By Aife Bisclaveret, for Aya.
When Maggie opened the door the heat seemed to evaporate out of her. First her skin grew cool and then the cold dug deeper down into flesh and bone. There was still snow in the air, small, feathery flakes that danced in the wind and dusted the tops of her boots. The view before her was strange. It had been even before the snow had enveloped it but now all the little backyard landmarks, that she had just been getting used to, had disappeared under a dust cloth of white.
Seeing so much snow come down in such a short time had made Maggie thankful that the daybreakers they were living with seemed to have been trained by some pretty extreme survivalists. She had never seen so much tinned food outside of a supermarket never mind their stock piled gas, generator and satellite phone. Though Maggie was pretty sure they weren't preparing for winter despite the remoteness of where they were. The cabin was somewhere in North Dakota or at least that's what she thought but she wouldn't bet her life on it. The last town they had passed through had been at least an hour and a half and some 4 ever worsening roads behind them. They could have easily passed a state line in between and been none the wiser. She'd asked Sif but all she'd tell her was that they were east, west and north of nowhere but south of Canada.
Even east, west and north of nowhere wasn't safe enough for the daybreakers. They kept them all on a pretty tight leash, which didn't help the tension in the house. Maggie was dying to throw herself at the side of a mountain, to dig into the scars and hollows that marked its face or to throw all her energy into a game, to run up and down a pitch until her lungs were burning and then push herself that little farther, to make that tackle, to help her team. Mostly she just wanted to do something other than be cooped up inside waiting for the big ball of resentment in the cabin to explode.
Before Miles would have been going crazy too, dying to find something to climb or just wanting to get out and do something. But this wasn't before and now Miles had something more, something better that she couldn't understand. Everyday Arno took him out, teaching him how to ride the air currents, how to swoop down and catch his prey in his talons and how to use his powers as a shapeshifter. Miles loved it when he came home he would talk for hours about what he had done and what he had seen.
Delos got to go out too. Maggie considered that to be the most unfair considering he was the one who needed the protecting, though he was never allowed out alone. Still there were practical reasons for that too. He wasn't the only one who needed to hunt. Every couple of days Delos, Lionel, Rosa and Aaron would make up a hunting party and head into the woods. When they'd return her parents' eyes would go cold and wary as though they could still see the blood smeared across their mouths.
As she stood in the doorway Maggie watched her breath hang in the air, streams of condescending water molecules that seemed to freeze almost as they left her mouth. It reminded her of when she and Miles were young and used to pretend they were dragons blowing smoke at each other. The memory had seemed a lot more fun when she didn't know the truth about dragons, when they were the stuff of fairytales. Just like princes and castles she thought with a smile.
Everyone had been on edge until the news came through that the dragon had been killed. The daybreakers at the safe house had spoken of little else for a week, apart from the Witch Child and promise ceremonies. The witches had blown off steam by filling Miles in on the blood soaked past of his new species. It hadn't exactly been the best lead up to Christmas.
Maggie had hoped that once the new Wild Power was safe they could settle into a happy, normal Christmas, well as normal as possible under the circumstances. Fate, however, had other plans. It had decided that she would spend her Christmas Eve looking for a needle in a haystack. Actually a needle in a haystack was nothing compared to looking for a white kitten in a vast white landscape.
On reflection Maggie had to admit that he kitten had been a bad idea. It wasn't just that it had escaped sending her tramping out into the snow. It was simply a bad idea. She should have known better. She had an older brother; she knew a kitten was not a good gift idea for any 17-year-old boy much less for Delos. It had just seemed like a good idea at the time, which was pretty much a patented Maggie Neely move, act first and think about it later. Later had actually been two days earlier when Sif had handed her the little ball of fluff and she had realised what a dumb idea giving Delos a kitten for Christmas was. He already had so many responsibilities, the last thing he needed was to take care of a tiny living thing especially one that was stupid enough to run out of a warm house into the snow just because someone dropped a pot.
Maggie felt bad for thinking the kitten was stupid. The poor thing would probably freeze if she didn't find it. It wasn't its fault that she had made a mistake. The truth was the kitten was a substitute for what she had really wanted to give Delos, the perfect Christmas. She had wanted him to have the kind of Christmas her family had always had, warm and happy and full of love. She had wanted him to experience for himself the things that she had shown him when they first meet, when she had tried to show him what a family should really be like. When it became clear that that wasn't going to happen she had asked Sif to get the kitten for her.
She had known things wouldn't be easy when she got home but maybe she had been a little naïve. She had expected far too much from her parents. They had to deal with so much. It was hard for her but it was even harder for them. It might have been easier if they didn't have to leave their lives behind. Maggie had not expected that even though Aradia had told her that she and her family would have to be protected. She had no idea that it would be like this. She hadn't known she would have to leave her friends, her teams, her home, her life and she hadn't known that her parents would have to leave their lives behind too.
A week that was all Circle Daybreak had given them. One week to pack up their lives, make their excuses and say their goodbyes. Daybreak had helped of course. One week while Daybreak tested and videoed Delos, Maggie wondered how long they would have given her family if they hadn't wanted to assess Delos. Really it was no wonder that her parents resented Delos.
The resentment didn't bother Maggie half as much as their wariness, their fear. Delos saw it too and it made him cold with them, made him pull back into that glacial place where he was the proud, insolent prince who didn't care about anyone. And that just made it harder for her parents to see the real him, to see why she loved him. It was understandable. She was sure Delos would come to understand. Parents were naturally a little wary of their teenage daughter's boyfriends anyway and that was without the vampire and deadly weapon issues. She was sure that they would come around eventually though probably not in time for Christmas.
At least Miles and Delos were getting along. Miles was even trying to help Delos acclimatise to the outside world. Though Maggie wasn't sure how much help it was to make him watch Interview with A Vampire and The Lost Boys and he'd probably tried introducing Nirvana a little too early but he was making an effort. She was grateful for that.
In the middle of the backyard she strained her ears listening for the kitten. She thought she could hear a faint mewing but when she got to where she thought the sound was coming from there was nothing there. She was trudging her way back towards the centre of the yard when Miles appeared in the door.
"Maggie. What are you doing out there?" he asked.
"I'm searching for Delos's present."
"Why? What's it doing out there?"
"It escaped," she told him.
Miles raised his eyebrows, "Escaped? What exactly did you get him?"
Miles started to laugh when she told him about the kitten. It was a big mistake on his part. She was already riled up and here he was aggravating her more. Turning her back to him she picked up a pile of snow and packed it between her hands. She turned quickly and flung it at Miles. And hit Delos square in the chest. Maggie could feel her face redden as Delos just stood there with a shocked look on his face and Miles started laughing again.
Miles picked up a handful of snow and quickly shaped it into a ball. "Here you go," he said handing it to Delos. "You don't have to take that from her."
"Miles, we don't have time for this I have to find..."
Maggie's thought was cut off as her brother walked towards a bush at the side of the house and scooped the tiny kitten out of the snow.
"Shapeshifter remember," he told Maggie's surprised face. "Come on little guy," he said to the kitten, "Mommy and Daddy are about to let loose and I think we should be elsewhere."
"You should throw that at her before it melts," he told Delos as he passed, "It's a winter time tradition."
"I know about snowball fights," Delos said.
"Really, prove it," Maggie said running up to him and dumping the snow she had been gathering down the back of his sweater.
Delos exclaimed in shock and then chased after her laughing. It wasn't quite scaling a mountain or winning a soccer match but as they raced around the backyard hurling snow at each other Maggie could feel the tension begin to drain out of her. And when Delos finally caught up with her and tumbled them both into a pile of snow all other thoughts flew out of her head. All she could think about was his breath on her face and how her heart was thumping so loudly.
"You know Miles had been teaching me about Christmas traditions," he said to her, "Where can we find some mistletoe?"
"I think we can make do without it," she said with a smile and kissed him.
Fin.
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