Katherine was in her room at Santoff Claussen. It was almost the opposite in many ways to her room on the ship, and she hadn't realized until now just how much she missed this room, this place, this feeling.
The lamps were lit, and the evening cool and quiet, all calm and serene. Mr. QWERTY was lying, still slumbering, on the desk near where she worked. So far, nothing was waking him, but Katherine hoped the familiar sounds and scents of Big Root might urge him towards wakefulness.
Kailash was in her nest outside the tree, occasionally honking quietly to herself as she fussed with the sticks and treasures arraigned within the space. Nightlight was in the branches at the top of the tree, gazing out at the stars and thinking.
Katherine herself was writing in one of her many books. This one was a compilation of tales about the Guardians, a way to monitor the stories told about them and all their different iterations, including the occasional very strange stories that could sometimes throw their powers for a loop when belief in that version of their story waxed and waned.
Jack needed a chapter, and though Katherine was eager to fill write the chapter, it was a little depressing so far how few stories she had yet to fill it with. Next time she was with Jack, Katherine decided, she was going to have to tease more stories out of him. And maybe this time get some more details, seeing how few he'd gone into when it came to General Winter.
She would have to press harder next time, keep Jack from spinning it around on them, Katherine decided, tapping her pen against her cheek and smiling. What an improvement it was, this ingenious little thing, she thought idly. Ask someone from Santoff Claussen for a pen that didn't require fussing with inkwells and they would have created something amazing, surely, but it wouldn't have been so...simple, so non-frilled and practical, as the pens created in the last five hundred years.
This new world was amazing, and Jack was the cherry on top, Katherine decided, allowing herself to be sentimental in this moment, this space of peace and quiet and calm that seemed to call for such thoughts.
At least, it was, until her window flew open with a bang, letting in a rush of colder than seasonable air with a rush of snowflakes.
Katherine cried out in surprise, the cry turning into a laugh as she was tackled back onto the bed by a blur of blue and brown and white that resolved itself into a laughing Jack Frost, who had already backed off and was hovering over the bed rather than lying atop her as he had been for a few happy seconds.
"Hi!" he said cheerfully.
Katherine blew curl that had come lose from her ponytail out of her face. "Hello yourself," she said, levering herself upright. "What caused you to blow in like the North Wind? I do have a regular door, you know." She kept her tone light and teasing, so Jack wouldn't think she was actually upset, and was relaxed when he took it as the teasing it was.
After all, her windows were kept open and unlocked for Jack and Nightlight.
"Well," Jack drawled, floating down to perch on Katherine's bed, "I was with Bunny and Tooth and it happened to come up that you and North are keeping a se~cret," he said the last in a sing song, and Katherine tensed.
"Not just from me, from everyone else too," Jack continued, still watching Katherine, shifting to cross his arms, staff propped against the foot of her bed. "North's got tells that Bunny and Tooth know. So start talking, or I start tickling!"
