Alban Arthuan
Little Things

"Fires burn well in the winter. They ward off the night and keep away the cold."





Tonight was clear, cold and somehow purifying as Renne rode through the city.

Wrapped in his furs to keep in his intense core temperature, he rode Ty'Rekh quietly, slowly down thoroughfares and through smaller side-roads. His physical path may have been aimless but his mind was on a singular course.
He knew what much of the market had to offer, knew what other towns near and far had to offer. Everything from the unusual to the amazingly exotic existed everywhere he went but none of that seemed to fit what he sought. This was Rhy'Din, the place of transience and uncertainty. What was extraordinary was too mundane.
Too impersonal.

He turned his pony Westward.

The city slowly gave way to the wilder country, where things just lived as they lived or died as they died. Fireworks and sparks made no impression in the quiet open and Renne almost smiled as the crisp wind blew snowflakes onto his nose.
Do you hear what I hear?

Renne dismounted and let his pony roam for a while as he crouched in the snow. The sky above him soon cleared its weatherclouds away and the snow stopped falling. The stars above hung silently and unseen from below. On the ground, Renne reflected on what he knew; his hands idly toying with a bit of the fallen snow for the few seconds it lasted before vapourising from his touch.
His PADD came out a little later and he asked it to tell the stories of winter. It spoke of Modranect, Eid ul-Adha, Yule, Bodhi Day, Hanukkah, Christmas and near a hundred others. Some were Human in origin, others were not. Yet in all of them, Renne found correlations.

he smiled, put his PADD away and trilled for Ty'Rekh.

--------------

He didn't like what could be, by some, "breaking in" but Renne reminded himself that logically, to "break" in, one must cause damage. He was careful to avoid that clause. Renne crawled carefully up the Red Dragon's wall and slipped in through the window. Holding his breath, regulating his temperature and praying the faint glow from his heartstone went unseen.
Do you know what I know?
Renne crept through the room, quietly hanging holly sprigs at each corner of the walls. On the bureau, he left a little etched snowflake atop a folded message.

Dude Three,

Have a reflection of light. Happy Christmas.

-Renne

He slipped back out and carefully shut the window behind him. When he was on the ground and away from the Red Dragon, Renne made a new line to an old song.

Friend is a light of his own.

Alban Arthuan
Victory in D Minor

"Ever heard a Russian bell ring? Listen to it and you might hear the tragic victories within."




The sky was a dark, frozen blue above Rhydin that night.

Parcels still lay on the Red Dragon Inn's bar but Renne wasn't there. He had missed a few souls so far in his gift-list but one of them seemed particularly impossible to find.
Ground searches had proven frustratingly fruitless but he'd gone as far as Copper Forge at one point. The cold North was no place for him; it was a thing only a Russian could love. Even so, it gave him at least some time to properly formulate something -- his beloved PADD had been utilised to great extent in some lessons.
What Russia was. How it began with the two brothers killed during their prayers. He had learned of nations, pride, triumph and atrocity, and as the creature spread his set of nine wings out, he began more lessons.
English. Vulcan. Everything he could listen to and get at least some grasp of at a beginning stage.

It was up here, in the frozen blue wind that the idea came.

He'd crafted the egg himself although it was no imperial-worthy wonder of gold or jewels. It was just a nice wood with an enamel coating. The tiny gift inside was an amber piece, meant to be worn around the neck. Renne had briefly thought of trying this thing with the precious metals and gems of Faberge himself but...it just didn't feel right with all the pretty baubles.
Thus, the egg had been created and sealed in its brown paper parcel and left on the Red Dragon's bar.

Renne remembered creating the thing and almost smiled. Up here though, with his furs done like a cape across his back and his new scarf proudly wound about his neck, he frowned more than once. He couldn't find the man and didn't know why.

At first, his emotions had been mild puzzlement.

By now, Renne was flying carefully, scouring for any Russian scent. It was worry, it was fear and while he'd probably be damned to admit his imagination was running wild, it couldn't be helped.
In all of his years, it was perhaps up in the here, the now and the freezing winter sky that he realised something.

His heart still couldn't stop trying.