Drabble #63: Solstice
Friday, 1 December 2017 00:01![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
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labyfic...we had a very quiet response to the drabble prompt of Drabble 62, with an entry by me (your intrepid drabble proposer
jalenstrix). We were more lively on the commenting love, with encouraging words by the tremendous 3iggy and the gorgeous ghislaine.Mwah, my dear labyfic collective!
For this prompt, we continue with our one-word drabble roots, again taking inspiration from the seasonal change:
Solstice
Such a special point in time, with so many possibilities. What could be happening then? Why? And more importantly, with whom and how? Tell us all about it. You know you want to.
I continue to enjoy the 300 word limit, so let's continue with it for this month. Though remember that shorter pieces are most definitely welcome!
Your entry should take the following format, posted as a comment on this entry:
Word count: # of words
Drabble: $your_beautiful_drabble
I'll aim to get the next drabble challenge out on the first Wednesday of next month (Jan 3).
I'm also very happy to take suggestions if something in particular strikes your fancy -- comment on this post or PM me with your suggestions. You can see our current collected suggestions here.
Remember: Feedback is LOVE. So do reply to your fellow labyficcers' drabbles if so inclined. (Though be careful of concrit unless specifically okayed by the author beforehand.)
Funeral Festivities
2017-12-03 02:42 (UTC)Drabble:
Toby couldn’t stop staring as they squeezed through the throngs of reveling fairy tale creatures. A pretty golden eyed wood nymph smiled at him enticingly as they slipped past. Toby swallowed and smiled stupidly before Sarah rolled her eyes and pulled him along.
Snapping back to attention Toby asked, “So, the Holly King...this solstice thing is his funeral?”
“Well, in a way, yes. He’s not truly dead. We can’t take anything for face value in fairy. Umm, try to think of it as an annual going dormant funeral-slash-party.”
“Oh, like a hibernating bear?”
“That would be one way to put it.” Sarah called back. During the previous year’s festivities the Holly King, or Green Man, had successfully managed to outdrink a large horde of Jareth’s goblins and still manage to take three steps before succumbing to his intoxication. Yes, a hibernating bear was indeed an accurate description of that particular aftermath.
Sarah wasn’t totally comfortable with exposing Toby to this level of fairy, but she’d little choice. Her parents deserved to celebrate their twentieth anniversary. She knew the shenanigans a high school senior could get into with a full week of freedom. Better she was present.
Sarah saw the familiar blonde head she’d been searching for. The slender figure turned; granting a wicked smile in greeting.
“I knew you’d still come.” Jareth murmured to Sarah as he passed both siblings goblets of mulled wine.
Sarah gave Jareth an exasperated look. Toby smiled and took a large gulp before loudly coughing.
Jareth clapped the young man on the back a few times in response.
“You okay, Tobes?” Sarah questioned.
He cleared his throat before giving the thumbs up.
“I think it’s best we steer him far from the Holly King.” Jareth responded.
“Yes, and most definitely from your goblin horde.”
Re: Funeral Festivities
2017-12-03 23:46 (UTC)Re: Funeral Festivities
2017-12-04 03:27 (UTC)Re: Funeral Festivities
2017-12-06 18:08 (UTC)Re: Funeral Festivities
2023-08-08 10:19 (UTC)no subject
2017-12-11 18:39 (UTC)Drabble:
I breathed in the night air, letting its crispness slowly fill me as I looked up at Jareth. He was officially scrumptious, with those patrician features and long, lean limbs. I knew he wasn’t using a glamour either. This was au naturel Jareth. And that was Faerie Lords for you.
Said scrumptious Faerie Lord was staring into the fire in front of us and studiously avoiding my gaze.
My patience gave out. “Well?”
“Well what?”
“It’s the solstice.”
“And?”
“Isn’t that supposed to be significant to you magical types?”
He shrugged. “Could be.”
“So you’re really just going to spend it here curled up under a blanket with me toasting marshmallows?”
He stretched his feet against mine and shifted his marshmallow to toast on the other side. “Looks like it.”
“That can’t be good for recharging your magical energy.”
“There are other energies of mine that need recharging.”
I smiled in spite of myself. “Toasted-marshmallow-based energies, your highness?”
The heat of him flared along my back like wildfire. “Among others, Sarah mine.”
no subject
2017-12-15 01:32 (UTC)no subject
2017-12-22 15:49 (UTC)no subject
2023-08-08 10:21 (UTC)no subject
2017-12-15 02:39 (UTC)Drabble:
The lights reminded Sarah of the glory of the ball that had lain within a single dreaming bubble, where she had danced with Jareth. She lay in her bed, listening to the wind gusting. From somewhere, a barn owl hooted, while her own tiny Christmas tree winked at her in the darkness.
The hooting of the owl went on, and the wind gusted harder. Suddenly, the casements blew open and Sarah jerked to her feet. Snow billowed into her room through the balcony doors. She began to brush the snow off the sill, feeling as she did so something cold and hard beneath her palm. A diamond ring glittered like ice. It numbed her skin, as though it had remained in the cold for a long, long time.
As Sarah held it to the dim light, she heard a voice near her ear, but she knew that it echoed from within her mind: “Merry Christmas, Sarah. Wear my gift.”
The diamond was adorned with delicate strands of platinum that looped over it like a Bohrs model of the atom. Sarah placed it on her right hand.
“Does it please you?”
The voice was anxious, as though he genuinely feared she would reject his gift. A hope that she sensed she should not feel embraced her heart, that some magic still awaited her, undiscovered. The dark void outside, where the sense of him permeated, felt long and embracing.
Sarah summoned her sense and brushed away the rest of the snow, closing the casements.
“Yes,” she said softly. “It’s beautiful, but...” Her face suffused with warmth. She remembered his intense gaze on her at the ball, amused by her confusion. “What will I tell people who ask about it?”
“That your boyfriend gave it to you.” His voice was droll.
no subject
2017-12-22 15:51 (UTC)I also love the amused Jareth-comment at the end. Her boyfriend, indeed. I can just hear the smirk in his voice. Love it!
no subject
2023-08-08 10:23 (UTC)Enchantment
2023-08-08 10:24 (UTC)Drabble:
Sarah was having one of the minor disconnects she occasionally experienced when dealing with the world Above. She’d been catching up with Irene, who had been filling her in on the latest family gossip, as well as giving her a gleeful update on how well her charity venture was performing.
Jareth had been correct in how much Irene relished her role of door bitch and getting to put her talents to use in sourcing the much needed equipment, products and services that were desperately required by the local charities who were the recipients of her procurement skills.
Once she’d given Sarah a full rundown of all the men she’d made cry as part of her business, Irene had been effusive in her description of her evening out. There was a cosy restaurant with a dance floor and a huge bunch of Irene’s favourite flowers. Sarah’s father had gone all out. She’d even let her know about Toby’s outing with his latest girlfriend before asking how Sarah had spent the day.
It had been a run of several days of her and Jareth passing each other in the halls between their various duties, with them only catching up together at night. While Jareth couldn’t reshuffle their schedule for some time, he did manage to carve out a few hours for lunch and they’d taken advantage of the reprieve for a picnic in one of the castle’s private gardens.
Her previous week had been spent in the studio and Bishop had been kind enough to drop off one of her works that had just come out of the kiln. The picnic gave Sarah the chance to present Jareth with the first of her glaze test samples that she had painted especially for him. He’d been delighted with the tiny owl sculpture and she was pleased to learn it had followed him to sit on whatever table he was working at for the rest of the day.
Irene had cooed in happiness at the romance of her outing. Sarah had smiled and agreed, not thinking again about the subject until a few days later when she’d consulted her schedule to check if any appointments lined up with the Above days she had planned to visit her family. It surprised her that it had just gone past Valentine’s Day Above, which did explain why Irene had gone off on her romantic date tangent.
It wasn’t until this point that Sarah realised that she had become more attuned to Underground festivals. She supposed she didn’t have the deluge of marketing reminding her that she needed to spend her hard earned money to celebrate the occasions and was instead involved in the planning of the kingdom’s major events that occurred in conjunction with the solstices and equinoxes.
She certainly didn’t miss the commercial expectations that surrounded something like Valentine’s Day, which could never hope to live up to a brief respite from the everyday bustle of life and a simple meal shared with her Goblin King.