Secret of Frost and Moon

I believe, I believe, I believe

Alaia Skyhawk:

Disclaimer: I don't own Rise of the Guardians, the Guardians of Childhood, or any related characters etc. This story is written purely for entertainment purposes.

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Chapter 16: I believe, I believe, I believe

Jack sighed as he descended towards the village, the first snows of winter having fallen on it the previous afternoon. He'd gone to the Winter Sanctuary after leaving Santoff Claussen, wanting to keep the books as a surprise for when he could go to the village and stay put for a while. But even that week and bit of delay had been test in resisting temptation. He'd spent it looking at the stories written by Katherine, and practicing reading them aloud. He'd never really been much for telling stories around camp-fires before he'd died and come back, and he wanted to make sure he'd do those tales justice.

His expression now changed to a smile, when the village itself had come into view. He could see the garlands of ivy, fern, and winterberries hung on every porch, and the little shrine at the base of the storm pole had a pile of berries in front of it as well.

Jack landed with the grace of a snowflake on the top of the little shrine, frosting over its roof before spiralling the frost up the pole. The nearby children began to smile and point when they saw him, and the nearby adults looked reassured to know the Spirit of Winter had returned and given the village his blessing.

There wasn't enough snow on the ground yet for a snowball fight, but Jack did grin at the children mischievously.

"Come to the pond this afternoon. I've got a surprise for you all."

The children darted away to tell the rest of their friends, and Jack took that opportunity to discretely slip into his sister's cabin. Albert wasn't there when he entered, but she was, and she was sat at the table spooning mashed up vegetables into her son's mouth.

Jack couldn't help but stare, at the sheer change between his nephew when he was newborn and the way he was now. After spending all of summer and autumn locked into reading books with no concept of the time passing, this evidence of how long it had been was something of a shock. He'd missed so much while he was away.

Little Thomas' gaze fixed on him, the infant curious about this new visitor. It was that which made Emily realise that someone was there, and she turned before gasping in joy.

"Jack!"

She was at his side in moments, pulling him into a hug that he gladly returned. He then picked up the bag he'd set down, and held it out to her.

"These are for you, although I'll be borrowing a few of them now and then to read to the children."

Emily's eyes widened, as she then accepted the bag and quickly opened it to reveal roughly thirty or so different books. For a community out in the wilds, the collection would be worth a small fortune if she'd had to buy them, for all of them were leather-bound and made of the finest quality materials... Mr Qwerty wouldn't have accepted anything less.

She set the bag on the table, beside the wooden chair where Thomas was propped up in a nest of folded blankets, and lifted out one of the books.

"Oh Jack, where did you get these?"

He continued to smile, and spoke with a hint of humour.

"They're a gift from Ombric, and his library assistant, Mr Qwerty. Qwerty got quite worked up when he learnt almost no-one here could read, so he may have added a few more books than what I asked for copies of." He now started to look a bit embarrassed. "Ombric got me started on reading, and then besides my Southern Winter duties, I've spent most of the last six months with my nose stuck in one book or another. Reading's actually quite easy once you start to get the idea of how the words are written. I've got copies of the teaching books in there as well, so I can show you how to read during this winter, and then you can teach the children during the summer. All the others in there are storybooks, and there's even one full of stories written by 'Mother Goose'."