RotG - A Bitter Frost - 9

I followed the lights north for a very long time. The fairies who were following me seemed to know what was going on but I was still in the dark. I passed over oceans, mountains, forests, farther and farther north until The entire landscape was just white. It snowed in some areas and I found it easier to fly up above the cloud cover, keeping my wings dry more easily and staying warmer. It was very cold - even more so above the clouds than under them - but the energy of flying, the rapid movement of my wings kept me fairly warm.

Suddenly, looming out of the white landscape was a huge building, tucked into a mountain side. It was bigger than any of the workhouses we had near our town in the Massachusetts Colony and there was smoke rising from various chimneys. The lights seemed to be coming from this building, from a point right over a large curved section of roof, so that's where I flew to. There was an opening in the roof, looking down into a large room. It seemed like the room went down several stories but at the top there was a balcony around it. There was a large spherical structure that was slowly turning and next to it on a platform stood three figures. There was a large man wearing red, a smaller person who seemed to be entirely gold-colored, and a very tall animal of some sort.

I hovered by the opening in the roof. The fairies flew right past me, ignoring my whispers of "wait, stop!" and flew down to where the three figures were standing. They seemed happy to see the man in red and the gold figure. The animal-like figure seemed confused, but the man looked up toward the roof opening.

"Hello, new Guardian!" he shouted up to me. Instinctively, I ducked out of sight but peeked back over the edge of the opening. "It is ok, please come in!" he called. Now the other two figures were looking up toward the roof too. I slowly moved over the opening again, looking down into the building. "Come, come," the man said with a laugh, "We do not bite. Well, maybe Bunny, but..." The animal figure reached over and smacked the man's arm. Bunny? I thought. I let myself fly slowly downward to the platform they were standing on. With how my wings were used to moving, it felt unnatural to be flying so slowly but I was a bit scared. The fairies flew back up to me, tugging on my fingertips and leading me down to the landing.

Up close, I could see that the animal figure did indeed seem to be a large bunny standing on its hind legs. He was much more intimidating than any bunny I'd ever seen. The smaller figure looked like a man, but no bigger than a child. He was wearing strange robes that seemed to have the texture of sand, and was entirely the color of a beach at sunset from head to toes - toes that were actually hovering a few inches above the ground. He wasn't nearly as scary-looking as the bunny. The tall man had a long white beard and was wearing a bright red top and black pants. He looked a lot like... Well, I thought it was silly of me, but he looked like the man in the stories of... "St. Nicholas?" I asked quietly, thinking that I must be losing my mind. But then again, after all that had happened to me in the last couple days, would it really be so strange?

The man let out another booming laugh as my fairies guided me down to the landing. My feet hit the cool floor and my wings slowed down but didn't stop - I was still nervous, I think, and I wanted to be able to fly away quickly if I needed to. Everyone was smiling at me but it was still strange. "Nicholas St. North, that is my name," the man said jovially, "but here I am mostly called North. I deliver presents to the children of the world on Christmas." My eyes must've been very wide. My mother had told me stories of St. Nicholas and we'd gotten presents around Christmas time but I never thought I'd meet him - and he spoke with a strange accent that I'd never heard before but of course how he talked was never mentioned in the stories. "This," he said with a grand gesture around the room, "is my workshop. My helpers - the yetis and the elves = and I make the toys." He gestured to the bunny and said, "This is Bunny-"

"E. Aster Bunnymund," the bunny said, cutting in, stepping forward and looking at me. "I'm the Easter Bunny." He also had a strange accent, but that wasn't the strangest thing.

I cocked my head to the side and raised an eyebrow in confusion. We celebrated Easter in our town but I'd never heard anything about a bunny of Easter. The man called North laughed again, clapping the bunny on the back and saying, "Bunny, where she is from they do not yet believe in you."

"Right," said the bunny, who, I guess, was just called Bunny for short. He looked a little sad but then said, "But they will soon!"

North smiled and then gestured toward the floating, gold-colored man, and at this point things were starting to make sense in my head. If the man was St Nicholas, who delivered presents on Christmas, then... Pippa's mother had mentioned the name to her when I saw them heading toward the meadow. "This is..." North started.

"The Sandman," I said, looking at him. He smiled and bowed though he didn't say anything.

"Yes, Sanderson Mansnoozie," North said. "But usually we call him Sandy. As you probably know, Sandy gives good dreams to people. He is the Guardian of Dreams. Bunny is the Guardian of Hope, and I," he said proudly, standing up a little straighter, "am the Guardian of Wonder."

A memory flickered into my head. There are those who have been chosen to guard Hope, Wonder, and Dreams, the Moon had told me, but there must someone to guard Memories. This is your task, Tabitha... You are a Guardian. I looked at them all watching me. "You're all Guardians?" I asked.

"Yes, and so are you," North said. "What is your name, child?"

"Tabi-" I started but then I remembered what the moon had told me. Your name will be Toothiana, the Tooth Fairy. "My name is Toothiana," I said slowly. "I am... the Tooth Fairy, the Guardian of Memories." I hadn't known what to say but the words seemed to come out on their own. "When children lose their baby teeth, my fairies and I collect them, leaving gifts in their place. Their teeth hold the most important memories of childhood, so I keep them at my Tooth Palace so that when they need to remember their childhood later on, we can help them." I was a little more confident now, though the words seemed to have been more the Moon's than mine. "Did the Moon choose all of you, too?"

North smiled. "Yes, Man in Moon chooses all Guardians. He has done a very pretty job with you," he said and the others nodded.  

"Are there more Guardians?" I asked.

"Not right now, no," he said. "It has just been us for a while, but I suppose Manny decided that it would be good for us to have help."

"Help?"

North walked over to me, took my shoulder gently and turned me around. The spherical shape I'd seen before from above I saw now was a globe and all over it there were little lights glowing. "These lights are the children of the world who believe in the Guardians. It is the Guardians' job to protect them, to keep safe the Wonder, Hope, and Dreams that children have - and now the Memories, since you are a Guardian."

I lifted off from the ground again, getting a closer look at the globe and the shining lights on it. I flew around it once, and then hovered over the area where my town was located. A few weeks ago I wouldn't have known where it was at all, but in just a few days of collecting teeth, I'd learned more about the geography of the earth than I had ever known. "Protect them from what?"

"From Pitch Black," said Bunny. I turned around and came back to land on the platform.

"From Fear," North said.

"What's Pitch Black?" I asked.

"Not 'what', 'who'. Maybe you have heard of the Boogey Man, yes?" North said. Above Sandman's head, images of a man with swept back hair appeared, seemingly made out of sand. Again, it was something I had heard stories about as a child. The Boogey Man would hide under beds and scare children in the night. When I was younger, he seemed a very scary figure, but as I grew up more I didn't believe in him anymore. I nodded. "The Boogey Man, his name is Pitch Black. He spreads fear in the hearts of children, making it hard for them to believe in us. Well, he did..."

"But we've gotten rid of him now," Bunny said proudly. "He was a big problem a while ago but we made sure that no one worries about him anymore."

"Still," North said, "We have to continue to protect the children. You see, as long as they believe in us, we have the power to keep spreading Dreams and Hope and Wonder, but if they stop believing in us-"

"Those powers go away," I said. "The Moon told me that about me and my powers."

"That's how it is for all of us," Bunny said. "Well, for those of us who are Guardians. Not the others."

"The others?" I asked.

"There are other people like us, immortal with special powers, but they're not Guardians. Their powers don't depend on people believing they exist. But they don't have any special part in protecting children, mostly they just do what they want." Bunny seemed a bit annoyed at saying this. "They don't have to work like we do. I mean, don't get me wrong, I love what I do, but-"

"I love what I do too," I burst out, unable to contain it. I was thinking of Pippa and the other kids from my town. "I love collecting teeth even though I never would've thought anything about it before. I think the Moon made me like it. But it's good to know that it helps protect the children. I like being a Guardian." Sandman smiled and bobbed up and down a little and North looked proud as ever. "But, I'm sorry, you were saying? Who are the others?"

"Well," Bunny continued, "There's the leprechaun in Ireland..."

"And a groundhog in the colonies that you came from, Tooth," North said. A groundhog? I thought, What's so special about a groundhog? Above Sandman's head appeared the image of a snowflake which I didn't understand but North continued, "Ah, and yes, a very new boy, Jack Frost!"

I guess it was just the name that struck me and made me want to ask more. "Jack Frost? Who is he?"

"A boy who has powers of Winter," Bunny said. "I definitely prefer Springtime, and why we needed a kid who can control Winter, I don't know. He can make it snow and freeze things and-" As Bunny talked, images of Winter in the town flicked into my head. The snow falling, the lake, ice skating with Jack and then sitting on the edge of the lake under the moonlight, staring at the hole in the ice where he'd fallen through... I shut my eyes tightly and shook my head, trying to clear the images but all I could see was Jack on the ice - a smile, and the sickening sound of ice cracking...

"Bunny," North said loudly, and I felt a small hand on my arm. I opened my eyes to see Sandman patting my arm with a sympathetic look while North said, "Tooth does not want to think about Winter, look, it upsets her."

"Oh," Bunny said. "Sorry, I didn't mean-"

"It's ok," I said.

An awkward silence followed but then North clapped his hands. "Well, now! It is time to do what we were all called here for," he said happily. "It is time to make you a Guardian, Tooth."

"I thought I was already-"

"We have to make it official," Bunny said while Sandman nodded eagerly.

Suddenly there was a flurry of movement and a burst of sound. All around me there we small shapes in red pointy suits with bells on the top - "St. Nicholas's Elves" I realized - and large bear-like creatures which I figured must've been what North had referred to as "yetis". The elves were playing grand music from horns while one of the yetis handed a giant book to North. While he leafed through it, Bunny and Sandman backed up until It was just me and North surrounded by elves and the bear-creatures.

"The Oath of the Guardians," he announced, looking at me while the music slowly faded out. "Will you, Toothiana, vow to watch over the children of the world, to guard them with you life, their hopes, their wishes, and their dreams, for they are all we have, all we are and all that we will ever be?"

Again I thought of Pippa and of countless children like her to whom I'd delivered gifts in return for teeth, children whose memories were now entrusted to me and my fairies. "I will," I said with a smile.

"Then congratulations, Toothiana, for you are now and forever more a Guardian." North smiled and applause broke out among the elves and the yetis, and Bunny and Sandman came over, both clapping as well though Sandy's claps didn't make any noise.

"Congratulations," Bunny said. "Now, if you'll excuse me, I have a holiday to prepare for. See you later," he said with a little salute before tapping the ground with his foot. I gasped as a large hole appeared and he dropped down into it, the hole closing up behind him.

North laughed. "Haha, yes, Bunny's tunnels can be surprising. That is how he gets everywhere so quickly - much in the same way that the wings Manny gave you allow you to travel fast. I nodded, still too surprised to say anything.

Above Sandman's head appeared an image of a child in bed and he gestured toward the opening in the roof, which I understood to mean that he was leaving too. "It was a pleasure to meet you," I said as he floated up through the roof and was off. It made me realize that I too should probably be getting back to my job. Already the locations of lost teeth were crowding up in my head. "I should go, too," I said. "It was nice to meet you. Thank you, North." I reached out to shake his hand and instead he pulled me into a hug.

"You are always welcome here, Tooth. I will be seeing you."

I said goodbye and zipped back up through the opening in the roof, my fairies following along after me.




***




As I flew, I thought about what Bunny had said about Jack Frost. Somewhere deep in my heart I wondered if he could possibly be the Jack I knew. If the Moon had chosen me, was it so wild to wonder if maybe Jack had been chosen too? They had said that he was new. I thought back to what I'd overheard my father and the town leader talking about: they'd never found my body - presumably because the Moon had changed it into this form - and they'd never found Jack's body either, so...Could it be? Would he have been chosen to be some sort of Winter spirit because he'd fallen through the ice? I didn't know - I didn't know how or why the Moon chose Guardians or other immortal creatures.

Then I realized, if the fairies had been collecting teeth, maybe they'd collected Jack's too. I flew faster, arriving at the Tooth Palace much more quickly than I should've considering how long it had taken me to fly to North's Workshop, but I suppose that it made sense given the way that the Tooth Palace seemed to move around in the sky.

Fairies were still coming and going, delivering coins and returning with teeth. A flurry on them buzzed around me as I returned and almost out of habit I began reciting the locations of teeth to them, and so they flew off in different directions while I flew over to the wall of tooth containers. I looked at all of the pictures on the ends. There were so many, it would take me forever to find his if they were - but there he was. The picture was unmistakable. It was Jack.

I delicately pulled the tube out of the wall. A few fairies fluttered around me still, watching curiously. I wondered what sort of memories were in this container. They probably wouldn't help me at all to find out if Jackson Overland had anything to do with Jack Frost but it was worth a try. I pressed a finger to the tube and it slowly opened up, but I only saw the teeth within. Most of the spaces were full but there were a couple still that would never be filled. I couldn't see the memories they held though, I realized, remembering how the Moon had explained things to me. The only person who could see the memories in the teeth would be the person that the teeth belonged to.

I sat back and sighed, tears coming to my eyes. Whenever I thought about Jack, I wanted to cry. I missed him and I wanted to know so badly what had happened to him. He had... died, I know, but could he possibly have come back as a creature like me? A few tears escaped my eyes and for a few moments I just wrapped my arms around myself and cried. My fairies flew close around me, their tiny hands resting on my forehead and my cheeks, trying to comfort me. I knew that if I kept thinking about Jack, and wondering, and hoping, and dreaming, that I would not get my job done. Wonder and Hope and Dreams were for the children of the world, and so were Memories. I had to protect them, which meant that I didn't have time for those things myself.

I brushed myself off and lifted into the air again with new resolve to collect teeth and protect children as best as I could. Maybe I would run into this Jack Frost person while I worked, or maybe I wouldn't. Maybe Jack had been chosen by the Moon and maybe he hadn't. I couldn't dwell on it.

I listed off more locations for my fairies and then after collecting a handful of pennies, I flew from the Tooth Palace to continue my job as Toothiana, the Tooth Fairy, collecting teeth and protecting memories.