ARCHITECT
If there was one thing Jack knew he could do well, it was using ice to create fun. But, he thought a tad smugly as he surveyed his handiwork, even for him, this was a new level.
"Jack, this is amazing!" Jamie cried, his voice shrill in his excitement. Sophie was already climbing the newly built ice structures and laughing happily as she slipped down a slide.
Jack laughed too, flicking his staff casually to add some roughness on the surfaces of his creations as extra traction for Sophie's little boots. He leaned against the nearest ice wall with a cockeyed grin. "Yeah, I read some architecture books from a library a while back. Practiced on ice scale models for a few years while I was bored hanging around the arctic."
It was a time he looked back on with mixed feelings. Some of the people who had come across his larger practice buildings had whispered of ghosts and spirits from ancient religions, giving him hope that maybe, finally, someone would see him. They never managed to name him as the creator, though, and eventually he'd moved on.
But the kids didn't need to know about any of that. Jamie was getting more intuitive and had started picking up on some of Jack's odd pauses, so he had to be a lot quicker at covering them lately. His first believer had a soft heart, and Jack didn't need to burden it-his job was to create fun, not melancholy.
After months of understanding care from the Guardians and innocent love from his believers, it was starting to coming a lot easier now.
Confident none of his thoughts showed on his face, Jack leaned against his staff and grinned as he watched Jamie join his sister stampeding across one of the bridges between the castle sections. Despite his nonchalance, he really had outdone himself for the Bennetts this time.
If it had been winter, he could've made the castle bigger for Jamie to run through, but since Sophie took after Bunny in her preferences, he had put more of his attention into the small details. The faceted towers glinted in the rays of sun dancing through the trees, the softening golden beams making the ice sparkle more like gold than like crystal. The main structures of the towers were historically accurate. (Well, accurate-ish. Based off of the pictures he'd seen in the books he'd studied.) He'd added the quintessential trappings of a castle; stone-block texture, battlements and wall-walks, sloped tower roofs, even narrow windows to imitate arrow slits.
Maybe they weren't completely accurate, but they sure looked awesome.
Other parts of the structure were purely fantastical. Jack had made several twining towers and walkways that looked more like living ice plants than a building, implemented several slides, and added a sturdy ladder up one of the tower walls that looked like icy ivy.
He grinned and added a spray of perfectly shaped flowers trailing from one of the bridges, tiny petals oh-so-delicate that a few warm breaths would melt their glittering forms away.
He tried not to imagine what Bunny would say if he saw Jack making flowers out of ice. Although come to think of it, the Aussie's entire existence was caught up with cute baby animals, pastel colors, and spring flowers, so he wouldn't really have any space to scoff.
"I'm a princess! In a tower!" Sophie announced gleefully from several feet above Jack's head, poking her head out the tower window that Jack had carefully made too narrow to fall out of. (As well as adding a fluffy snow drift beneath for safety. He wondered, sometimes, what about actually being seen by kids had turned him into a worrying mother hen. Centuries of far more reckless actions while seeking attention had usually ended up fine, but with two toothy smiles beaming down at him from small faces that weren't immortal, he wasn't willing to take the risk to change back to old habits again.)
These kids are worth turning into Tooth.
"Jaimeee! You have to rescue me! I'ma princess inna tower and I wanna get out but Pitch says no!" Sophie declared, casting her favorite villain in the role of her captor and Jamie in the role of her knight. "Come an rescue me!"
"I'm coming Sophie!" Jamie shouted valiantly. He ran past Jack, who laughed and wafted the hand holding his staff at Jamie's side. The Wind carried his magic to the younger boy, where it hardened into an ornate (dulled and rounded) dagger attached to his belt and caused a delighted whoop. Thinking for a moment, Jack smirked mischievously and added a small circle shield, thin enough that the nine-year-old could carry it, but thick enough to hold it's own weight.
"I'll be the villain keeping the princes guarded!" he volunteered, scooping a half-formed snowball out of the drift he'd created just for the occasion.
With the weather cooling off, Jack had been able to put more into his magic for the kids since he was no longer actively fighting the summer heat working against his powers. It still was far too warm for snow most of the day, but it was getting cool enough in the evenings to edge towards frost, making it perfectly reasonable to expend a little energy on ice sculptures for his favorite believers.
Jamie charged the castle, swinging his little flat blade as he cried out. "Don't worry, Sophie, I will free you!"
Jack threw his snowball with an appropriately evil cackle, pelting Jamie's shield with a crack! He winced and pointed his staff to shoot another burst of magic at the chipped shield, hardening it past its natural strength without increasing the thickness.
His magic flowed around him and danced in the air as the wind laughed in the treetops, creating a soft background noise to the kids' happy shrieks. It felt good to be playing again. He'd been so busy over the months Burgess was experiencing summer, partially by choice as he missed his first few believers so much that he wanted to stay busy to ignore it. He'd played plenty, of course, but there had also been a lot more work and planning and guardian meetings to think about. It was exhausting, even though it made him happier than he could ever remember being.
His believers had spread, too, adding to the busyness. To interact with them, he'd spent a lot more time globe-trotting this summer than he had in most of his years of solitude. Though he'd had several restless years where he didn't stop moving for any longer than a day or two, he usually did his job spreading winter and then left the weather to continue its own patterns after a little kickstart. The rest of Burgess's summer months, he'd choose a few crash zones to spend most of his time at and miss this lake until it was cool again.
He had never really known why he missed it so much before, apart from knowing it was where he'd woken up, which added an extra layer of confusion to the ache. After finding his toothbox, he finally knew the reason, and was starting to make peace with it.
Even so, it ached more to leave Burgess now that he had friends tying him here as well as the lake.
He snapped back to attention to the present when Jamie threw a poorly aimed snowball at the winter spirit, shouting "You can't keep her her, you fiend! Knave! I will defeat you and bring her home!"
Jack almost snorted, though he managed to preserve his menacing expression. Fiend? Knave? The kid was watching too many knight movies. (Knights and castles were his current thing, along with all the legends of the Guardians, of course.)
Jack pretended to dodge the snowball with exaggerated motions, instead flinging himself into its path by "accident." His antics earned an eye roll and a fondly exasperated "Jaaack!" from the older Bennett and a fresh round of giggles from the younger, exactly as intended.
Jack flopped to the ground in dramatized injury, gasping for air. "No! I will forever keep her here, for she is mine! You cannot defeat me!" He grunted, hauling himself to his feet with the amused wind tickling his hair against his ears. "Even with your mighty steed, I shall prevail!"
(Okay, maybe he'd also been watching too many of those knight movies with Jamie the few times he'd visited over the summer. It was hard to play their usual rowdy games when he was stuck inside in the air conditioning!)
"Steed?" Jamie looked confused. "But I didn't bring my stick horse today."
Jack felt a crafty grin pull at his lips. He'd been working on perfecting this trick for weeks with Sandy's help, and now was finally his chance to show Jamie!
Tapping the ground with the butt of his staff, he created a flat, smooth sheet of ice dusted with frost before bending down to poke a finger at it. With fast, fluid strokes, he sketched the large figure of a horse into the frost, before bending his head slightly to concentrate. With a moment of effort, he pulled the horse off the ice tablet and into the air, using his magic to fill in both details and substantiality until the ice creature was the size of a miniature pony, sturdy enough for a child to ride.
Jamie whooped with excitement when the frost horse tossed its head and ran towards him, scooping him up onto its neck to slide down to its back before galloping around the towers. His shrieks of laughter were nearly covered over by Sophie's squeals of "Me too, me too!"
Grinning wider and with more happiness than he'd felt in months (which was saying a lot; he'd had some really good moments in the past few months), Jack drew a tiny butterfly into the frost and flicked it into the air without effort, sending it fluttering around the little blonde's head to distract her while he made a second pony. He made Sophie's smaller than Jamie's and a bit daintier, and pulled it carefully into the air.
Giggling, Sophie clapped and followed the butterfly down the stairs at her toddling run, chasing it down to the waiting side of her small ice pony, which nickered and bumped its head into the little girl's hair. She shrieked in happiness and threw her arms around the creature's neck, not caring about its cold surface. Fortunately, the evening was chilly enough that Mrs. Bennett hadn't been too confused at her children bundling up extra warmly, so the kids were thickly swaddled in warm gear for their evening of icy entertainment.
Jack picked the little girl up and set her gently on her horse, wrapping her mittened hands into the handles he'd built into the shape of the frosty mane and let the pony trot off, carrying a bundle of happy shrieks to join the whooping Jamie, whose horse was running up and down the ramps Jack had built into the castle for that very purpose.
Jack sighed, his happiness softening in his tiredness. He leaned back into the wind's embrace and floated a little off the ground, watched the kids' delight. His eyes skimmed over his creations one more time, making sure the snow drifts along the ramps were deep enough if the kids should fall, and that the horses showed no sign of misshaping or melting.
He inhaled deeply again, pleasantly tired. Between the not-exactly-tiny castle construction, the snow drifts created from warmer air moisture, and animating two large frost creatures, he had used a lot of power in disciplined precision; something that his battle with Pitch and more recent skirmishes rarely required and he hadn't practiced on such a large scale in years. But it was fully worth it, to see Jamie and Sophie's smiles as they clung to the backs of their frosty steeds, faces bright with excited joy.
Between his creations and the sweet dreams Sandy would likely give him of the afternoon, he'd sleep well tonight.
Energy somewhat replenished after a few minutes of passive observation, Jack decided to up the stakes and retake the imaginary role of tower guard. He shouted dramatically about his imminent victory and started building a pile of snowballs, packing them lighter than usual (he didn't want the weight to knock the kids off, after all) before firing them at the prancing riders, eliciting yelps and giggles. He missed a few on purpose, getting progressively closer as Jamie dodged and ducked low over the horses neck, before throwing one perfectly at the younger boy's back to explode against his jacket.
Jamie shouted a laugh and tried to steer his frost horse away, but Jack pelted him with a few more snowballs before the pony dodged behind the castle. He tossed a very soft one at Sophie to scatter snowflakes in her hair, laughing along with her squeals.
"Jaaaaamie! Soooophie!"
Jack jumped, then froze, looking toward the voice. His horses froze as well at his moment of complete inattention, mostly self-directing but still connected to him enough to make them turn their heads towards the sound as well.
Jamie's smile melted, he and Sophie looking confused before the call came again. "Jaaamie! Soooophie! It's time for supper!"
Mrs. Bennett had come outside for her kids.
Jamie glanced at Jack, his expression uncertain. In the first few weeks after Easter, Jamie had tried to convince his mom of the Guardians' existence, and was discouraged by her fond dismissal of his "games." Jack had told him not to worry about it, that adults didn't believe the way kids did, but he knew Jamie was still disappointed. North had told him it was for the better, though– when adults started to believe, it tended to come with fear rather than wonder, and that wasn't what any of them wanted.
Jack smiled at his first believer, a little sadly– it seemed fun time was at a close for the day. "Go on, see what she wants," he urged. He chuckled and hooked a thumb at the castle. "Can't have her coming back here to see this thing!"
Jamie nodded and smiled, grabbing Sophie's mittened hand to run back to their mom.
***0***
Mrs. Bennett stirred the bubbling spaghetti sauce and peered out the window again, trying to catch a glimpse of her energetic children. They must have gone farther into the woods while she was in the pantry, because she couldn't see their coats through the trees any more.
Normally she would have waited another few minutes and finished the pasta– Jamie was old enough now that she trusted him to watch his sister for short periods of time– but after all of the things that had been weird recently, she worried when they were out of sight for too long.
She checked the pasta water, which was nearly boiling. She turned off the steaming sauce and lidded it to keep in the heat, wiping her hands on her apron. I'll go find them. It's almost time for supper anyway.
She slid on her shoes, shivering a little when she stepped out the door and pulling her sweater a little tighter around her. Though it was still barely into fall, her house and the surrounding area had already been hit with chillier weather, especially in the evenings.
"Jaaaaamie! Soooophie!" she called, crunching through the dampening leaves. She heard the telltale happy shrieks of her rambunctious children and headed that direction. "Jaaamie! Soooophie! It's time for supper!"
She carefully ignored the touch of relief that twinged in her chest when she saw Jamie running toward her with Sophie in tow. "Yeah, mom?"
Mrs. Bennett smiled warmly at them. "Hey, kiddos. It's time for dinner— the spaghetti will be done by the time you get the table set."
"It's Jamie's turn!" Sophie declared.
"I know that, Sophie, you did it yesterday." Jamie started to roll his eyes, then caught himself and looked at his mom. She gave him an encouraging smile. (She was doing her best to stamp out Jamie's occasional snotty responses before he became a teenager and they became the cultural norm.)
"What were you guys doing back there?" she asked.
Sophie bounced up and down. "We were–"
"Playing pretend," Jamie finished. "Sophie was the princess and I had to rescue her."
"Ahh, that sounds like fun!" Mrs. Bennett laughed.
Something glinted wetly through the swaying trees, the reflected gold light catching eye, and she strolled toward it, curious. "Were you building something in the leaves? What makes back here better than the playset in the…"
She trailed off.
There was a frenzied scrabble behind her as Jamie and Sophie caught up, but she was too busy staring to notice.
Before her rose a stunningly elaborate castle, twice her height and sparkling in the last pale sunbeams. It looked like it was carved from crystal, but the piles of snow at its base made her look again.
Ice?
There were two elaborate crystalline ponies standing closer to her in front of the castle, too detailed and lifelike to believe they were ice carvings. Feeling disconnected, Mrs. Bennett ran her fingers down one's curved face.
Cold fizzled up her fingers, the impossible ice solid and real beneath her touch.
What...
Still feeling distant from her body, Mrs. Bennett turned back to her kids. Jamie looked like a deer in the road and even her irrepressible Sophie was still, seeming to sense the tension.
A strange sensation twisted in her gut.
"What's all this?" she heard her own voice ask, remarkably calm for how impossible the scene around her was.
"Uhhh…" Jamie started, trailing off.
"Just … her the truth."
If she hadn't still felt so disconnected from reality, the unexpected voice would have made Mrs. Bennett jolt. As it was, she wasn't quite sure she'd heard it, really. It almost felt like it was more in her head, broken up as if from a long ways away.
"…might not… believe you, but…. better than… her a lie."
She shook her head slightly to dislodge the tickle of the words– this time they sounded like the were almost next to her.
She almost missed the moment Jamie focused on the empty air next to her, like he was looking at something.
The empty air where the impression of words had come from.
Did he hear them too?
The uncomfortable feeling twisted in her stomach again, and she was starting to lose the disconnected floating state that had allowed her to stay calm until now. "Jamie?"
His brown eyes flicked back to her, and hesitated for a moment.
"Well… Jack made it for us." Her son broke eye contact again and twisted his foot in the frosted leaves.
"...Jack made it."
Of course he did.
"Jack Frost?" she clarified for absolute certainty.
Of course, what other Jack would her children be talking about that could make a small ice palace with gorgeously detailed architecture in their back woods?
Jamie nodded hesitantly. "Yeah."
"Ah." She really wasn't sure why she'd needed to ask.
Jack Frost… a saying?
Imaginary friend– real ice…
What is going on…
After a moment, she forcibly shoved all her wild emerging thoughts back down to bubble beneath conscious attention until later, when she could actually think for a minute.
Right now, she really couldn't sort this out in front of her children.
"Well, it's time for supper, so you'll have to leave this here until tomorrow," she said in an admirably normal tone.
She struggled to keep her expression straight when Jamie looked to the side again, then nodded.
Sophie, clueless to the remaining tension now that her mom was acting normal again, waved cheerfully. "Bye, Jack!"
Mrs. Bennett followed her daughter's gaze. For a fraction of a second, she thought she saw a pale figure nearly blending into the snow, blue eyes widening as they fixed on hers.
Then she blinked, and the evening sun only reflected off the gleaming ice again.
She tore her gaze away before her fragile collected facade cracked and ushered a happy Sophie and a wide-eyed Jamie towards the house. All she had to do was finish the pasta and get the kids fed. Then she could send them to bed early with a book and a lamp and get the chance to breathe and engage her frazzled mind enough to make sense of all of this.
Just finish the pasta, she repeated, refusing to look back at the towers she knew were still glittering in the evening sun. Pasta, and then bed.
Pasta and bed.
***0***
Jack exhaled slowly, his breath unsteady.
The wind swirled agitatedly around him, whipping through his sweatshirt as it fretted, but Jack hardly noticed.
For a second, he could have sworn Mrs. Bennett's eyes had fixed on his.
Like she could see him.
Shaken, Jack gripped his staff and let the wind lift him, carrying him up past the yellowing leaves.
He would have to be more careful.
He wasn't sure how to do that without feeling like he was abandoning the Burgess kids, but he'd have to figure out something.
Something.
But what?
What did one even do when an adult started to believe in you?
A/N: Look at that- she does still live! I survived my six classes, y'all! (At the cost of sleep and all social life- I think I only saw my non-school friends about five times the entire semester... but hey, we did it!) All my limited writing time was sucked up by my creative writing class, though, so even though this was mostly typed for months, I still never got it up, blerg. I have many excuses, ha- thank you to all for your patience!
This is unbeta'd as always, and prolly a little excessive in descriptions. (...I got carried away...) But it's here! I've been wanting to write this chapter for ages, hehe. I hope y'all like it!
Thank you to everyone who followed and favorited in the gap! You're the best!
To my most fantabulous reviewers: DuckieLuver- I'm glad you like it! Finding tiny wonders unlooked for is so much fun for me, so I thought it was completely up Jack's alley! Hplover040505- Thank you! I'm so happy you like it! Nahau Moondust- Thank you! I'm glad it felt in character! Snowy Monday- He really is! There's a reason I have so much fun writing him, he's such a well-created character to play with! Ha, here's another shoutout- thanks for waiting so long, and I hope this chappie was worth it! Guest- I'm glad you like it! Did you survive your six classes? I hope you've gotten a little sleep this break! SpiritBlackPaw- Aww, I'm so glad you like it! Hopefully this was a nice addition to my biggest subplot. Thank you for the holiday wishes- I hope your festivities were lovely!
Ch 1, 44lunasolair- It makes me happy that you like it! Ch 10, Nyx- ohh, thank you for pointing that out! I'll adjust those details and appreciate the feedback!
Welp, there's your daily inundation of exclamation points, ha! Be kind to yourselves today, darlings, and thank you so much for visiting my little nook of the internet! Until next time! (Prolly another few months, eheheh...)
Elen out!