Secret of Frost and Moon

Memory of a Smile

Alaia Skyhawk: yeah, it's been a while, but here's the next one. Enjoy! :D

Also, the info about Juno comes from a wiki page, so I take no responsibility for how accurate it is (or how badly the wiki misled me lol)

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 73: Memory of a Smile

Three more months rolled by... Three more months of seeking out and removing the Unnatural Fear from children. Three more of tending to that role, while at the same time being faced by the suspicions and antagonism of other immortals.

Kosmotis glanced over his shoulder at his current 'stalker'. An older Legend, who had changed her name and role more than a dozen times, but was most prominently known as Hera or Juno. Her original name was Hera before she was Juno, and she had more recently been a 'goddess' of the Roman Empire; her roles having been so diverse and changed so often, that in present times archaeologists struggled to decide which of those they'd discovered were accurate and which were not. Truth was, they all were, and she remained as unpredictable now as her Legend was chaotic. Which was saying something, considering her reputation among the Greeks was a stark contrast to her prevailing one among the Romans. To the Romans she was mostly a patron of women, birth, fertility, and other related matters, with more than a few war-like hints... Among the Greeks, as Hera, the stories painted her as the vicious and horrifically jealous wife of Zeus.

Kosmotis sighed to himself, continuing onwards astride the charcoal-grey pegasus his daughter had loaned him for this trip. By all accounts, according to Mother Nature, Juno wasn't actually that bad of a person. In fact the majority of the time she was quite pleasant... It was just her habit of needless suspicion, and propensity for losing her temper at unpredictable and often minor things, that caused most immortals to maintain a discrete distance from her.

A distance he devoutly wished he had at this moment. She'd not attacked him, his clothing and the pegasus were proof he was working for his daughter, but her innate suspicion and 'Pitch's' reputation had meant she'd followed him on and off for the past two weeks.

He sighed again, the pegasus glancing back at him to where he sat astride it's shoulders, and he reached forward to pat it on the neck.

"My apologies, Umbra, it's not my intent to make you worry about me. I'm just tired by those who view me as 'Pitch'."

Umbra craned his neck further, to see past his rider to the immortal following them, and let out an equine snort of disgust. Pegasi, like the Unicorns, were few in number these days and lived under Mother Nature's protection. But unlike their passive cousins, Pegasi were more than willing to express their displeasure with teeth and hooves when annoyed. It showed in their general bold attitude, and their brash confidence.

Umbra turned his head forward, shook it, and interrupted his gliding gallop through the air. That interruption being to kick out a back leg, only once, but that action struck a shard of lightning from the air and sent it skimming past Juno's shoulder.

She dodged to the side in surprise, plummeting several feet from the air, and Umbra loudly neighed what was obviously some form of equine insult before huffing with horse-ish laughter. Kosmotis managed a smile at that as well, appreciating the friendship the pegasus had given him. It was just a pity Umbra couldn't accompany him on his work rounds, it would slow him down too much. Still, there would be plenty of times like these to enjoy a ride together.

And the destination of this ride? That was the village to be found up ahead, here in the frigid lands of Siberia. Although right now it was actually fairly warm, what with it being Northern Summer. Kosmotis was on his way to see a certain boy and his sister, as he'd been invited to do three months ago.