Make Hay While the Sun Shines
That was what Mother always said, wasn't it? Mother wasn't always right – Rapunzel was learning that in full force with every passing day –but it was still solid good advice.
She had Jack Frost, here, in her tower. He was sitting still for once in his life, trading stories with Merida and Hiccup, each one trying to outdo the others. And Rapunzel had a pencil and a box of chalk and a drawing pad.
She found the spot with the best light, facing Jack Frost's right-side profile, sat down, and started to draw.
She relied on the conversation to keep him occupied while her pencil flew across the paper. First a loose circle for his skull – NO, that wasn't right! It was just a circle in pencil but it wasn't right! Further down the page she tried again. Another circle, some eyes and a triangle of a nose, just loose sketches, just to get her arm warmed up. Besides, the flight of the pencil and the loose, unfinished lines seemed to fit Jack. She couldn't associate him with long hours of solitary toil at her easel.
Well… maybe she could… with a little imagination…
She looked up again, wondering how on earth she would use chalk to catch the reflection of the light off of his skin. Or his hair. He was so animated, his expression changing from minute to minute– and she bent down again to try them, in the margins – a frown, a smirk, a dead-on impersonation of North. It hadn't quite worked – she hadn't gotten any of them quite right.
She drew on a memory, instead, from yesterday – seeing him fly past her, while she was on Toothless' back. The wind had been playing havoc with his hair. He had been smiling at her, teasing her, before he took off to somersault on his staff. He'd been entirely in his element, like a prince of the sky.
Did he have any idea how marvelous he was?
Rapunzel sat back and sighed. She looked up at him for a moment, and found herself staring. His lanky frame, the long legs stretched out in front of him, the shock of white hair and those blue eyes and that smile… She looked down at her drawing pad. Why even attempt to capture it, when he was so inimitable and so perfect and right in front of –
He wasn't right in front of her anymore. He was right next to her, leaning over her shoulder and asking "What are you drawing, Zellie?"
"AAH! Nothing!" she flung the drawing pad away from her – and by a miracle of mis-coordination, managed to fling it right up into the air. As loose sheets of paper fluttered down like snowflakes and Rapunzel's heart beat out a merry tattoo, she attempted casualness, "Uh… why do you ask?"