The Spirit of Autumn // Jack Frost

Chapter 2

Present Day (800 years later)

"No freezing the fairies you hear me Jack!?" Tooth called.

Jack chuckled from where he sat on the top of his staff in a crouched position. Occasionally one of the fairies would alight on his shoulder but their feet would soon get frosted to his hoodie just from the cold he gave off.

"No promises," Jack remarked. "Especially since they're the ones starting it."

Tooth huffed as she buzzed off to see to the teeth. Jack flew over to the rafters above where Tooth worked and perched on one of the beams, swinging his staff lazily.

"Say Tooth," he remarked. "How come you stopped working in the field?" He asked. "it must have been something important if it kept you off the field for over 440 years."

Tooth had been buzzing around the patio, talking to the fairies so fast that it was hard to understand her. For a moment Jack thought she would collide with something but the moment he finished asking his question, she froze. Jack checked his staff and his hands to make sure he hadn't accidently hit her with ice for it really looked like she was frozen.

"Tooth?" Jack inquired.

Tooth slowly ducked her head and averted her pink eyes from Jack's gaze, "I would rather not talk about it right now Jack," she muttered.

Jack frowned, that was really unlike Tooth to not want to talk in general, but her reaction to his question was even more puzzling.

"Tooth..."

"I LOST SOMEONE IMPORTANT TO ME ALRIGHT!? Tooth yelled.

Jack fell off the beam and was just in time to catch himself before he collided with the ground. Tooth had never snapped, let alone yelled and now she was shaking with her hands clenched, tears streaming down her face.

"I... lost someone..." she whispered. "She was like a sister to me... She would go with me to collect teeth whenever she wasn't busy.... She would help North every Christmas and Bunny every Easter...She was the only one who understood Sandy..."

"Another Guardian?" Jack whispered.

Tooth nodded, "The fifth.... before you came along."

"There was another guardian," Jack whispered. "How come you guys never told me about her? And how come I never met her? I've been around for at least 300 years and I've been on the team for almost five decades."

Tooth sighed, "We had to keep it from you and you alone Jack.... Everyone else knows about her but you."

"But why me?" Jack insisted. "Why can't I know about her?"

"Because she is the spirit of autumn Jack," Tooth interrupted. "And she purposely asked that the spirit of winter not know about her existence... at least for a while."

"But why?"

Tooth groaned at Jack's persistence, "Because the spirits of Summer and Spring hurt her. They hurt her beyond words, so she left. She began to get distracted in her work as a guardian and as a spirit of a season. She found it hard to do her work when most of her mind and heart were concentrating on what had happened with her and the other spirits. This was long before you arrived Jack...when she left, she only said goodbye to North because she said that saying goodbye to the rest of us would make it too painful. She left a letter... where she expressed her apologies and how much she loved us... and explained why she was leaving. At the end of the letter, she asked that if there should ever be a spirit of winter, that he or she would not find out about her existence... if the spirit of winter did not find out about her existence, then he might be spared from the pain that was caused because of her frivolous feelings. At least, that's what she said."