-Rein, Arizona-
After questioning a few more reindeer about a few things, like directions, I made my way for the frozen lake. Upon arrival I saw Velvet sitting there quietly on a bench and looking contemplative, she still seemed out of it and she’s had a lot of time to open up about it.
She had asked me for a date using Paprika as a go between and I was going to give her one, the lake looked nice for a bunch of frozen over water. I quietly approached her and sat down next to her on her left.
“You seem distracted Fluff Butt.” At the sound of my voice Velvet jerked and looked at me, she seemed a little shocked that I had snuck up on her. If she denied being distracted then I’d have to point out what she was missing here.
I put a hoof around her, making sure to rub her shoulder gently as I hugged her.
“What makes you think I’m distracted?” There was rather quick answer for this Velvet. I simply pointed my left hoof to her right and she turned her head to see what I was pointing at.
There was a tiny war zone right next to the bench, ice sprites were screaming and running around with candy canes making pulling motions on the hooked portions to make tiny snowballs leap up under the lengths of the cane. Said snowball would then fly forward across the battle zone to where the ends of the candy canes were pointed at.
I counted out about seven small forts, thirty or so ice sprites and hundreds of tiny snowballs flying in all directions. The snowballs were so small, it was doubtful the little could guys hurt themselves with them.
How Velvet could have missed all this I would never know, what I did know was that they were all carefully making sure not to hit or aim anywhere near Velvet’s direction in their fun.
I tried to looking for Tinsel in that mess, I eventually spotted him on the top of a snow fort as he was diving off of it sideways. He was wielding two candy canes and clutching at the hooks tightly to fire several miniature snowballs while screaming wildly.
He then hit the snow and became embedded into it with a soft squeak. He was then promptly pummeled with multiple tiny snowballs from all sides by the other sprites, up until he was practically buried in a light amount of snow.
“You’re seriously telling me you didn’t notice the adorable war that is currently ensuing here?” There was a pause and I saw Velvet’s cheeks became bright red. She nuzzled against me in embarrassment while whining a bit.
“Okay so I’m a bit distracted.” That’s an understatement Velvet and you know it.
“Yeah, I kind of cottoned on to that Fluff Butt.” I told her flatly. “Though I would say it was a little more than a bit. So… you skirted around the entire town to come here why? We’re going to have to eventually go into town for food if you want this to be a real date, now talk to me Vel.”
“I know...” She said quietly as she pressed her face into my chest. After rather quiet minute, she pulled back and huffed loudly. I didn’t see any warm air escape her mouth, reindeer were biologically weird. She looked me in the eyes. “This was one of my favorite places to be Arizona, I used to come here all the time to do some ice skating when I was younger. The frozen lake is really quite good for it, every time I got done performing I’d have a large audience of ice sprites cheering me on. It kind of surprised me the first time they appeared, then I started doing some routines for them. I thought I had been all alone and they all came to watch me enjoy myself on the ice.”
“What about the skirting around town thing.” Simply avoiding something will not make me forget that it's there Velvet.
“What do you want me to say Arizona? I just don’t want the news to spread like wildfire that I’m back yet. I wanted a little bit of peace... and that I can have that with you.” She was being very affectionate and open with me right now, I hardly knew what to say or do. “How do you tell a village full of reindeer you’re not going to be staying here? That this isn’t home, despite having grown up here.”
“So about that ice skating…” I was going to offer if she could teach me how to do so, but I was interrupted.
We heard a squeak and turned to see Tinsel and all the sprites had stopped their snow war, having come to some kind of cease fire agreement. All the friends he made were now staring at Velvet with worried looks, it was as if they could feel Velvet’s reluctance to have a little fun.
“I’m…” Cutting Velvet off with a light nuzzle to the cheek, I stood up.
I kneeled before her and took her hoof to lightly kiss it.
“Would you do me the honor of teaching me how to ice skate?” I was going with the old school gentle guy routine. Sure I was a girl, and a rather fight happy one at that, but that didn’t mean I couldn’t play my part to be at least a little romantic for Velvet. Now wasn’t a time for me to be aggressive, it was a time for me to be gentle and try to make some gestures I’m sure she’d appreciate. “I’m sure that you look outstanding when you skate Velvet, if it’s anything like your wonderful smile.”
“Nice acting Arizona, but don’t hurt yourself or break your brain on my account. Though I do always appreciate compliments coming from you, getting them from you is usually harder than that unless I’m winning one of our fights.” She was snickering into the hoof I wasn’t holding, there were a lot of friendly cooing noises from the sprites off to the side. I just smiled at her and snorted a bit myself, those insults were just a natural part our relationship. She turned to the ice sprites. “I’m okay Tinsel… and friends. So I guess if I’m to start off with my ice skating lessons, one has to first learn balance. Since we don’t have ice skates, we’ll just have to use our bare hooves and do it the old fashioned way.”
I let Velvet’s hoof go as she stood up and led me over to the edge of the frozen lake. She held up a hoof for me to wait and I did so. All the ice sprites came over to us to watch what Velvet was doing, all their ears were perked and they were giving her their full attentions.
Her long legs led her to standing at the edge of the frozen over lake, she slapped her hooves roughly against the surface of the ice and I saw the ice ripple a bit from the point of impact.
“Safety first for anyone who wants to skate, check the edge of the lake to make sure it’s frozen over well enough. I just made the ice a bit thicker to be certain. Now I put both my front hooves on the ice and carefully get my third leg out here like so.” The flex of her butt and the way her small tail wiggled was always an appreciable sight for me, for Velvet is quite beautiful. I watched her get a third hoof on the ice. “Once positioned like so, I kick off with my remaining hoof to start my forward momentum. Now watch carefully, this is a bit hard to explain.”
Oh believe me, I was watching you quite carefully Velvet.
She kicked off and started to slowly shift her hooves a bit and stumbled slightly. Once she got her balance with her four hooves moving in a steady rhythm shifting from left to right, she started to slowly glide across the ice and a growing smile came to her face.
I think that was the point that she forgot the lesson, because she forgot the sprites and I were even here as she started to skate in circles while picking up speed. She leapt into the air bringing her front two hooves together with a twirl and then she landed on her left hind leg while sliding backwards, holding all her other hooves out in a showy pose.
With a quick twist into the direction she was sliding, she had all four of her hooves on the ice again.
She circled back towards the middle and performed three rapid jumps where she twirled through the air, spinning faster after every jump. On the last twirl she landed on her front hooves and spread her rear legs out to go into a spinning hoof stand.
Scrunching up her body, Velvet performed a spiraling hoof spring to land on two of her opposing hooves while sticking out the others while holding her head high as she slid. She leaned slightly to skate along the edge of the lake while holding this pose.
She had tried to portray herself as a lady, well I was finally seeing it here. What followed was us watching as she danced on the ice as if she had been born on it. She started to tap all her hooves against the ice in a rhythm and started to hum something.
“For I can go twirling and birling, on the iced water~.” Velvet started to sing as she crouched and stood on the ice, she still spun and slid around at a decent speed. “This is where the ice dancer learns to slide spritely~.”
“For its birling and twirling, on this iced water~.” Velvet stood on her hind hooves and started to elegantly spiral towards the center of the lake shifting her weight and her hips to keep her spin going, how was she not dizzy yet? “You should watch where you’ve been, unless you want fall in to be soaked completely~.”
Velvet broke out of her spin and continued to skate around the rink humming a waltz like tune that only she knew, I looked to the sprites and they were really enjoying this. I really liked it too. I was as inelegant as you could get, but that didn’t mean I couldn’t appreciate someone like Velvet putting on a show for us.
“If you ask me, who was the fairest in town~? Who would be the most beautiful of all the reindeer around~?” As she sang, Velvet performed a backflip and landed it without a single thought. “I’ll be certain to tell you, what I know and have found~. For I say to you, it’s any ice dancer who can dance on the slipperiest of ground~!”
Velvet sped up to leap high into the air, I could see the joy on her face and that she was expressing more happiness on it than I’ve seen on it in a long while. She went from spinning vertically into horizontally and then landed on all four legs.
“For the ice dancer goes twirling and birling along the iced water~.” She twirled and spun, switching between skating backward and forwards. “This is after the ice dancer already knows how to slide lightly~.”
“For it is by birling and twirling upon this iced water~.” Velvet stood on her hind legs and slowly spun on her rear hooves, she put one hoof on her hip and held the other one out for balance. She crouched and stood on her hind legs repeatedly as she twirled back towards us. “That an ice dancer knows how to please all eyes completely~.”
Finishing the last note of her song, she kicked outwards for one last twirl and came to a stop at the edge of the lake on all fours right at where she started, she blinked at us as she noticed us all staring at her.
The ice sprites all started cheering and applauding uproariously.
I smiled at her and approached her to kiss her on the lips. Aside from showing her how I felt about the performance, I needed to tell her something.
“That was really quite beautiful Velvet.” She could tell I was telling the truth even if I wasn’t applauding, because I was looking her in the eyes when I said that with the staunchest conviction mustered. “It doesn’t exactly quite teach me how to ice skate with my hooves though, so who’s the one that’s being brain dead here?”
Velvet blushed as she slapped her face with her hooves.
-An hour later-
Tinsel looked like he was bragging about his reindeer to the other sprites and a few of them even looked a little jealous by the time we were done skating.
My chin and butt were so sore from flopping against the ice, how did Velvet make it look so easy? Ice skating was ridiculously hard to do! I was a walking cavalcade of bruises and she hadn’t even faltered once since that first time she stepped onto the ice.
While she had been nervous previously, Velvet has been a lot happier since her performance for the sprites and me.
It was time to grab some food and I didn’t know any good places to go, this was a date she set up and she had the home field advantage here.
A few of the reindeer seemed to take notice of Velvet and were quite visibly surprised to see her. She didn’t notice as her ice skating had relaxed her to a point where she was able to ignore their staring and was leading me, by holding my hoof, towards a place to eat.
I wondered what Paprika was doing?
Something exploded in the distance and a house caught fire, I hoped no one was in that place… though it’s a little unusual for a building made entirely of brick to catch fire like that.
“Ah here we are Arizona, a nice quaint place to eat!” Didn’t seem like a fancy place, seemed more of a mom and pop establishment. Something like Kuril’s restaurant.
“Hello and welcome to… Champion Velvet?!” The reindeer looked a little shocked.
“Hello, I am not here as a champion, but as a regular reindeer with my lovely companion. I hope you don’t mind, but after some ice skating we’re a bit hungry.” Maybe Velvet’s finally loosened up? It was about darn time!
“Oh, of course! Come this way then.” The reindeer seemed a little confused, but welcoming of us.
We were placed in a booth where we quickly ordered our food and drink. Now for some small talk.
“Do you know a reindeer named Vixen?” That was my starting question.
“Yes and she’s a terror to fight at a long distance, you know I prefer middling ranges to getting close up and personal.” She gave me a searching look. “Why do you ask?”
“I met her and asked about you. She told me that we’d have to join the Tundra Tourney to get at the key or at least information to find it.” I received a few blinks before recognition appeared to light up in her eyes.
“The outsider's rule… of course! Rarely does that ever get used, we always do our best to win. You and Paprika will have to sign up for the Tundra Tourney.” Okay, then what?