Visiting By a Loved Draki (Christmas story 3/25)
Visiting By a Loved Draki
Title: Stories For Christmas (25 as total) Number 3/25
Undertitle: Visiting By a Loved Draki
Fandom, Characters: Dark-Hunter, Orlando, Elijah, Viggo
Rating, warning: PG, were-hunters, probably very au from Sherrilyn's serie
Eventually in which 'verse it set in: Phantom of The Night
Used prompt: # 6 Snow, table posted here as the master list
Word count: 952
Beta: A friend
Authors note: See the master list for the common for all stories.
Especially for this: All the characters are my own, but set in Sherrilyn Kenyon's Dark-Hunter world. If you not familiar with it, you can check the master list for Phantom of the Night (where you will get explanations about some specialities of the characters).
I'm not sure if this would fit to the Phantom story when it is finished, but this is what could have happened. Also it is written before I read Dragonbane, which might change the way I would use a were-dragon in my stories.
Summary: Time spent together with friends.
Living in Canada wasn't what Orlando had wanted to do, but after the circumstances he preferred that to anywhere else. England was out of question, even if both Viggo and Acheron had assured him the things he been exposed and accused of was taken care of. Just the thought about his old country made him shiver. He had two other reasons for his choice of place to live. First and most obvious was that he knew that Viggo did prefer a colder climate and when he didn't have any assignments, he liked to be somewhere with as few people as possible. The second was that if his friend Elijah ever would want to come and visit him, it would be good if the place had as few power lines as possible and open fields. If he ever felt the need to have more people around him, he could always visiting his friends down in New Orleans.
There was another advantage for them all to be where they were living, the access to living animals. Of course they tried not to be different from human hunters, and to kill more than might be allowed. They didn't want to be responsible for the extinction of any animals or draw too many eyes on themselves. Several times they had discussed if they’d made the right decision to let their animal side out and hunt, and had come to the conclusion if they were really, really careful it wouldn’t hurt anyone. Also, if ever there was any indication off any exposure, they would stop hunting.
For the time being, Orlando had gone into the nearest town to stuck up on supplies. He could feel in his body that the weather would turning colder, and with that there probably be snow, which would make the roads harder to drive on. He had learned to handle a car quite well, but still felt very uneasy during the winter. It had also happened that they had been snowed in a few times. Sure they could jump back or forward in time, or even change location, but they liked the freedom they found there, so it was best to be prepared.
When Orlando was loading the truck, he stopped in the middle, of picking up a bag, trying to discreetly sniff the air. The smell that had alerted him didn't seem to disappear. He put the bag in the backseat, and slowly took a few steps from the car, looking around and as he turned around he could see his friend emerge from the side of the house across the street. A wide smile spread in his face.
He didn't let Elijah to speak. "I didn't expect you to come anytime soon, but I'm so happy to see you." Orlando threw his arms around the little guy.
"Hello to you too. I wasn't sure myself and you’re damn lucky its dark." Elijah hugged Orlando back.
Orlando didn't comment. He knew that Elijah would have trouble traveling during the day, as a dragon would be all too sensational and his friend would be very weak. Even he was more at ease during the night, being a Katagaria and being in his natural state.
"Need any help?" Elijah broke in.
"I thought you would never ask, though since you here, we will probably have to add more food."
A deep rumble was his reply which got them both to laugh - some things never changed. After the second purchase, Elijah offered to drive and Orlando happy handed the keys to him. On the way back, they caught up on what happened since last time they meet.
Orlando had been right about the weather and the temperature had dropped several degrees during the night and into the morning. It had snowed so the yard was white, though he believed it was just the beginning. After some breakfast, or rather a late lunch, he went to bring in some more wood, in case the power would go out.
Back inside, he put a few more logs on the fire and then went to his bedroom. He was tired, his bones still ached from the former abuse, especially on the cold days. It also strained him to be in his human form, so he shifted to his panther form and jumped up on his bed.
Hours later, Orlando was woken up by his friend's voices. He slowly stretched his limbs and didn't bother to shift back when he went to find them. He found them in the living room, sitting opposite of each other, drinking beer. He stood watching them until they knowledge him. Viggo projected that he would get himself a beer and join them. Orlando turned around and after a few steps he turned back to human and summoned clothes.
When he joined the guys Viggo said, “The weather keeps getting colder and I guess we will soon have up to 20 inches of snow.”
“I felt that in my bones.” Orlando told them and turned towards Elijah, “Sorry to sleep so long. I forgot to ask, how long you will stay?”
“I hopefully can be here awhile, but you never know when we be needed. It isn’t exactly calm between the worlds.”
“Damn the curses.” Orlando said silently.
After a long moment, Elijah suggested they should go out into the shelter of the night and snow. They all knew that he meant as the animals. The weather would help to conceal them and give them a lot of more energy.
“I can only fix us a deer or bear.” Elijah added.
Viggo and Orlando just laughed and said it would not be so bad, they could always need some more meat for Christmas.
*~* The End *~*