What Little Remains Of Terpsichore Ironheart

As the semester gradually wound down to a close, we found ourselves regaining our free time from the demands of studying, and then quickly losing it in the fires of holiday preparation.

"I sure hope these kids appreciate all the work we put in for 'em," Faith said as she tapped a wand to the last seam of her stuffed dragon. "Why the hell are you doing this, anyhow?"

"Because I like making stuff," I said, putting the last bit of stuffing inside the unicorn I was making, before tapping the final seam with my own wand- while I was an actual Wizard, and perfectly capable of casting a simple sewing spell myself, the fact of the matter was that using a wand was just easier, and I'd known from the beginning that I'd be doing a lot of this. "Also, because my family runs Greenwood Village, and while that position of authority is pretty durable, it does still need to be maintained by frequent acts of generosity and largesse, like the scion of House Ironheart batching out a shitton of toys for literally every child in Greenwood Village as New Year's gifts. My people have taken care of me, and I've always understood that, once I was capable of it, I had to step up and take care of my people, too."

"...I see..."

"But honestly it is mostly because I like making things, and something like 'I want to give a gift to every child in my neighborhood' is an excellent prompt for these sorts of big projects."

"Last year she made wooden train sets, and the year before that was wooden building blocks," Talia added. "I actually brought 'em with me, if you wanna see just how little Cat is fucking around here."

"Wood is cheap, and my time is worth however much I feel like charging at the moment," I said. "I will absolutely buy the friendship and loyalty of everyone growing up in my neighborhood for the low, low price of a few big crafting projects I already wanted to do."

"It's nice, as far as family traditions go," Emily said, carefully sewing a stuffed bird together with a spell she was actively casting. She'd decided, all on her own, that learning a mage-weaving spell and casting it towards productive ends would be a worthwhile exercise, and so far, she'd stuck with it through a dozen or so of these things over the past few days.

"Okay, I can buy wood being cheap," Faith said. "Especially if you're using firewood instead of proper building lumber, because you just don't need pieces that big. But these things are made of silk velvet, and there is just no way in hell that you consider silk to be cheap."

"It isn't, but I can afford it," I said, shrugging. "A stuffed animal just doesn't use that much fabric, and also, I have millions of dollars."

"Oh," Faith murmured. "Right, we're Adventurers and we're already richer than God. I keep forgetting that. We didn't exactly ramp into it gently and slowly, did we?"

"We sure as fuck did not," I said. "Don't worry, you'll get used to it eventually."

"So, Catherine, I know you're going to be in Greenwood Village handing out gifts to the kids there," Emily said, "but what about everyone else?"

"Also Greenwood Village," Talia said. "We do a big community feast, and my family's always been where half the food for that comes from. My mom makes an amazing apple pie."

"Eugh, apples," Faith muttered.

"You haven't had elf-grown apples," Talia assured her. "Trust me, they're amazing."

"Also, the apples are drenched in sugar syrup and spices," I said dryly. "How about you, Emily, what's your family do for New Year's?"

"We do a big dinner with House Redwater's Knights and vassals," Emily said. "You're expected there, by the way."

I blinked.

"...Fuck, of course," I muttered. "Knighthood comes with duties... Alright, well, I'll see what I can swing."

"How about you, Faith?" Talia asked.

"I'm gonna be staying with one of you over the break," Faith said. "Because, uh, my parents are also Paladins, and I don't think they'd be too happy with me being excommunicated by Hano himself and then running off to worship an Elven god. Also, probably wouldn't be too happy about the gay part."

"...Huh," I said. "You don't trust them to...?"

"Not everyone has amazing parents like you and Talia," Faith said bitterly.

"I'm sorry, hon, I wasn't trying to imply..." I trailed off, then pulled Faith into a tight hug. "I'm sorry about your parents. You want me to beat 'em up for you?"

"Tempting, but... no." Faith shook her head as she burrowed deeper into the hug. "I wanna ring in the New Year with people who know what love is, and aren't afraid to show it."

I nodded gently, grinning as Talia, and then Emily, added herself to the hug.

"I think we can do that, yeah," I said.

---

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"Ugh, fucking finally," I muttered, as I slid out from underneath the van. In addition to the jack-stands I'd packed initially, I'd recently built a thin, padded board that I could lay down on, with little caster-wheels to let me roll underneath the van without lying directly on the ground and having my duster ride up when I shifted around.

"Finally what?" Vanessa asked, startling me a little.

"How long were you standing there?" I asked, sitting up. She hadn't come alone; the rest of the Harpies were with her, too.

"Five minutes or so," Nicky said. "Vanessa put up a silencing charm so we could gossip without you hearing. I wanted to let you know we were here, but I was outvoted."

"You seemed busy," Erica said. "I didn't want to interrupt."

"Well, fair enough," I said, wiping grease off my hands. "What brings you ladies by? Wanna step inside, have a cup of tea?"

"Tea would be nice," Envy said.

"Might I ask what you were doing under your van?" Vanessa asked.

"Installing some hover modules," I said, as I unfolded the stepladder and opened the passenger side door. "It took us a week to get from Redwater up to Mount Fate, and we'd rather not burn that kind of time on the return trip, either. My van may not be a full-on airship, but I reckon this thing can get us back to Redwater in a timely manner."

I ushered them inside, and almost immediately, Vanessa was the recipient of a "friendly" hug from Talia that involved the shortstack Druid shoving her face straight into Vanessa's cleavage.

"Aw, there there," Vanessa said, patting the back of Talia's head and not-coincidentally pressing her face in even deeper. "They'll miss you too, darling. You'll only be apart for the holidays."

"Speaking of holidays-" Faith attempted to begin, before Talia interrupted her.

"Volex, can you shapeshift into Vanessa while we're in Redwater?" Talia asked.

"You'll have to talk to Cat about that," Volex said.

"Volex pointed out, a few months ago, that I didn't ask her to shapeshift for sex stuff," I said. "There wasn't that much meaning behind it at the time, but now, it's a commitment to loving her in whatever form she so happens to take. And if she's going to shapeshift into a busty blonde in a low-cut Wizard's robe, it's going to be because she feels like it."

"Awww," Talia whined.

"Also," I continued, "while I'm sure Vanessa is flattered by your deep and abiding love of her tits-"

"I am!" Vanessa chirped, cheerily.

"-I feel the need to point out that Volex already has giant boobs you can stick your face between," I finished.

"Not if she's going to be ungrateful," Volex said, folding her arms and huffing.

"Anyhow," Nicky said, hoping to steer the conversation away from her sister's rack, "Do you have any adventures planned for winter break? We're thinking about squeezing in a quick one just to have it on the books, so that we can spend all of our last semester studying instead of having to find one last quest to knock out so we can graduate."

"Currently, no," I said. "I would like to do no adventuring over winter break, because this first semester has run us ragged. I, personally, plan to spend the six weeks lying in bed, catching up on my backlog of reading and Sweet Fuck All."

"Iunno, I could go for a quest," Faith mused.

"Shut up, no you couldn't," I threatened.

"I mean, maybe I'm just not taking all those advanced classes like you are, but so far?" Faith shrugged. "College just really isn't that bad. Way easier than high school was- I'm in class for like two hours a day, and the homework really isn't that bad."

"I think another adventure could do us some good," Emily suggested, innocently. "I didn't get to, um... do much, in the last two we've had."

I blinked, remembering Emily's fondness for being kidnapped and watching her kidnappers get it in the neck.

God, she's fucked up.

I mean, we all have done some fucked up things- even aside from the mountain of corpses I stood on, Faith had her own pile of dead people, Talia had turned into a bear and dismembered people back in Redwater, and Volex... Actually, Volex isn't much of a fighter, is she?

But, well, all those horrors that we all wrought were specific goal-directed behaviors. We didn't kill people for the hell of it, we weren't serial killers- that has much more specific criteria than just killing someone with your teeth- but Emily? As far as I knew, she didn't have some grander motive behind this. She wanted to watch her kidnappers die because she wanted to watch them die.

"Anyhow," Volex said, "I've been informed there's going to be a hell of a New Year's party in Greenwood Village, and that we'll be participating in that. What about you, any festivities planned?"

"House Vega is going to be doing something, but nothing special," Vanessa said. "Mostly, though, we're going to be making arrangements for the wedding this summer. Would you like to come?"

"Provided the world isn't ending in such a way that can only be stopped by a half-dragon with a gun, sure," I said with a shrug. "Where's House Vega's lands, anyhow? It occurs to me that I have no idea where any of you people live. Aside from Erica, who I assume is from Silver Mountain."

"I will not be returning to Silver Mountain anytime soon," Erica said coolly. "As a perceptive young woman recently pointed out to me, the Order of the Silver Maiden is directly responsible for the majority of my long-term stresses and problems in life."

"House Vega's territory is in the Hikaano heartlands," Nicky said. "I could point it out on a map if we had one, but it's about seventy miles from the eastern coastline, and straddles a middling tributary of the Black River."

"Ah, so it's about as far south as Redwater?" I asked. "I don't suppose it snows as much there as it does in Redwater, does it?"

"No, we're closer to the ocean, which keeps the temperature from swinging too wildly," Vanessa said. "It never gets too hot or too cold, although we do still have our share of snowstorms."

"Since we'd be heading south anyways," Nicky added, "would you like us to give you a lift to Redwater? I know you've been upgrading your own vehicle, but it still isn't an airship, and stopping at Redwater would only add about two or three hours to our own trip."

I hummed quietly. On the one hand, I did want to actually test out my upgrades, but on the other hand, I also wanted to get back home as quickly as possible, and there was always the prospect of taking the van out for a spin once I was back home, or even just using it for the return trip.

"I vote yes on anything that prolongs my access to these," Talia said, still ears-deep in Vanessa's cleavage.

"Well," I said, "I guess that settles it."