Chapter 7 #2
She gestured toward Vesa, who was now snorting indignantly while Jarmo murmured to him and patted his neck.
“Define unexpected,” Vic said. “Because frankly, this is just about on brand.”
Erin’s mouth twitched. “You okay?” she asked, the question lower, more serious.
Vic did a quick body scan. Cold. Wet. Bruised ego. No sharp pains, no alarming cracks. Her arm would probably have a spectacular bruise from where she’d hit the ground, but she’d had worse falling off horses over the years.
“I’m fine,” she said. “I’ve bounced off harder things than Scottish snow. You, on the other hand, nearly dislocated something throwing yourself at me like that.”
“That’s my job,” Erin said.
“Body-slamming me?” Vic asked. “We need to revisit your job description.”
“Protecting royal assets,” Erin said. “And you, unfortunately, qualify.”
Vic’s chest did a stupid little warm flip completely unrelated to the fan heater debacle.
“Yeah, well,” she said, trying to cover it with flippancy. “Protect me less dramatically next time. Or at least give me a helmet.”
Snow crunched behind them.
“What on earth is going on?”
Alex’s voice. Equal parts concern and deeply entertained fascination.
Erin pushed herself halfway upright, one hand still braced on Vic’s shoulder. They must have made quite a picture: Vic sprawled in the snow, hair full of flakes, Erin poised over her like some sort of protective… something. Panther. Lion. Overworked human disaster.
Alexandra stood a few metres away, cloak wrapped tightly around her, crown of golden hair dusted white. The triplets were clustered around her legs, all in various states of hat-askew, eyes enormous. Hyzenthlay hung back a pace, taking everything in with that unnervingly calm gaze.
“Auntie Erin tackled Auntie Vic,” Frank announced gleefully. “It was like rugby but with more snow.”
“You were not supposed to see that,” Erin muttered.
“I see everything,” Frank said proudly.
Alex’s eyes swept over Vic, then Erin, then the reindeer. One of the beasts snorted and shook its head as if in indignation at the whole affair.
“I turn my back for half an hour,” Alex said, “and you start staging stunts?”
“Not stunts,” Vic said quickly, scrambling to sit up properly. “Just… active reindeer management.”
“Active reindeer avoidance,” Erin corrected. “Which you were not practising.”
“You screamed ‘NO NO NO’ and sprinted at it,” Hyzenthlay observed. “That’s not avoidance.”
“I didn’t scream,” Vic said. “I… exclaimed.”
Matilda bounced on the spot. “Can you do it again?” she asked. “The thing where you flew through the air? Mummy Erin was like whoosh and you were like argh—”
“That’s a very accurate summary,” Alex said, laughter dancing in her eyes.
“Oh good,” Vic said. “Because near-death experiences are only worthwhile if your humiliation is thoroughly documented.”
Alex stepped closer, her gaze lingering on Erin. There was affection there, and something else—something Vic had been seeing more and more over the last few days. An ache, almost. A wanting that went beyond “please don’t throw yourself in front of moving animals.”
“Are you all right?” Alex asked Erin quietly, the humour softening.
“I’m fine,” Erin said, brushing snow off her knees. “Just trying to keep everyone alive.”
“You always were overly zealous about that,” Alex said, and there was a note in her voice that made Vic feel suddenly, acutely like she should avert her eyes in case she walked face-first into something private.
She did the opposite, of course.
“So, good news,” she said brightly, clapping her gloved hands together and ignoring the way her palms stung. “The reindeer are here, alive, and mostly upright. Which means Phase One is technically a success.”
“I’d like to file a complaint about your definition of ‘technically,’” Jarmo called, still hanging onto Vesa.
“Rejected,” Vic said. “We’re spinning this positive.”
“Spinning what positive?” Julia asked, emerging from the archway with the air of someone who had sensed chaos and come to supervise.
She took in the scene with one sweeping look: the animals, the handlers, the children vibrating with excitement, Vic and Erin wet from the snow.
“Oh,” she said. “Reindeer Gate.”
Vic groaned. “Please don’t call it that.”
“It fits the naming convention,” Julia said serenely. “Snowpocalypse, Mattressgate, Cranberry Crisis—”
“I refuse to acknowledge Cranberry Crisis,” Vic said. “We fixed Cranberry Crisis. Patel found an alternate supply. It never happened.”
“You can’t retroactively erase events by sheer force of will,” Julia said.
“Watch me,” Vic muttered.
Alex laughed. It was a low, warm sound that turned her head at just the wrong angle for Erin’s sanity.
“Children,” the Queen said, crouching to their level. “These are the reindeer who will be in the courtyard tomorrow when we do our Christmas Eve surprise.”
“Yes,” Vic said, seizing the chance to pivot back into her element. “And we are not going to scream or run at them or attempt to ride them, because they are big and easily spooked like young horses and we have to always respect them for the beautiful animals that they are.”
Frank looked faintly disappointed. “Not even a little ride?”
“Absolutely not,” Erin said. “They are not ponies. They are basically small elk.”
“Can we feed them?” Florence asked. “We have oats.”
“You threw oats all over the front steps,” Julia reminded her. “The steps are fed.”
“We’ll arrange something tomorrow,” Alex said. “If the handlers agree. Today, we’re just going to let them get used to the castle and settle into their warm straw beds in the stables.”
“And not chase them onto any more landing pads,” Erin added, giving Vic a pointed look.
“I didn’t chase,” Vic said. “I was… moving purposefully in their general direction.”
“Semantics,” Erin said. “Either way, I’d prefer you not to get flattened. The Queen needs you.”
Alexandra’s head snapped around at that, and for a second, their eyes did something soft and private again. Vic looked away pointedly.
“Right,” she said. “Okay. Great. Everyone’s alive. The reindeer are alive. The pad is intact. No one tell the civil aviation people about this, or they’ll make me fill out a form.”
She dug frantically through her coat pocket for her pen, fingers numb. Her clipboard was somehow still clutched under one arm, miraculously unscathed.
This, she thought wildly, was why you planned. Because events were always one panicked reindeer away from disaster.
If she’d repositioned the delivery time, or set the welcome somewhere else, or insisted on a double line of fencing—
“Are you… revising the schedule?” Julia asked, watching her scribble.
“I’m upgrading the risk assessment,” Vic said. “Reindeer: higher threat level than anticipated. Must increase barriers. And signage. And maybe helmets.”
“For whom?” Erin asked. “The reindeer or the children?”
“Everyone,” Vic said. “No one is allowed within twenty feet of anything hoofed without a briefing.”
Alex smiled. “You do realise this was a freak incident?” she said. “Animals get skittish. That doesn’t mean the whole plan is doomed.”
“Freak incidents are my brand now,” Vic said. “And if there is one more freak incident, my schedule will implode and it will take Christmas down with it.”
“You’re catastrophising again,” Julia said gently.
“I am proactively catastrophising,” Vic said. “It’s different.”
“How,” Julia asked.
“One is panicking,” Vic said. “The other is panicking with bullet points.”
Erin snorted. “There she is,” she murmured. Erin took Alex in her arms and held her close.
Vic ignored them all and wrote, in unnecessarily capital letters:
NO UNSCHEDULED AFFECTION DURING OPERATION HOURS.
She underlined it.
Twice.
Alex, reading upside down, choked. “I’m sorry,” she said. “What?”
Vic felt heat climb her neck. “Look,” she said defensively. “We have had two near-misses today that could have been avoided if people—” she shot Erin a look “—had been paying full attention to their surroundings instead of trying to sneak kisses in draughty corridors.”
Erin’s mouth fell open. “You think the power cut was caused by my sex life?”
“I’m saying,” Vic said, “that we don’t have the bandwidth for spontaneous anything right now. We are operating on a razor-thin margin of control. If people start getting distracted, chaos wins.”
“You want to ban kissing?” Alex asked, incredulous and amused.
“Temporarily,” Vic said. “During scheduled operation hours. There can be… designated affection windows. It’s all in the appendix.”
“There’s an appendix?” Julia murmured.
“There’s always an appendix,” Vic said.
Matilda tugged on Alex’s cloak. “What’s affection?” she asked.
“It’s cuddles,” Alex said. “And kisses. And nice words. And sometimes hand-holding.”
“Why is Vic banning cuddles?” Frank demanded, outraged.
“I am not banning cuddles for children,” Vic said quickly. “Child cuddles are exempt. This is an adults-only restriction.”
“I’m not sure that makes it better,” Julia said.
Hyzenthlay considered. “Is this about you wanting everything to be perfect?” she asked.
Vic looked at her warily. “Maybe,” she said. “We all have to mitigate risk.”
Alex folded her arms, cloak shifting. “So, if I, the reigning monarch, wish to kiss my wife in my own castle,” she said, “I must… consult your timetable?”
“When you say it like that it sounds bad,” Vic said.
“How else is there to say it?” Julia asked.
“Okay, fine,” Vic said, exhaling. “It’s a guideline, not a law. A… strongly worded guideline. Just until we get through the next twenty-four hours without anyone dying or setting anything on fire. Please. For my sanity.”
There was a pause.
Alex exchanged a look with Erin. Something unspoken passed between them—one of those long-practised conversations made entirely of eyebrows and tiny shifts of mouth.
Finally, Alex said, “All right. For your sanity.”
Vic sagged in relief. “Thank you,” she said. “See? This is teamwork. This is how we win Christmas.”
“But I reserve the right,” Alex added, “to ignore your little rule if circumstances become… compelling.”
“Compelling affection is scheduled between the hours of eight and ten p.m.,” Vic said. “Everything else is strictly platonic.”
“You are absurd,” Julia said. “I love you, but you are absurd.”
“You love me because I’m absurd,” Vic said.
“True,” Julia said, and kissed her quickly, just at the corner of her mouth.
Vic pointed at her. “That was scheduled,” she said. “That was on the agenda. Spontaneous spousal reassurances are always allowed.”
“You’re making this up as you go along,” Erin said.
“Obviously,” Vic said. “But with commitment. That’s the important part.”
They got the reindeer settled eventually.
With Erin’s help and Jarmo’s coaxing and Alex’s quiet, soothing presence, Vesa and his compatriots were led to the stables, away from the pad and anything else expensive.
The children were shepherded back inside with promises of hot chocolate and a chance to “draw their tactical reindeer plans.” Hyzenthlay drifted along, pausing just long enough to pat one of the animals’ flanks and murmur something that made it snort and relax. Vic pretended not to be unnerved.
Vic was so confident handling horses, but these reindeer, they just seemed very highly strung.
By the time the handlers were satisfied and been directed to their accommodation and the courtyard had been restored to something resembling order, Vic’s fingers were numb and her nose felt like it belonged to a different person.
“Right,” she said, stamping her feet for warmth. “I’m going to go update the schedule before it updates itself via catastrophe. Then I need to negotiate with Mrs. MacLeod about pigs in blankets. Pray for me.”
“Always,” Julia said, rubbing her gloved hand along Vic’s arm briefly before heading back toward the warmth of the house.
Erin and Alex lingered for a moment by the archway, talking quietly. Vic saw the way Alex tilted her face up, the way Erin’s hand hovered at her back as if pulled by gravity.
Instinct kicked in.
“Hey!” Vic called, brandishing her clipboard. “Remember the rule! No unscheduled affection in operational zones!”
Erin’s hand dropped as if she’d been caught shoplifting.
Alex closed her eyes briefly, lips pressing together around a smile that looked about ten percent murderous and ninety percent resigned amusement.
“You are not seriously enforcing this,” Erin said.
“I am absolutely enforcing this,” Vic said. “If you two start snogging under every archway, we’ll never get anything done and someone will definitely get trampled by something.”
“We’ll behave,” Alex said, raising her hands in mock surrender. “For now.”
She gave Erin a look that made Vic’s ears go a bit hot. “We’ll reschedule,” she murmured.
Erin’s answering smile was small and a little pained. “Looking forward to it,” she said.
They brushed shoulders as they turned toward the entrance. Just that. No kiss. No lingering touch. Not with Vic’s eyes on them, clipboard clutched like a weapon.
Vic watched them go, a little triumph sparking in her chest. One tiny bit of control recaptured. One more variable managed.
She told herself the little twist she felt when she saw Alex’s expression—something like disappointment, quickly smoothed away—was just indigestion from too many biscuits.
Later, much later, she would admit that maybe—just maybe—her ban on unscheduled affection had done more than just keep people alert.
But for now, as the snow fell and the reindeer snorted and the cold seeped into her bones, Vic held her clipboard tighter and thought:
Fine. If the world is going to keep throwing disasters at us, then I will answer with laminated policies.
Somewhere behind her, in the shelter of the arch, she heard Erin’s low voice.
“We’re never going to get five minutes alone, are we?” she murmured.
Alex’s reply was too soft for Vic to catch. But whatever it was, it sounded like a promise.
Vic turned her collar up against the snow and marched back inside, already drafting the next amendment in her head.