chatelaine of cair paravel

[charning]

In the wood, near but not too near the Lantern, drives a sledge, drawn by a reindeer under the whip of a Dwarf, and carrying a woman, of sorts. She is taller, and paler, and somehow - grander, more terrible, colder even than the deep winter through which she rides. The furs are decorative; she wears nothing over her ears, which, were she human, would spell frostbite given how long she has been on this ride.

The harness-bells jingle tinnily.

Comments

[pythbox]

"Bye, your majesty," he says, and he scampers off to pack.

He doesn't bring a companion; he does bring food that will last, and flasks for water, and a sword and a knife and a good coat. And the map. From all of the hunting he has done for his Queen, he knows little tricks like how to take shelter in the snow and which trees to trust with his business; he won't have any trouble crossing the country of Narnia.

After that, it may get interesting.

[alicornucopia]

It does not get very interesting. Winter may be a human, but he has been in Narnia long enough to pick up the speech and habits and dress of Narnians, and could be mistaken for a young midgety giant or a certain type of incubus. No creatures he meets outside of Narnia's borders know who or what the White Witch keeps at her right hand; they see the blades he carries and the way he walks and presume that his business, if he doesn't trouble them with it, is his own.

There are a great many mountains in his way, with hazardous slopes and even bitterer cold at the high altitudes.

But once they have been crossed, there is a garden.

[pythbox]

He pushes back his hood and looks at the garden with a feeling of immense satisfaction.

[alicornucopia]

There are some words, just as the Queen said.

Come in by the gold gates or not at all
take of my fruit for others or forbear
for those who steal or those who climb my wall
shall find their heart's desire and find despair

[pythbox]

Shrugging, he tries the gate.

[alicornucopia]

It opens.

[pythbox]

He smiles at it and enters the garden.

[alicornucopia]

And there is an apple tree.

[pythbox]

He's kind of hungry.

He takes three.

[alicornucopia]

The first one does nothing in particular, except be oddly dark-fleshed and juicy for an apple, that he can detect.

At the second, he feels cold, when he first bites it - and colder as he goes on - and at the end of the apple he is so much so that "cold" has ceased to have meaning; he can no more feel cold than a snowflake can.

At the third apple, he may notice the color of his hands changing, as though he is a snowflake, or a human-shaped tracery of frost on the landscape.

[jackfrostbite]

That first bite of the second apple almost stops him, but he keeps going so he can find out what happens.

And what happens is -

He laughs with delight, drags a handful of long curly hair in front of his face; the morning light ripples through it, glinting blue and white and green from the ice-black strands. He stretches out his arms and watches them shine with all the colours of frost.

"I'm Winter," he says gleefully, spinning around with his arms flung out, whirling and whirling until he sits dizzily at the base of the tree. He hugs it. It is a good tree and he loves it very much. He's not hungry anymore, not even a little bit, except for the familiar squirming ache when he thinks about jelly beans.

He doesn't get hungry again the whole way back to the castle.

He eats anyway, once or twice, and the rest of the time he doesn't; it doesn't seem to hurt him either way. He does get thirsty, but eating ice and snow solves that. He's stronger and faster, though not as strong as his queen; he tires more slowly, but he still needs to sleep.

He can curl up in a snowbank and it won't melt. Snow makes a nice blanket, when it's light and fluffy. He does that a lot.

A month and a half after he left, he arrives at the castle gate with snow in his hair and a bright beaming smile.

[charning]

Jadis is quite fascinated.

"My dear Eternal Winter," she purrs. "Whatever has happened to you? Tell me everything."

[jackfrostbite]

"I ate some apples," he shrugs. "And now I'm all - frosty."

[charning]

She laughs. "I told you to eat one apple, greedy child. Who knows what will come of this in the long run? But come here, sit by me, and I will give you some jellybeans, unless you no longer want them now that you have changed color and grown chilled."

[jackfrostbite]

He sits by her and grins up at her.

"No, give me some, give me some."

[charning]

She rearranges him according to some opaque whim and pats his cheek and conjures up a jar of jellybeans; it is the first full jar he's been allowed since she first collected him.

[jackfrostbite]

He hugs the jar happily before he starts eating them.

[charning]

"Dear Eternal Winter," Jadis purrs.

[jackfrostbite]

He giggles around a mouthful of jelly beans.

[charning]

Time goes on, but while Jadis didn't want her Winter snatched away by the end of mortal life, this apparently doesn't mean her interest in him is actually infinite. It fades gradually; there is never a reason offered her to move him from his chambers to the servants' quarters, so he keeps his accustomed lodgings, but her attention - and the jellybeans - become less frequent.

On one occasion, she produces a container of jellybeans not for him, but for Maugrim to distribute, because she is going to an island in the far North with some of her retinue - and not Winter - in the hopes of retrieving some arifacts and books that may have use for her. The jellybeans are to keep Winter "out of trouble" in her absence.

They are promptly distributed, and everyone who's received any - is, first of all, careful not to eat them, and, second, curious about the extent of how good they are at controlling Winter.

[jackfrostbite]

Winter, it turns out, will do all kinds of amusing tricks for a jelly bean.

[charning]

Jadis's trip lasts a long time.

The supply of jelly beans was pretty generous, though. It lasts too; everyone has enough to do and can only occasionally spend their down-time sending him on amusing capers or delegating Winter their less delicate chores in exchange for candy.

One day there is a fateful combination: an incubus with a jellybean and spare time and no ideas.

He toys with the green bean between his clawed thumb and forefinger. "I wonder what you would do for this," he purrs, in a voice like velvet and a serrated knife. "Has anyone found a limit to it yet?"

[jackfrostbite]

Winter laughs.

"Not yet, my lord. Do you care to try?"

[alicornucopia]

"Oh, maybe," says the incubus, as though he has something in mind. He doesn't, yet. He's not a very creative incubus. "What wouldn't you do?"

[jackfrostbite]

"Well, that would be telling," he says reasonably. "Do you just not have any good ideas, my lord? Because—" he licks his frost-blue lips "—I can think of a few."