbed her shoulder and arm, like his nanny did to him when he took a tumble.
He was glad he was sharing his cloak. Now he was much warmer. Sitting next to the little triangle tree and the girl, he did not feel the wind so much. And she had stopped crying so hard, although he could see tears running down her chubby brown cheeks as she stared through the forest.
"Girl, why are you crying?"
She turned to look at him, her pretty brown eyes shiny wet. "My name is Gwen."
"Gwen." He thought that was a pretty name. He thought she was pretty. He smiled the smile that usually got him a smile from his nanny. "Why were you crying?"
She sighed and dropped her face back onto her knees. He could barely hear her answer, "My mama died."
"Oh." Arthur knew it was a bad thing whenever anyone died, but since he had never known his mama, it was not that bad. At least it was not as bad as not having a pony. Still, she was sad, so he should try to cheer her up.
"Winter Solstice is tomorrow. You'll have fun getting presents."
She kept her head down as she shook it back and forth. He could feel her big inhale and sigh. "I don't think so. My papa is really sad and I don't know if he'll remember. And Elyan wants presents, and he's littler so he should get them. I miss my mama." Gwen started crying again.
Arthur didn't know what to say so he went back to rubbing her shoulder. She cried for what felt like forever. The snow on the ground was pretty.
"I'll share my nanny with you." That didn't seem to make any impression on her.
"I don't have a mother either, but my nanny is very nice. She brings me food and gives me hugs and sings to me at night and helps me with my reading." He could tell the little girl was listening now, she was not crying so hard anymore, even though she had not raised her head. "She'll give you hugs and sing to you and help you read."
Gwen looked at him then and smiled. She had a nice smile. "All right."
Arthur smiled back, relieved that the girl was better, but then he frowned. He did not know how to get back to his nanny. "She's in Camelot. Do you know how to get there?"
"Yes."
"Let's go."
Arthur stood up and helped Gwen to her feet. She stumbled a little and whimpered, "My feet hurt."
"Must be asleep. Too much sitting. Walking will help." Arthur told her what his nanny always told him. He knew how much it hurt to start walking on asleep feet, so he grabbed her hand to help her. Also, he was a little worried that she would be cold again without his cloak.
"Are you cold? Do you need my cloak?" He did not want to give it up, but sometimes you had to do things that you did not want to do.
Gwen smiled at him. "No, thank you. I'm not cold."
She started walking, tugging him along by his hand. He liked walking with her through the forest – she knew where she was going. He found out about her father, the blacksmith near the pump, and her brother who sounded like a lot of fun. Arthur wanted a brother. He told her his name and about his two friends that he had lessons with and about his father who was also sad.
When they reached the gates of Camelot, Arthur was mad that he could not take Gwen to his rooms to meet his nanny. Sir Gorlois picked him up and began riding up to the castle. That was fun.
It took Arthur until the day after Winter Solstice to walk down to Gwen's house with his nanny. She packed a basket of food and clothes, and Arthur added the rest of his favorite candy that he had saved from the feast for Gwen and her brother.
When they arrived, Gwen's father opened the door and Arthur's nanny explained why they were there. Soon Arthur had supervised a nice hug for Gwen and Elyan and they had eaten from nanny's basket and cleaned up. After that, they played. Gwen taught him a funny game called draughts and he told a story about some of the knights' feats, using her doll to illustrate the moves.
When they left a few hours later, he told his nanny that it was more fun to share things like Gwen did with Elyan. Playing today had been even better than opening presents on Winter Solstice. He hoped they could come back. His nanny smiled, so maybe they would.
But after he told his father, they never did.