"HALLO THE HOUSE!"

Slowly the door creaked open and Ian got a fleeting look at small blue eyes and golden ringlets before it slammed shut again. From inside the farmhouse a child's voice rose. "Nana, there's a soldier and a bear outside!"

Ian looked at his aide Marcus, who'd been growing a beard as of late for winter. He nodded straight-faced. "I can see why the child would think that. It does... "

Marcus heightened the effect by giving a growl, then walked over and knocked on the door. "Briony, open this door, or I'll have to give this bag of sweets to another little girl for Yule." Now an infectious giggle and the sound of a cane thumping across the wooden floor of the building could be heard. The door opened, a child's arm snaked out and Marcus was pulled inside.

Ian sighed, looking around the farmstead as Marcus explained their errand. The place slowly but surely was deteriorating, its owner and son both killed in the orc invasion. Now all that was left was the owner's widow and her young granddaughter... and one roan filly, a colt that had caught the eye of Skye Blackthorn. She'd hinted... nay... TOLD Ian it was what she desired for Yuletide, and he had tried in vain up until now to obtain the gift for his wife. Then Marcus had mentioned he'd known Dame Bronwen for years, and Ian had dragged him out here in a hurry. It was Yuletide Eve, and time was running short.

"Milord... Bronwen would speak with ye now!"

Ian quickly dismounted and walked inside, ducking at the low doorway and stopping to let his eyes adjust to the dimmer light of the room. Marcus stood next to an old lady huddled up in a rocking chair under several layers of quilts, a peppermint stick set at a jaunty angle in her mouth. One knobbed hand reached up to remove it as Bronwen regarded him with pale eyes that once must have sparkled like her grandchild's. "Back again. You ARE a stubborn one, aren't ye?"

"Nae more stubborn than milady wife. She has her heart set on that filly. I'll give you fifty gold pieces for it."

"Sixty"

"Fifty-five"

"Six... " she stopped, racked by a fit of coughing. No wonder, thought Ian, the smoke from that peat she's burning is so rank... And then it suddenly hit him. A pile of logs stood beside the house and none of it cut into firewood. She was too old and feeble, the girl too small to cut it, so they used peat. He glanced at the wood box beside the hearth... empty. He wagered the pantry was not well stocked either. He watched as she wiped her mouth and then he rubbed the back of his neck as if in distress "I've only the fifty five left till payday. Unless... hmmm... I'll give you fifty five and a day's labor, and a haunch of venison, and that's my final offer."

There was a minute of silence and Ian's heart fell as he began to think he'd been too smart by half and Bronwen would reject his offer as charity. But when she looked at her granddaughter with her eyes beginning to fill with tears, he knew she would accept. "I'm sorry Briony... I know you had your heart set on raising yon filly... but we've barely enough feed to keep her as it is."

"S'alright, Nana... I know... " and the little girl trudged out to the barn to say her goodbyes.

Ian looked at Marcus. "I'm going to start with the wood pile out there. You ride back to Camelot for the venison, and while you're there... " Ian leaned forward to whisper in his aide's ear.

That afternoon, Marcus returned to find most of the wood cut, a section of fence mended, and the General of Camelot's Army flailing away with a stick at a rug hung from a clothesline. One of Ian's hands was wrapped in a handkerchief to protect the blister he had developed chopping wood. "Breathe a word of this to a soul, Marcus, and you'll be cleaning stalls for the winter. Did you get the meat... and the other?"

"Aye, milord. Chamberlain knew exactly where the box was stored. You've a good eye for size if I may say so, Sir."

"She's nearly the same age as Astra when... well... she has the same build. Let's get that food inside."

Together the men walked into the house and stored the meat in the pantry. Strangely enough, the venison had somewhere acquired the companionship of several sacks of vegetables, another sack filled with apples, and two bags of candy canes. And last but not least, a package wrapped in a brown paper and a faded pink bow that Ian handed to Bronwen. "A Yule gift... for the girl."

Once again he feared he'd overstepped the bounds, but the old lady merely nodded teary eyed and set out some corn muffins with strawberry jam and tea to wash it down. "I know who ye are," she whispered. "And I would ask ye... in the name of my dead Theo and my son... to find a place for Briony at the castle. I'm not going to live forever. I would rest easier knowing she is taken care of... "

"Old woman, you'll be around to dangle Briony's babes on your knee. But if it makes you feel any better, aye... send her to the castle when the time comes. We'll find a spot for her." His own throat tightened and he quickly swallowed some tea to hide it.

The rest of the time passed in polite conversation. At its end, Marcus and he rode out, Skye's gift gamboling along after them at the end of a rope. The older man looked at Ian as they turned onto the road back to Camelot.

"Mind if I ask you sumpin', milord? You could have done all that like that!" he snapped his fingers, "Instead of working up a blister. Why... "

"Nothing worth having comes easy. Speaking of which, I want a list of all such survivors of dead Guards on my desk the day after Yule. Perhaps we can make their New Year's Feast a bit better then tomorrow's. The Guard takes care of its own."

Marcus nodded and smiled, "Merry Midwinter, m'lord."

"Merry Yule, Marcus ... Merry Yule"