[Legend of Sun Knight] fic: Entries in a Holy Knight's Journal: Third Entry
Took me four, five days to write 2k+ words... also, first piece of writing for May! Did not manage to write anything in April, sadly. Since this doesn't use a theme from 31days_exchange, I'm using my own header here. A very bad header. My headers are never the same. This makes me cringe.
Non-writing related... I started playing Professor Layton and the Diabolical Box. I was given a fat hamster to look after. I named the hamster... Tekatme. (Oh man, he'd be pissed). XDDDD I am perhaps too gleeful about this.
Title: Entries in a Holy Knight's Journal
Third Entry in a Holy Knight's Journal: “To Incur the Ice Knight’s Wrath, Mangle His Masterpieces.”
Fandom: The Legend of Sun Knight
Words: 2,760
Notes: So this was supposed to be a series of oneshots featuring two different knights each, but now it seems that I'm continuing exactly where I left off previously, just with a different POV. By the end of this, maybe two weeks will have passed in the story after following all the different knights for one chapter. Fun times. \o
Notes 2: Lots of spoilers in this one...first, spoilers for Leaf's name, a nickname of his, and some of his character quirks. I don't think they're plot-related spoilers, but still. Spoilers. Possibly also contains some spoilers for some of Ice's character quirks, though I'm not sure. My information is all jumbled. Also, even though I'm writing about some character quirks of Leaf's, that doesn't mean I have all that good a handle on his character. XD; I hope my interpretation of him feels IC. More notes at the end. XD
Previous Part
Third Entry in a Holy Knight's Journal: “To Incur the Ice Knight’s Wrath, Mangle His Masterpieces.”
Hi. My name is Elmairy Leaf. Not a lot of people call me “Elmairy”, not even among the Twelve Holy Knights, but I do sometimes get called... Strawberry by Sun. I’m not sure if I should be fond of his nickname for me or not, but that’s Sun for you. If he didn’t mess up your name, that meant you were either Lesus Judgment, or something was wrong with the world. Or he was still messing up your name, just privately to himself. I think he does it on purpose, maybe out of fondness, but I can never tell for sure.
While Strawberry isn’t a terribly bad nickname, especially since Sun’s nicknames for Blaze are much worse, I prefer the sense of closeness that my own name offers the most, but all I ever hear is “Leaf”, “Leaf Knight,” or “Knight-Captain Leaf”. My position has become who I am. I am my position, so much that people might not have even noticed that I’m not my teacher. It has only been a few months since I’ve become the official Leaf Knight, but the people of Leaf Bud City treat me exactly like they used to treat my teacher, the previous Leaf Knight.
It’s a bit lonely to think that almost no one knows me as “Elmairy”, but I also feel proud that I can be that Leaf Knight that everyone depends on. For me, the transition hadn’t been a hard one, unlike the transition for Storm and Earth, who had needed their new “character” drilled into them. In our very last lesson, my teacher’s parting words to me had been for me to be myself (and for me to remember to relieve my stress from time-to-time, but that’s a story for another time). I took that to mean that I could openly worry about my friends.
Just like now.
When I saw Storm walk out of the building, I gasped. “Storm! What happened to your eye?” I exclaimed. I lowered my bow and placed the arrow in my hand back into its quiver. Practice could wait until later, especially since I was still sore from overexerting myself two days ago. Shooting a hundred arrows at the practice dummy after Sun’s visit had not been my smartest idea, but at least it had prevented me from going after Sun instead...not that I would have done that. It’s not in my nature to do that! I wasn’t imagining Sun’s face when I was shooting those arrows either! I save that for my voodoo dolls...
One of Storm’s eyes was covered with a black eye-patch. He didn’t have that when I last saw him yesterday, heading for his room with a towering stack of paperwork. My imagination was already running wild. Had Storm’s eye been gouged out by a demon beast? Was Storm now blind? What if something had slashed at Storm’s eye and caused an infection? How would Storm be able to do his paperwork if the infection were to spread?
Storm snorted. “Just an infection from dirty water. Earth’s fault.”
So it was an infection! My heart thudded in my chest. “An infection?” I was about to ask what had attacked him until it finally hit me that Storm had said it was Earth’s fault. Still, even if the infection wasn’t the result of something malicious - surely Earth hadn’t done it on purpose - it was still serious!
“Have you gotten it looked at yet?” I asked, mind going through who Storm should visit. I was afraid he hadn’t gone out of his way to do that yet with how often he kept himself locked in his room so that he could finish his paperwork and avoid females at the same time.
Storm nodded. I instantly felt relief flood through me. “Is there anything I can do to help?” I asked.
He started shaking his head but seemed to change his mind halfway. His last shake turned into one resolute nod before he shoved a stack of paperwork at me. I hurriedly fumbled with them, managing to save them from slipping away with the combined effort of my free hand and my right knee.
“Thanks, Leaf, you’re the best,” Storm said, flashing me a grateful smile that would have made many females swoon, if only he were able to smile that naturally in front of them. “These need to be distributed to Ice.”
With that said, Storm walked back into the building. I blinked, wondering why he had even come outside in the first place, especially if he had been searching for Ice who wasn’t anywhere near here.
Surely I was thinking too much?
-----
My thoughts turned to Ice as I began my search for him. Ice was a quiet person who never spoke more than he needed to. It made conversations with him difficult and usually meant I felt like I was speaking to a wall. A wall might even make me feel less awkward, because then I wouldn’t have cold eyes staring at me, urging me to hurry up and make my point. Sometimes, I wonder if he finds my fretting annoying or if he dislikes me for some other reason. I don’t think I’m being too paranoid even though Ice’s expressions never change regardless of whether or not he feels happy or angry. The truth was that we weren’t friends, being on opposing factions like we were, but surely it didn’t have to be that way.
It just meant I had to try harder, right?
When I rounded the corner, I spotted some holy knights from the Ice Knight platoon. They were able to tell me where their captain was, though they did it quite solemnly, in slow, measured voices, as if speaking quickly and excitedly was out of the question. Maybe it was, since they were all Ice Knights. I remember witnessing Ice with his platoon once - they all stared at each other and spoke in short, clipped sentences, completely opposite of how my platoon works. The Ice Knight platoon must all understand each other very well to be able to do that.
After thanking them, I made my way towards where they had indicated - Ice’s quarters. Given the current time, he was most likely preparing dessert for everyone. No one talked about where their desserts came from, but everyone knew Ice was the source, and if they didn’t know, they only had to pass by Ice’s door to find out. The sweet scent was hard to miss, as was the perpetual smell of baked bread that Ice carried himself.
Ice was, like his platoon had mentioned, in his room. There was even someone else in there with him from the sound of things. Ice was probably deep in conversation with that person, or rather, that person was probably doing all the talking, since I think I mostly hear only one voice, and it wasn't Ice's deadpan voice. This one was much livelier, full of exclamations and jumbled words from being overly hasty.
I gently knocked on Ice's door, not wanting to disrupt the conversation too badly. When the talking didn't stop, I knocked again, this time a bit louder. The talking stopped abruptly.
There was some shuffling going on, a thud - what was going on in there? - before the door opened and brilliant blue eyes blinked at me, complete with a dazzling smile. I'd been prepared to be greeted by a frigid expression, so this set me back.
“Sun?” I asked somewhat confusedly.
“Brother Leaf, might you have a message from the God of Light for Sun?”
“Um, no,” I replied before looking down at the papers in my hand. I looked back up at Sun’s beaming face. “I have papers from... Storm? For Ice.”
“Ah, so it is Brother Ice’s presence that you are seeking,” Sun murmured. I nodded. This was Ice’s room, wasn’t it? I sniffed, smelling a rich scent of chocolate, a sure indicator that I was in the right place, though it was also true that such a scent wasn’t out-of-place in Sun’s room either...
Sun opened the door wider, revealing Ice busy at the oven. I was in the right place after all. I entered, once again amazed at how Ice had managed to convert half of his room into a kitchen. My feet were already taking me towards the seasoning section - Ice had a small but fine selection - before I remembered that I was here to give Ice papers. I stilled my footsteps, coming to a stop next to a table full of bread, cupcakes, and pies. Ice had truly outdone himself once again.
When Sun closed the door behind him, his entire demeanor changed. He was still the graceful Sun Knight that people looked up to, but the smile on his face was much more real, and dare I say... even somewhat goofy? He practically bounced over to the table next to me, his steps springy and light, before he bent down in front of the table, his golden hair dangling dangerously close to the whip cream on the cupcakes next to the pies.
“Don’t touch,” came Ice’s cold voice. I swivelled my head to look in his direction, just in time to see him take out a new batch of steaming bread. He wasn’t even looking this way, but I guess he didn’t need to look to know what Sun was doing.
“But you promised me pie! For throwing away my store-bought one,” pouted Sun. He was definitely pouting and had completely dropped the fancy speech. Ice spared a glance at Sun before staring pointedly at a tipped over mixing bowl on the floor that lay in the middle of a pool of chocolate. Maybe that was the result of the thud I had heard earlier and why the room smelled so heavily of chocolate.
You better clean that up was what Ice’s stare seemed to say. I could even hear an or else tacked onto that.
I felt like I was witnessing a domestic scene between a mother and her misbehaving child. In this case, the mother was Ice and the misbehaving child was Sun, who was still making eyes at the pies on the table. It was then that Sun finally seemed to remember my presence. He tore his gaze away from the pies and looked at me with eyes that seemed almost...calculating. Inadvertently, I took a step backwards.
“Ah, but I only disturbed the bowl because I was startled by the knock on the door...” Sun claimed.
I blinked. Hadn’t I knocked softly in warning? Still... “Let me help you clean that up,” I said. I placed the stack of papers I had for Ice on an unoccupied chair and bent down to clean up Sun’s mess, something that I seem to be doing more often than I should, yet I never refuse. At least, Sun started helping once Ice shot him a few more looks. I watched in amazement as Sun gingerly rolled up his sleeves and grabbed a rag. I would never have been able to get Sun to do that.
I was once again sidetracked - this time thanks to Sun - until Ice walked over to the table with his new batch of bread.
“Ah!” I exclaimed when Ice’s feet came into view.
Ice glanced down at me. Any other person would probably have their eyebrows raised at this point with my sudden exclamation at the sight of their feet, but Ice merely stared stonily. Looking up at Ice from where I was kneeling made him seem even more intimidating than usual. This feeling was only mitigated by the fact that Ice was wearing a pink apron as well as oven mitts decorated with red hearts. The image didn’t add up.
“Um,” I started. “Storm gave me some papers to give to you.”
I pointed at the stack of papers that I had placed on one of the chairs.
Ice followed my finger before he put the tray of bread down and scooped the papers up. His eyes then began roaming across the words. I returned to wiping the floor, since I wasn’t going to get a verbal response from Ice, and he looked completely engrossed in whatever the paperwork had to say anyway.
After Sun and I cleaned the floor until it sparkled, Ice finally allowed Sun a slice of pie. With Sun busy eating in the corner and the papers handed over like Storm had requested, it was time for me to take my leave.
However, before I left, Ice stopped me.
Much like how Storm had shoved his papers at me, Ice shoved something at my chest too, but instead of paperwork, this time it was an entire tray of bread (that was thankfully only warm to the touch). I hastily extended my hands.
“Kitchen,” he said.
“Okay,” I answered, grabbing the tray. I was going to pass by the temple kitchen on my way back anyway.
Even after my answer though, Ice still stood in front of me without moving. His eyes flicked down at the tray and then up at my face. I blinked, wondering if I was supposed to do anything. Oh! Maybe he wants me to try one.
“Ice, you shouldn’t even bother...” warned Sun from behind his pie. I wasn’t at all sure what he meant or if I had even heard correctly. Sometimes, I found Sun hard to follow even when he wasn’t using his fancy speech.
I sniffed the bread and kept an eye on Ice’s response as I did so. He looked like he was watching me carefully with his eyes trained on my every movement. However, once I breathed in the scent of green onion and corn, I completely forgot about Ice’s attention. My stomach rumbled. Balancing the tray on one hand, I rummaged in my pockets, producing two small bottles, one of pepper and the other of a special spice I had saved specifically for bringing out the best taste in bread. Like a man possessed, I sprinkled the seasoning over the bread, watching smugly when my handiwork settled over the tray of bread in a thin and beautiful layer.
With that done, I placed the two bottles back in my pockets. I was never without at least one bottle of seasoning. Who knew when I would end up needing to eat? Even if I didn’t have anything else, I at least had to have pepper.
I picked up one piece of bread and bit into it. Yup, using that spice was definitely a good choice. I was so lost in the rich taste that the spice brought out that I even closed my eyes to savor the taste.
When I cracked opened my eyes again, Ice had his back turned on me. I blinked. Perhaps it was because Ice never expressed himself through his facial expressions, but the way he held himself usually said a lot, and right now, he looked tense with his shoulders rigid. I edged to the right to peer over Ice’s shoulders so I could see if Sun knew what was going on. He had a better view of Ice’s face, and he seemed to be able to decipher Ice’s non-expressions better than me.
I blinked again.
Sun had his face in his hand. His shoulders were shaking so much that it looked like his pie was about to fall out of his other hand.
Did I do something? I wondered. Apprehensively, I turned my attention back to Ice.
I watched as Ice clenched his hands - now I knew something had to be up - and stalked back to the counter next to the oven, his long jacket rustling loudly in his steps. On the counter were some fruits that he had prepared. He paused in front of them, his head bowed.
I was about to move forward to ask him if something was wrong when his hand shot into the pile of fruits and snatched a single, red strawberry.
He then smashed the strawberry with a rolling pin.
Red juice spattered over the counter and speckled Ice's hand.
I stared.
I think I am very far from Ice's favorite person at the moment. I am definitely not being paranoid about this.
By the side, Sun pounded the table and hugged his stomach. He was no help at all.
-----
the end
More rambling notes!
This was inspired by a line of Sun's in volume three about how Ice looked when Leaf added seasoning on something made by Ice. Leaf is quite a fanatic with seasoning. Who would have thought? Though it sure took me forever to get Leaf interacting with Ice here...(and the scene that I wanted to write kind of fell... flat?) Poor Ice, another failed attempt at getting Leaf to eat something of his without adding seasoning. I think I might like to do the next one from Ice's POV. :3
Leaf also seems to have...voodoo dolls, but I tried not to mention that too much here. XD; I believe Ice's room does have a kitchen, though I don't know how it looks like, and do they use... ovens? Hm.
Most other details were made up by me. XDDD
Next Part
Non-writing related... I started playing Professor Layton and the Diabolical Box. I was given a fat hamster to look after. I named the hamster... Tekatme. (Oh man, he'd be pissed). XDDDD I am perhaps too gleeful about this.
Title: Entries in a Holy Knight's Journal
Third Entry in a Holy Knight's Journal: “To Incur the Ice Knight’s Wrath, Mangle His Masterpieces.”
Fandom: The Legend of Sun Knight
Words: 2,760
Notes: So this was supposed to be a series of oneshots featuring two different knights each, but now it seems that I'm continuing exactly where I left off previously, just with a different POV. By the end of this, maybe two weeks will have passed in the story after following all the different knights for one chapter. Fun times. \o
Notes 2: Lots of spoilers in this one...first, spoilers for Leaf's name, a nickname of his, and some of his character quirks. I don't think they're plot-related spoilers, but still. Spoilers. Possibly also contains some spoilers for some of Ice's character quirks, though I'm not sure. My information is all jumbled. Also, even though I'm writing about some character quirks of Leaf's, that doesn't mean I have all that good a handle on his character. XD; I hope my interpretation of him feels IC. More notes at the end. XD
Previous Part
Third Entry in a Holy Knight's Journal: “To Incur the Ice Knight’s Wrath, Mangle His Masterpieces.”
Hi. My name is Elmairy Leaf. Not a lot of people call me “Elmairy”, not even among the Twelve Holy Knights, but I do sometimes get called... Strawberry by Sun. I’m not sure if I should be fond of his nickname for me or not, but that’s Sun for you. If he didn’t mess up your name, that meant you were either Lesus Judgment, or something was wrong with the world. Or he was still messing up your name, just privately to himself. I think he does it on purpose, maybe out of fondness, but I can never tell for sure.
While Strawberry isn’t a terribly bad nickname, especially since Sun’s nicknames for Blaze are much worse, I prefer the sense of closeness that my own name offers the most, but all I ever hear is “Leaf”, “Leaf Knight,” or “Knight-Captain Leaf”. My position has become who I am. I am my position, so much that people might not have even noticed that I’m not my teacher. It has only been a few months since I’ve become the official Leaf Knight, but the people of Leaf Bud City treat me exactly like they used to treat my teacher, the previous Leaf Knight.
It’s a bit lonely to think that almost no one knows me as “Elmairy”, but I also feel proud that I can be that Leaf Knight that everyone depends on. For me, the transition hadn’t been a hard one, unlike the transition for Storm and Earth, who had needed their new “character” drilled into them. In our very last lesson, my teacher’s parting words to me had been for me to be myself (and for me to remember to relieve my stress from time-to-time, but that’s a story for another time). I took that to mean that I could openly worry about my friends.
Just like now.
When I saw Storm walk out of the building, I gasped. “Storm! What happened to your eye?” I exclaimed. I lowered my bow and placed the arrow in my hand back into its quiver. Practice could wait until later, especially since I was still sore from overexerting myself two days ago. Shooting a hundred arrows at the practice dummy after Sun’s visit had not been my smartest idea, but at least it had prevented me from going after Sun instead...not that I would have done that. It’s not in my nature to do that! I wasn’t imagining Sun’s face when I was shooting those arrows either! I save that for my voodoo dolls...
One of Storm’s eyes was covered with a black eye-patch. He didn’t have that when I last saw him yesterday, heading for his room with a towering stack of paperwork. My imagination was already running wild. Had Storm’s eye been gouged out by a demon beast? Was Storm now blind? What if something had slashed at Storm’s eye and caused an infection? How would Storm be able to do his paperwork if the infection were to spread?
Storm snorted. “Just an infection from dirty water. Earth’s fault.”
So it was an infection! My heart thudded in my chest. “An infection?” I was about to ask what had attacked him until it finally hit me that Storm had said it was Earth’s fault. Still, even if the infection wasn’t the result of something malicious - surely Earth hadn’t done it on purpose - it was still serious!
“Have you gotten it looked at yet?” I asked, mind going through who Storm should visit. I was afraid he hadn’t gone out of his way to do that yet with how often he kept himself locked in his room so that he could finish his paperwork and avoid females at the same time.
Storm nodded. I instantly felt relief flood through me. “Is there anything I can do to help?” I asked.
He started shaking his head but seemed to change his mind halfway. His last shake turned into one resolute nod before he shoved a stack of paperwork at me. I hurriedly fumbled with them, managing to save them from slipping away with the combined effort of my free hand and my right knee.
“Thanks, Leaf, you’re the best,” Storm said, flashing me a grateful smile that would have made many females swoon, if only he were able to smile that naturally in front of them. “These need to be distributed to Ice.”
With that said, Storm walked back into the building. I blinked, wondering why he had even come outside in the first place, especially if he had been searching for Ice who wasn’t anywhere near here.
Surely I was thinking too much?
-----
My thoughts turned to Ice as I began my search for him. Ice was a quiet person who never spoke more than he needed to. It made conversations with him difficult and usually meant I felt like I was speaking to a wall. A wall might even make me feel less awkward, because then I wouldn’t have cold eyes staring at me, urging me to hurry up and make my point. Sometimes, I wonder if he finds my fretting annoying or if he dislikes me for some other reason. I don’t think I’m being too paranoid even though Ice’s expressions never change regardless of whether or not he feels happy or angry. The truth was that we weren’t friends, being on opposing factions like we were, but surely it didn’t have to be that way.
It just meant I had to try harder, right?
When I rounded the corner, I spotted some holy knights from the Ice Knight platoon. They were able to tell me where their captain was, though they did it quite solemnly, in slow, measured voices, as if speaking quickly and excitedly was out of the question. Maybe it was, since they were all Ice Knights. I remember witnessing Ice with his platoon once - they all stared at each other and spoke in short, clipped sentences, completely opposite of how my platoon works. The Ice Knight platoon must all understand each other very well to be able to do that.
After thanking them, I made my way towards where they had indicated - Ice’s quarters. Given the current time, he was most likely preparing dessert for everyone. No one talked about where their desserts came from, but everyone knew Ice was the source, and if they didn’t know, they only had to pass by Ice’s door to find out. The sweet scent was hard to miss, as was the perpetual smell of baked bread that Ice carried himself.
Ice was, like his platoon had mentioned, in his room. There was even someone else in there with him from the sound of things. Ice was probably deep in conversation with that person, or rather, that person was probably doing all the talking, since I think I mostly hear only one voice, and it wasn't Ice's deadpan voice. This one was much livelier, full of exclamations and jumbled words from being overly hasty.
I gently knocked on Ice's door, not wanting to disrupt the conversation too badly. When the talking didn't stop, I knocked again, this time a bit louder. The talking stopped abruptly.
There was some shuffling going on, a thud - what was going on in there? - before the door opened and brilliant blue eyes blinked at me, complete with a dazzling smile. I'd been prepared to be greeted by a frigid expression, so this set me back.
“Sun?” I asked somewhat confusedly.
“Brother Leaf, might you have a message from the God of Light for Sun?”
“Um, no,” I replied before looking down at the papers in my hand. I looked back up at Sun’s beaming face. “I have papers from... Storm? For Ice.”
“Ah, so it is Brother Ice’s presence that you are seeking,” Sun murmured. I nodded. This was Ice’s room, wasn’t it? I sniffed, smelling a rich scent of chocolate, a sure indicator that I was in the right place, though it was also true that such a scent wasn’t out-of-place in Sun’s room either...
Sun opened the door wider, revealing Ice busy at the oven. I was in the right place after all. I entered, once again amazed at how Ice had managed to convert half of his room into a kitchen. My feet were already taking me towards the seasoning section - Ice had a small but fine selection - before I remembered that I was here to give Ice papers. I stilled my footsteps, coming to a stop next to a table full of bread, cupcakes, and pies. Ice had truly outdone himself once again.
When Sun closed the door behind him, his entire demeanor changed. He was still the graceful Sun Knight that people looked up to, but the smile on his face was much more real, and dare I say... even somewhat goofy? He practically bounced over to the table next to me, his steps springy and light, before he bent down in front of the table, his golden hair dangling dangerously close to the whip cream on the cupcakes next to the pies.
“Don’t touch,” came Ice’s cold voice. I swivelled my head to look in his direction, just in time to see him take out a new batch of steaming bread. He wasn’t even looking this way, but I guess he didn’t need to look to know what Sun was doing.
“But you promised me pie! For throwing away my store-bought one,” pouted Sun. He was definitely pouting and had completely dropped the fancy speech. Ice spared a glance at Sun before staring pointedly at a tipped over mixing bowl on the floor that lay in the middle of a pool of chocolate. Maybe that was the result of the thud I had heard earlier and why the room smelled so heavily of chocolate.
You better clean that up was what Ice’s stare seemed to say. I could even hear an or else tacked onto that.
I felt like I was witnessing a domestic scene between a mother and her misbehaving child. In this case, the mother was Ice and the misbehaving child was Sun, who was still making eyes at the pies on the table. It was then that Sun finally seemed to remember my presence. He tore his gaze away from the pies and looked at me with eyes that seemed almost...calculating. Inadvertently, I took a step backwards.
“Ah, but I only disturbed the bowl because I was startled by the knock on the door...” Sun claimed.
I blinked. Hadn’t I knocked softly in warning? Still... “Let me help you clean that up,” I said. I placed the stack of papers I had for Ice on an unoccupied chair and bent down to clean up Sun’s mess, something that I seem to be doing more often than I should, yet I never refuse. At least, Sun started helping once Ice shot him a few more looks. I watched in amazement as Sun gingerly rolled up his sleeves and grabbed a rag. I would never have been able to get Sun to do that.
I was once again sidetracked - this time thanks to Sun - until Ice walked over to the table with his new batch of bread.
“Ah!” I exclaimed when Ice’s feet came into view.
Ice glanced down at me. Any other person would probably have their eyebrows raised at this point with my sudden exclamation at the sight of their feet, but Ice merely stared stonily. Looking up at Ice from where I was kneeling made him seem even more intimidating than usual. This feeling was only mitigated by the fact that Ice was wearing a pink apron as well as oven mitts decorated with red hearts. The image didn’t add up.
“Um,” I started. “Storm gave me some papers to give to you.”
I pointed at the stack of papers that I had placed on one of the chairs.
Ice followed my finger before he put the tray of bread down and scooped the papers up. His eyes then began roaming across the words. I returned to wiping the floor, since I wasn’t going to get a verbal response from Ice, and he looked completely engrossed in whatever the paperwork had to say anyway.
After Sun and I cleaned the floor until it sparkled, Ice finally allowed Sun a slice of pie. With Sun busy eating in the corner and the papers handed over like Storm had requested, it was time for me to take my leave.
However, before I left, Ice stopped me.
Much like how Storm had shoved his papers at me, Ice shoved something at my chest too, but instead of paperwork, this time it was an entire tray of bread (that was thankfully only warm to the touch). I hastily extended my hands.
“Kitchen,” he said.
“Okay,” I answered, grabbing the tray. I was going to pass by the temple kitchen on my way back anyway.
Even after my answer though, Ice still stood in front of me without moving. His eyes flicked down at the tray and then up at my face. I blinked, wondering if I was supposed to do anything. Oh! Maybe he wants me to try one.
“Ice, you shouldn’t even bother...” warned Sun from behind his pie. I wasn’t at all sure what he meant or if I had even heard correctly. Sometimes, I found Sun hard to follow even when he wasn’t using his fancy speech.
I sniffed the bread and kept an eye on Ice’s response as I did so. He looked like he was watching me carefully with his eyes trained on my every movement. However, once I breathed in the scent of green onion and corn, I completely forgot about Ice’s attention. My stomach rumbled. Balancing the tray on one hand, I rummaged in my pockets, producing two small bottles, one of pepper and the other of a special spice I had saved specifically for bringing out the best taste in bread. Like a man possessed, I sprinkled the seasoning over the bread, watching smugly when my handiwork settled over the tray of bread in a thin and beautiful layer.
With that done, I placed the two bottles back in my pockets. I was never without at least one bottle of seasoning. Who knew when I would end up needing to eat? Even if I didn’t have anything else, I at least had to have pepper.
I picked up one piece of bread and bit into it. Yup, using that spice was definitely a good choice. I was so lost in the rich taste that the spice brought out that I even closed my eyes to savor the taste.
When I cracked opened my eyes again, Ice had his back turned on me. I blinked. Perhaps it was because Ice never expressed himself through his facial expressions, but the way he held himself usually said a lot, and right now, he looked tense with his shoulders rigid. I edged to the right to peer over Ice’s shoulders so I could see if Sun knew what was going on. He had a better view of Ice’s face, and he seemed to be able to decipher Ice’s non-expressions better than me.
I blinked again.
Sun had his face in his hand. His shoulders were shaking so much that it looked like his pie was about to fall out of his other hand.
Did I do something? I wondered. Apprehensively, I turned my attention back to Ice.
I watched as Ice clenched his hands - now I knew something had to be up - and stalked back to the counter next to the oven, his long jacket rustling loudly in his steps. On the counter were some fruits that he had prepared. He paused in front of them, his head bowed.
I was about to move forward to ask him if something was wrong when his hand shot into the pile of fruits and snatched a single, red strawberry.
He then smashed the strawberry with a rolling pin.
Red juice spattered over the counter and speckled Ice's hand.
I stared.
I think I am very far from Ice's favorite person at the moment. I am definitely not being paranoid about this.
By the side, Sun pounded the table and hugged his stomach. He was no help at all.
-----
the end
More rambling notes!
This was inspired by a line of Sun's in volume three about how Ice looked when Leaf added seasoning on something made by Ice. Leaf is quite a fanatic with seasoning. Who would have thought? Though it sure took me forever to get Leaf interacting with Ice here...(and the scene that I wanted to write kind of fell... flat?) Poor Ice, another failed attempt at getting Leaf to eat something of his without adding seasoning. I think I might like to do the next one from Ice's POV. :3
Leaf also seems to have...voodoo dolls, but I tried not to mention that too much here. XD; I believe Ice's room does have a kitchen, though I don't know how it looks like, and do they use... ovens? Hm.
Most other details were made up by me. XDDD
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