Secret of Frost and Moon

Revolution

Alaia Skyhawk: Well here's the next chapter. There's only going to be one for this particular time-period, because there are four major conflicts that will be referenced in this fic, and I don't want them to take up too much page-time. So without further ado, here's the first one.

Also, I did an absolute crap ton of internet searching for ANY clues on where Burgess is supposed to be within Pennsylvania, so that I could get a historically accurate name and distance-away for another town near it, but came up with absolutely squat. So the town I reference in this fic as being the one within travelling distance, is entirely made up. (grumbles) I hate it when I can't get the info I was looking for. If there's anyone who HAS found something to say where Burgess is, please let me know, thanks.

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.

~(-)~

Chapter 23: Revolution

The signs of it were everywhere, as wooden palisades and forts, as craters in earth and the shattered stumps of trees hit by cannon-fire. As men in red or blue uniforms, huddled in their separate camps around fires that gave off only a meagre amount of warmth. They were scars that not even a pristine layer of fresh snow could cover, and their presence edged at him like the ache of an open wound.

Jack flew overhead, his expression grim and unhappy. He understood the colonists' desire to be free, of the rules and restrictions that had rapidly become oppressive, but that didn't make the conflict sit any easier with him. He wanted to stop it somehow, to convince them they were being stupid to resort to slaughter, but he wasn't allowed to. Mother Nature had made that clear to him, very clear, when she'd come to him the day that war was declared. That had been three years ago, in 1775, yet now, in 1778, he was still bitter about what she'd told him.

Immortals were forbidden from seeking to change the course of wars among humans. Minor manipulation, within the bounds of their normal duties, they could get away with. But anything more than that and either she or the Man in the Moon would step in. She never said what the consequences would be if he did break the rules, but she did say that only once had they been broken, and since then no other immortal had dared even if the fate of the rule-breaker wasn't known beyond the fact they'd never been seen again.

And Jack, as unhappy and frustrated as he was, didn't want to put himself in the situation to find out.

And so he vented his frustrations by using the winter weather to hamper both armies, favouring neither side with better conditions than the other, and so no one could say his actions were a direct attempt to help one side win. He buried their military camps and much of the countryside with deep snow, raising the temperatures during the day to make the weather less harsh, but at the same time causing mud and slush to form under the white layer as the surface of it melted and the water drained through.

No soldier in either force, travelled anywhere unless they had to.

Jack's flight now took him over Kirktown, the large settlement that was two day's travel away from the village. The Revolutionaries had taken command of it, and stationed a small force in several of the buildings at the town's heart. Luckily this region was well away from the fighting, not so lucky was that the commander of the local force was a man with serious paranoia about the Loyalists. That they would come out here, or have spies out here, which meant Kirktown had become a very tense place to live.

It also meant the local Revolutionaries kept doing surprise searches of the nearest villages, but so far they'd decided that a certain nameless village two days trek away, wasn't worth the time. Searching a settlement that had only a dozen cabins, and who traded little but furs, wood-craft items, and a small amount of wool, was a 'waste of resources'.