Sparkle pft-ed:Pants are overrated.She tipped her head:Besides; you have great legs.
“Thanks. So do you.”
Sparkled preened:I’ve always thought so.She head butted her three times:Out. Out. Out.
Clove scrambled for whatever winter clothing hung on the hooks by the door as she was prodded out by a gorgeous and determined reindeer. She didn’t get to stop as she stepped into a pair of boots that were four sizes too big. Coupled with the long top, she was a fashion disaster.
If she thought Sparkle’s visit was strange, what she found in the yard was worse. Flash buzzed from house to house and yard to yard. He went over trucks and around tractors and circled children and adults alike. The children giggled; the adults yelled at him to stop.
He didn’t listen.
“I closed the door!” Pax insisted to Forest, who carried a bucket of grain.
He held it up and shook it several times. “He’ll get hungry—eventually,” he added as Flash buzzed right past the bucket.
Mitzi put her hands on her hips. “I have carrots in the fridge. I'll be right back.” She stomped off, only to be turned back by Snowflake, who stood in her way.
“Snowflake! What has gotten into you?”
The fliers caused issues on this side of the fence, but the rest of the reindeer herd–all three hundred and fifty of them–ran along the fence line, made a big arch, and then were back. They ran hard and were terrifying in their strength and beauty.
In the middle of the herd, Dunder stood proud and tall.
Abner and Anna fretted on the porch. “What do we do?” Anna asked.
Abner lifted his hands. “I’ve never seen them like this before.”
Sparkled nudged her again and Clove was forced down the stairs and across the parking toward the gate. “No. I don’t want to go in there.” She turned and tried to dodge the movie-star reindeer—to no avail. “I’ll be killed. Look at them!”
Pax and Forest ran toward her. “Sparkle! Stop!”
Abner cupped his hands around his mouth and yelled, “Dunder!”
Dunder put his two front feet forward and slammed his back leg down, shaking the rafters. The herd stopped on a dime and a hallowed silence filled the space where the sound of a thousand hoof-beats had just been.
Sparkle moved around her, hooked an antler on the latch, and opened the gate.
“That explains that,” Pax mumbled.
Sparkle jerked her head toward Dunder, the reindeer parting to make a path for Clove to walk through.
Clove checked herself and realized she was not afraid. She went through the gate, past the big reindeer who huffed and puffed from their big run. Their breath clouded and filled the air, fogging the whole oval they’d stomped into the snow and shielding her from view.
Inside the oval it was silent, eerie. Clove’s footsteps were too loud, like they were in a tunnel of sorts.
Dunder waited for her, his chest puffed out. When she was right in front of him, he turned his body but didn’t break eye contact. He bounded once and was in the air, circling her almost as fast as Flash had blown past the window. For a reindeer his size, the speed was impressive.
He soon turned from a blur of fur to a light. The light grew brighter and brighter until it blocked out everything and she was in a ball of it.
She covered her head and squeezed her eyes shut. Wind rushed past her, warm and insistent. Fabric flapped against her knees and her hair whipped into her face.
There was a flash, and then everything settled. She opened her eyes to find herself in a small apartment. Dunder stood next to her, his chest heaving and sparkles falling from his hide.
She spun in a circle, not recognizing anything. “Where are we?”
Dunder lifted his chin, indicating the baby bed by the tree:Look in there.
She moved that direction and found a sleeping baby girl with brown curly hair and a pink bow. The lights from the tree gave her skin a rosy glow, and she sighed, happy and content.
