A Frosty Tail

by Dawn Sister

  A Frosty Tail

  By Dawn Sister

  Copyright © 2018 Dawn Sister

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission of the author, nor be otherwise circulated without the author’s prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent publisher. The moral rights of the author have been asserted.

  Cover Design: Roe Horvat

  Picture: courtesy of Aaron Burden via Unsplash.com

  dawnsister.wordpress.com

  Acknowledgements:

  I would like to thank the usual people for helping me with this story, especially Suki, who is always there to beta, and Roe, who designed this amazing cover. Also, Alex, who runs the Rainbow Advent Calendar for which this story was written.

  Thank you. You are all awesome.

  Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter One: Frosty Encounters

  Chapter Two: Frosty Gardens

  Chapter Three: Frosty Stories

  Chapter Four: Frosty Feet

  Chapter Five: Frosty First Aid

  Chapter Six: Frosty Promises

  Chapter Seven: Frosty Evenings

  Chapter Eight: Frosty Mornings

  Chapter Nine: Frosty Lakes

  Chapter Ten: Frosty Memories

  Epilogue

  About the Author

  Other Books by Dawn Sister

  Acknowledgements

  ****

  Prologue

  When I was a child, I recall being told a story about how the foxglove came to be so called.

  The Fox and the Fairy Queen

  The fairy queen had taxed her fairy subjects to tidy up the forest, sweeping up all the leaves and debris and leave everything sparkling clean.

  She loved how beautiful her forest looked in summer and autumn but disliked the amount of leaves that fell from the trees to litter the forest floor. She also disliked the idea that eventually winter would come. She thought that she could cheat or at least hold back the winter by ordering all the fallen leaves to be fused back into the trees therefore tricking them into thinking it was still autumn.

  The fairies, despite disagreeing with their queen, followed her orders and spent all day tidying and replacing leaves. By the end of the day they were exhausted, but the queen kept finding fault with their work and made them sweep the floor several times over before she was satisfied.

  Just as they were finally finished, and the fairy Queen was satisfied, a wandering fox appeared. All around the edges of the forest there were signs of winter but the forest itself remained untouched. Being a curious sort, the fox began to explore the very tidy forest floor, leaving foxy footprints everywhere. Out from each of his footprints spread tendrils of frost. The first signs that winter was encroaching on the forest despite all the efforts of her fairy folk.

  The fairy queen was incensed and ordered the fox captured and hung upside down by his feet to prevent him from walking on her perfect floor or spreading the cold of winter through her forest. She did not wish the trees to sleep, nor the colours of summer and autumn to be leached from the land. She ordered that the troublesome fox be imprisoned that way forever.

  The fox argued and pleaded with the queen, telling her that he had special work to do and that if she kept him from this work, there could be dire consequences for her precious forest home.

  “You cannot halt the passage of time, your Majesty. Winter must follow Autumn as sure as night follows day.” He told her. “Mess with the balance here and the equilibrium of the entire world is at stake.”

  She would hear none of it, so obsessed was she over how her forest should look.

  “No winter will come here to spoil the beauty of my forest.” She scoffed at the fox. “Especially not spread by a lowly, trickster of a fox.”

  The fairies once more, reluctantly followed the orders of their queen, but had heard the fox’s pleas and arguments. They had listened with growing concern, because they believed that this fox was special. He did not look like an ordinary fox. His eyes were as blue as ice crystals. His fur, as pure and white as new fallen snow and the frost-sparkled tips glistened like diamonds in the moonlight. He was indeed a special fox. He was, in fact, the spirit of winter, and his imprisonment could spell disaster for their forest home.

  The fairies understood that the trees needed to sleep, or how could they wake in the spring, stronger and more beautiful than the year before?

  Once their queen had gone to sleep that night, the forest fairies rescued the fox, giving him four trumpet-like flowers from a digitalis plant to wear on his paws as gloves so that he could move silently and not disturb the queen or to leave any tell-tale fox prints as he escaped from the forest.

  At the edge of the forest, he thanked the fairies for their help and warned them to prepare for the imminent winter. He took off the flower slippers and disappeared into the night, leaving sparkling patterns of frost everywhere his paws touched the ground.

  Winter finally arrived in the forest that night. The carefully replaced leaves fell from the trees and were covered by a blanket of soft white, sparkling snow.

  The fairy queen, though she had been rather silly to try to stop the passage of the seasons, was not punished, but just to make sure she didn’t try to interfere again, the fox cast a spell that would keep her asleep until the first day of spring.

  When the fairies picked up the discarded flower gloves in order to get rid of any evidence that they had helped the fox, they saw inside that they had been marked with the delicate paw prints of the frosty fox.

  The flowers have born the fox’s mark and name, ever since.

  ****

  A Frosty Tail

  Frosty Encounters

  The icy wind took Liam’s breath away as he rounded the corner of the lane and headed for home. It was only five o’clock, but darker than pitch. There was supposed to be a full moon tonight, but it hadn’t yet fully risen.

  Liam tugged his knitted beanie hat further down over his ears. He pulled the fur lined hood of his parker over his head and brushed his dark hair out of his eyes. The wind was bitter, nipping relentlessly at his exposed cheeks and fingers. His final act of protection from the cold was to fold over the mitten tops of his fingerless gardener’s gloves. His fingers had grown numb from the cold hours ago, but he’d been unable to cover them and continue to do his job. They’d take an age to thaw out. That was the downside of having a career that kept you outside in all weathers and all seasons. The life of a professional gardener was not for those that couldn’t cope with the cold.

  The weather had grown steadily wilder as Liam had finished his last but few gardening jobs of the year. Tomorrow would be his last day before he took a well-earned break. Tomorrow would also be the twenty first of December. Winter Solstice; the longest night. He always took time off during the darkest part of the winter. He felt a gardener’s job was to sleep along with the trees and plants they tended. He worked long hours in the summer, so he could take his break now. From tomorrow, until mid January, he was planning to hibernate.

  The tarmac road gave way eventually to gravel and finally became dirt track. The trees and hedgerow that lined this stretch of the track leading to Liam’s cottage grew in a dense tangle, their branches entwining above his head. Even in the winter, when the branches and twigs were bare of any foliage, they formed a dark, forbidding canopy. Liam was prepared. He’d walked this track almost every day since he’d moved into the village of Kirk Alton four years ago. He took out his torch, his numb fingers fumbling to find the button to turn it on.
It wasn’t that he didn’t know the way home like he knew the back of his hand, but with the weather so wild and the ground frozen, he didn’t want to stumble over any branches or slip on any ice.

  He shone the torch along the path in front of him and gasped as the beam caught movement: a flash of frost-sparkled silver in the shadows of the tree-lined track.

  The white fox was back.

  Liam had seen the beautiful creature several times over the last few weeks, each time on his way home, mostly at twilight. The fox was becoming a creature of habit, because he’d seen it every night this week so far.

  Tonight, it didn’t follow its usual course of action, which was to run as soon as Liam’s torch beam caught it. Tonight, it did something different. It sat on its haunches in the middle of the track as if waiting for him, and Liam had to remind himself to breathe when he realised he was holding his breath. He switched off his torch, and allowed his eyes to adjust, focusing on the white fox, now bathed only in the rising moonlight.

  “Hello.” He huffed out the word softly. “What are you up to then?”

  The fox tipped its head to one side, as if listening to him. Its fur was whipped by a wind that Liam couldn’t feel as he stood in the shelter of the trees, the white tips glittering, like frost-covered cotton grass.

  “Frosty the fox.” Liam whispered as he took a few tentative steps forwards. How close could he get tonight? He was never certain when it was going to run. Usually, when it caught sight of Liam. Tonight, however, it was waiting. For what, Liam couldn’t fathom.

  Again, the fox tipped its head to one side, cocking its ears, studying Liam with an intense, vulpine stare.

  Liam was close enough to see its eyes now and although he could not see the exact colour, they were bright and light, crystal clear, standing out like beacons in the dim light.

  “Wow. You are stunning,” Liam whispered.

  Before one breath and the next, the fox was gone, a flash of white disappearing into the undergrowth as silently as it had appeared, leaving Liam breathless and elated.

  “Incredible.” He shook his head, smiling as he continued his journey home.

  Liam had counted himself fortunate to see the fox once, but to have seen it every night this week was unprecedented. Country foxes, unlike their brazen, urban cousins, were usually so elusive. You could have a fox living in your back garden and never see it. You’d know about it, because they were messy creatures, and noisy, but you could go years without ever seeing one. And a white fox, that was even more extraordinary.

  ****

  Frosty Gardens

  “A white fox, you say?” Mrs Appleby, Liam’s first gardening client the next day, mulled over his question as she hovered in her doorway.

  He’d spent almost an hour clearing the last of the autumn leaves from her lawn and front path. For some reason, her garden seemed to accumulate more leaves than anyone else’s.

  Liam didn’t want to keep her outside too long. It was cold enough to freeze the balls off a brass monkey and Mrs Appleby might like to think she was energetic and full of life, but she was ninety-five and needed careful handling or she’d be outside helping Liam in the garden. He’d already refused her help twice in the hour he’d been there.

  She’d called him over and handed him a steaming mug of tea which had been most welcome, so he’d taken the opportunity to ask her about the white fox.

  “Can’t say I have seen a white fox.” She told him. “Well, not in this country, anyway. In Canada, yes. Arctic Foxes. Beautiful little things. But not here. Interesting. Perhaps it’s albino, darling.”

  “Nope. Doesn’t look it.” Liam told her, knowing she would be even more intrigued.

  “You’ve seen it up that close, have you?”

  Liam nodded. “I’m not trying to get too close, obviously, but its always on my way home, on the track. I can’t help it if it sits and waits for me.”

  Mrs Appleby laughed, clapping her hands in delight. “I envy you, really I do. Seeing such lovely things while I’m stuck inside. Everyone seems to think I’ll shatter into a million pieces if I so much as set foot outside when it’s so cold.” She sounded rueful and Liam sympathised.

  For someone who was usually so active, being stuck indoors because of the bad weather must be very constricting. Liam wondered how he would feel, if in the same situation and didn’t really want to think about it. He spent his life outside. How would he make a living if he couldn’t garden?

  “Although,” Mrs Appleby continued with a slightly disapproving frown. “If that white fox is the menace that’s been pilfering the apples from my storage box overnight, then, I’ll have its guts for garters.”

  “Mrs Appleby,” Liam exclaimed. “I know you’re annoyed by the raids on your storage box, but I suspect local kids rather than animal interference. A fox certainly wouldn’t be able to undo the catch. Besides, you give away all your apples for free anyway.”

  “Oh, I know, I know. Pay me no mind.” She chuckled. “I’m just a grumpy old woman.”

  “Grumpy, maybe, but old? Never.” He smiled at her and winked.

  “Oh, you charmer.” Mrs Appleby blushed. “I’m too old to be flirting. Now get yourself away so you can be finished before it gets too cold. There’s snow forecast for tonight.”

  “Thanks for the tea, Mrs A.” Liam handed her his empty mug. “Have a lovely Christmas, and call me if you need anything, even if it isn’t garden related. You know I’m just up the hill.”

  “You’re a good lad, Liam. You have a lovely Christmas too.”

  Liam urged her back inside and left her garden to make his way to the garden next door. He only had two more jobs before he was finished for the winter and both were close by. With any luck he’d be finished before it got dark.

  “Have you asked Father Jacob about the white fox?” Raphael, his next client, and Mrs Appleby’s next-door neighbour, suggested.

  “I’m off to the vicarage after I’ve finished here.” Liam told him as he leaned on his spade, wiping his brow.

  This job had taken a little longer than he’d anticipated due to Mrs Appleby’s leaves clogging up the narrow little stream that ran along the bottom of both gardens. He’d found a load of rubbish too, plastic bottles and drinks cans, much to his disgust and frustration.

  “Why do people think it’s better to throw them in the stream than to recycle and save the planet?” He’d muttered to himself as he’d soaked his gloves dragging more and more from the water. Conservation and recycling, or rather the lack of enthusiasm for them, was a massive bug bear of his.

  Raphael had arrived home just as Liam was finishing so he’d asked about the white fox. He hadn’t heard of any sightings in the area either. Liam was beginning to wonder if he had imagined it, or if, perhaps, a trick of the moonlight had made the fox appear white. He’d seen the creature at least a dozen times, however, and not always when the moon was out. Surely it was real.

  “Your garden is very dry, Raphael.” He commented. He needed to change the subject because thinking that he might have imagined the fox, or that his eyes had been tricked, made him feel a bit sad. “That means it probably drains really well. That’ll be a blessing in the Spring floods.”

  Raphael rubbed his chin as he glanced about his garden. “Do you think I should water it then? It hardly seems worth it in the winter, and I’m only here for the weekend and then I’m off into the city again. I’m not planning on moving in properly until the spring. Besides, gardening isn’t really my thing, especially not in winter. I got this thing stuck in the mud last time I ventured down to the stream.” Raphael lifted his right leg, reveal a colourful, plastic prosthetic limb.

  “Well, yes, I can see why that would be a bit of a problem.” Liam nodded, trying not to stare at the limb.

  Raphael didn’t often draw attention to his disability, and it never seemed to stop the man from doing what he wanted, in fact, sometimes it made him more determined to prove he could rather than admit he couldn’t. It wa
s a testament to their friendship that Raphael felt comfortable enough around Liam to be showing his leg at all.