Face down in the cold snow. A winter song of summertime sadness (Chelle)

It was early morning. Very early. The sun was nowhere near rising just yet, but in the Hale family mansion,  somebody was already up. Ailill had woken up shortly before 4am for reasons currently beyond him. Who knew there even was a 4am? He sat in bed and looked out the window into the night. The outside was still from the lack of activity. Even the birds weren't awake just yet. Ailill yawned and laid back down to try and sleep. A couple of minutes later he realized his efforts were to no avail. The tired man slipped out of bed and decided on going to the kitchen to get a glass of water. He had read somewhere once that a minor stroll at night was helpful for insomniacs. Ailill was not an insomniac though. He generally didn't have too much trouble sleeping. It would be helpful if it actually worked, though.

He walked to his closed bedroom door and opened it to leave the room. He slept with the door closed because he didn't like the idea of people entering his room while he was asleep. Though he told people it was due to the outside light shining in through the hallway. Ailill quietly exited his room and walked down the hallway towards the kitchen. He did not want to wind up waking any of his relatives at this hour. Some of these people can be really grumpy in the morning. Nobody here was a morning person per say.

As he reached the kitchen and opened the fridge to pull out the water filter he thought he heard footsteps. Was someone else up too? Who else would be awake at this hour? Ohh, did he accidently wake somebody else up? He didn't want to talk to anybody. He was so tired. Ailill stifled a yawn in hopes that nobody knew he was up, and peeked around the corner to see if there was anybody coming. He saw nobody. Huh, did he just imagine the sound of footsteps? Maybe he got himself worked up for nothing. Now he was awake and alert. There goes getting back to sleep. Now what? What was he supposed to do now exactly? Ailill yawned again and leaned against the counter as he poured water into a glass and took a sip of it. He put the dispenser back into the fridge and closed it so he could go back to his room and probably fail at sleeping.

Ailill nearly choked on his drink when someone came around the corner and spoke to him. The sudden presence of the elf princess that he himself was responsible for bringing to this place startled him enough that he was forced to cough to clear his throat. He put the glass on the counter and his hand over his chest as he regained his breath from that. "Don't do that." he told her weakly after finding his throat finally clear.

"What are you doing up anyways? Don't you see what time it is?" he asked of her when he realized she seemed completely oblivious of anything going on other then managing to surprise him. She then started talking in that ridiculous baby talk voice of hers and it made him turn his head away so as not to look at her. Ailill didn't know why she talked like that so often. It was just annoying to listen to and it made no sense to him as to why she choose to do so.

With the way she was looking and acting, Ailill honestly couldn't tell if she were really clueless or just messing with him. With most people he would naturally assume the latter because that was often the case, but with this one, he was honestly starting to think she was just kind of idiotic. Did all those years spent sleeping leave her brain damaged or was she just like this naturally? Ugh, he didn't even want to think it over right now. He shouldn't even be awake, let alone trying to figure out something like this.

"No. Just try not sneaking up people at night." he concluded with a yawn. "And what do you mean 'cold'? Do you not have enough blankets or something? There are some more in the closet if you need any." he told her unceremoniously. Ailill swore she had like two or three in there so of course, he did not understand why she would need any more. It was cold that winter night, but not that cold. It had been colder the night they had retrieved her from that school. Plus, they had the heat on so it was really only slightly chilly in here. He was just too tired to get it. Putting two and two together was a chore for him right now.

"Why would you want to sleep on the couch? What's wrong with your room all of a sudden? You never seem to mind it before." he said as he was starting to get impatient due to how sleepy he was. He was kind of hoping something was going on to make this worth the time and effort. "It's like 4 in the morning. The sun's not rising for at least another hour or two. Is there something you need?" he asked her wanting to make some progress in his efforts of eventually trying to go back to sleep.

Now that he was no longer tired, getting this glass of water felt like a meaningless journey. Best to drink it anyways since it was apparently healthy for you to drink plenty of water. Even if you wind up having to use the bathroom often.

Ailill was awake because he had ran into Mirshann in the kitchen. He wasn't mad about it though. A tiny bit frustrated, but that was due to being so tired. It wasn't her fault for also being awake at 4 in the morning even if he didn't understand why she was. She wasn't a nuisance around the Hale household however. Outside of her annoying baby talk habit, she was a pleasant roommate. In fact, most of the family seemed to enjoy her company. They probably preferred to have her around over him for obvious reasons.

Speaking of baby talk, she was still doing it. Ailill grimaced when he heard it again. It was just so annoying. He couldn't tell if she acting the maggot or just didn't know any better. Regardless, he wanted it to cease. She seemed like quite the critter right now with that sad look upon her face and she told him about the cold that kept her up. Ailill sought to know what in the world was the bloody problem so he deal with it or just plain dismiss it and then go back to bed. Suddenly he found himself being grabbed around his free arm and looked to see her holding him gently. He looked at her with a bemused and skeptical expression upon his face.

For a moment he thought she had fallen asleep while standing up until she finally said something. Now she was trying to drag him to her room in order to show him what was going on in there that was keeping her awake. Ailill went along to avoid getting his arm pulled out of the socket and in a moment they arrived at her bedroom. She was hesitant to open the door to it so he did. Ailill felt a brisk of cold air when it came open and then he looked inside and beheld a strange sight. A small cloud of all things hung overhead her bed and snow fell from it like the winter skies often did outside. Ailill had seen a lot of things that most would consider strange, but last he checked, clouds tend not to form inside and not this far from the atmosphere. He looked at Miri to see how she looked before walking into her room to get a better look at this thing.

Once he started to examine this strange cloud, he could tell that it was not just precipitation. There was some form of magical energy fueling it, but he could not quite recognize it. Nor could he figure out what could have caused it. "At least I know why you can't sleep." he told Miri in a blandly humorous manner. Now, what to do about this strange cloud?

"Yes, yes, yes. I see what you mean." he told Miri as he stared at the mysterious cloud of strangeness. Ailill had to reposition himself due to the cold of the snow on the ground due to this thing. His feet were bare and completely exposed to this indoor weather. It was not comfortable to be standing in this room. He kicked some of it out of the way so he wouldn't have to move too far away from the cloud that he wished to examine.

Ailill now stood near it with his arms crossed and a curious expression upon his face. Various hypothesis of the exact nature of this thing whirled through his mind. A spell gone wrong that had been left unattended? An unforeseen consequence of some kind of work. He hadn't sensed anything unusual going on in this house and none of his family seemed to be aware of it since otherwise they'd be in here too. Perhaps Mirshann herself had caused this. She did still retain her magic even if it was being restrained. Despite all these possibilities none of them provided him with a means of ridding the room of this cloud.

Thinking that he did not know enough about this phenomenon to do anything about, Ailill considered heading back to his room to grab some stuff that would probably help him immensely. "I will be right-" he started to say to Miri as he turned to her to tell her about his idea. He stopped mid-sentence when he saw her pass by him and walk right up to that cloud. Ailill watched with mild curiousity as the elf princess attempted to touch the cloud. When her hand drew near it a spark of energy burst forth from the cloud to repel her attempt to touch it. Ailill stepped forward to get a good look at the effects that sudden spark had on her. For a second it looked like her fingers had been burn't, but only snow fell from them and her hand was just fine.

As he was examining her hand he heard he speak to him. She spoke of the gauntlet on her wrist that was used to restrain her powers and how she wanted it removed. It was there because she tended to be reckless with her powers and they possessed a great risk. Ailill was against doing it at first before thinking it might make something happen. Mirshann seemed to possess a greater understanding of this cloud, as hard as he found that to believe. "Okay, but I need you to very careful. Do you understand me?" he asked as he grabbed her hand and prepared to remove the gauntlet once he was sure it was a good idea to do so.