"Would you believe that's something one of my children had to point out to me?" Loki's voice is soft. "That love does not stop--even temporarily--when you've angered or disappointed your loved one? 'We still want you when you're not perfect' is what he said. I'm so grateful to him, to all of them, for that lesson."
If she had never tried to love these children, she might never have recognized all the places where she herself was lacking.
She sits up and leans over him for a kiss, closing her eyes to savor the touch. "We celebrate the turn of the seasons," she says when the kiss breaks, though she keeps her face close to his and peppers other kisses against his cheek. "Natural cycles. Winter is the time of darkness, and the wall between the worlds of the living and the dead is thin. We share and rejoice in defiance of destruction a hair's-breadth away, at Yule. We burn lights in the darkest hour of the year. And then, when those lights are extinguished, we honor the very forces that threaten us, because there is no light without darkness."
"Last year, the children and I led a procession around the Plaza with the Mari Lwyd, and I know they will want to do that again. It's playful, though the Mari Lwyd is itself a frightening sort of puppet--a skeletal horse with ribbons and a shroud. But the children like the singing and giving out sweets."
"That's for the daytime, though. At night, I will lead the spirits of the dead of Asgard in the Wild Hunt. That's far more serious, and I'm not sure whether it would be better for you to avoid it or not."
no subject
If she had never tried to love these children, she might never have recognized all the places where she herself was lacking.
She sits up and leans over him for a kiss, closing her eyes to savor the touch. "We celebrate the turn of the seasons," she says when the kiss breaks, though she keeps her face close to his and peppers other kisses against his cheek. "Natural cycles. Winter is the time of darkness, and the wall between the worlds of the living and the dead is thin. We share and rejoice in defiance of destruction a hair's-breadth away, at Yule. We burn lights in the darkest hour of the year. And then, when those lights are extinguished, we honor the very forces that threaten us, because there is no light without darkness."
"Last year, the children and I led a procession around the Plaza with the Mari Lwyd, and I know they will want to do that again. It's playful, though the Mari Lwyd is itself a frightening sort of puppet--a skeletal horse with ribbons and a shroud. But the children like the singing and giving out sweets."
"That's for the daytime, though. At night, I will lead the spirits of the dead of Asgard in the Wild Hunt. That's far more serious, and I'm not sure whether it would be better for you to avoid it or not."