Secret of Frost and Moon

Reminiscence

Alaia Skyhawk: Here's the next part :)

And I would like to thank Maybell's Stories for the great fanart cover she did for this story. Look for Maybellsspot on Deviantart it you'd like to see it.

Also HAPPY BIRTHDAY to Wilhelmina Grimm. You said today was going to be your birthday, and it so happens I planned to update yesterday once I got home from London. However, I delayed it a few hours to give you a birthday surprise! Hope you have a great day!

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 121: Reminiscence

It was a slightly harried-looking Pooka that emerged from the small meeting room two days after the weather incident. Leaving behind him several other much more flustered-looking fellows.

It was rather amazing really, in a very embarrassing way, just how many little but potentially catastrophic things had been missed in all the pre-training given to the various types of candidates to become immortals. Things that had slipped by the Pooka Brotherhood, but which were glaringly obvious to the one of their number who had been a Legend Immortal for over fifteen-thousand years.

Bunny ran a paw over his face and let out a sigh, before grimacing to himself and continuing towards one of the Citadel gardens. Sure they probably felt more embarrassed about this than he did, but it was still enough to make him wince when he thought about it. Probably because if he hadn't been an immortal all this time, and gained the knowledge and experience associated with it, he would have made the same mistakes himself.

It made the Pooka Brotherhood's 'no volunteering to become an immortal' policy into a recipe for misunderstanding... Which was why he'd now volunteered to be a consultant for them. Every new training method or alteration to existing ones would be run by him on Earth, before being distributed and used across the Allegiance. Extra work, yes, although it wouldn't be more than a few bits and pieces each year, and it would ward against any future incidents like the one with Emed.

Bunny winced at the thought, knowing exactly what it was like to be on the receiving end of one of Jack's lectures. And the fact he was so easy-going and cheerful most of the time, was part of why his lectures hit home so hard when he did come out with them. You never saw them coming, not from him.

Bunny reached the exit to the gardens, heading out along one of the winding paths among the depths of the greenery. Finding a place where a grove of trees left patches of dappled sunlight to stream through their leaves to the ground below. Beneath their shelter, among the grass, mossy rocks, and flowers around their roots, it was a lot like the Warren. And he had to admit to himself that, as much as a part of him hoped to one-day pay a visit back to the Pooka homeworld of Kanisarn, the Earth was the home of his heart now. Even if he wasn't a Legend Immortal now, he'd have chosen to stay there.

He sat among the rocks and closed his eyes, letting go of the stresses from his meetings with the other Pookas now on Lumeris. Settling into a half-doze within moments as he listened to the rustle of wind through leaves. As such he didn't hear her when she approached, what with Pooka's being one of the few creatures that can reliably sneak up on another Pooka. His only warning to her presence was when his sister sat down beside him and put an arm around his shoulders.

Lilali sighed, giving him a hug.

"You've changed, and I don't just mean that you're a Legend Immortal." She glanced at him sidelong. "Wyatt, Jakub, and the others you've been meeting with the past two days... I've never seen another Pooka make any of them wince like chastised children, the way you've been making them during the meetings. Before the Fall, you were always the one to avoid things like that. You were always the observer to things, and never a participant. You had to be forced to attend formal gatherings, always preferring to stay in your quarters and study your books."