“I can’t believe none of you have ever been sledding before!” Evelyn practically bounced with excitement as she led her friends on the march up the hill, a pair of newly-acquired sleds slung across her back. “Isn’t it wonderful that you’ll all get to share this first experience together? And on such a beautiful morning!”

Lathander truly had blessed them with the perfect morning for sledding. The air was crisp, the sun was shining in a cloudless sky, and a new layer of snow had fallen just the night before, leaving the hillside (except for where their tracks cut through it) absolutely pristine.

“My feet are cold.” Strix groused.

“I told you, you should have worn your boots.” Diath chided her.

“I didn’t want to wear boots. And it doesn’t matter because now we’re going to die doing whatever this is.” Strix stomped to the top of the hill and threw herself to the ground in protest.

“Strix,” Evelyn asked as she set the sleds down, “Isn’t that just gonna make you colder?”

“Ugh!” Strix clambered to her feet, her robes covered in snow. “This is stupid!”

Diath, perhaps sensing an incoming tantrum, grabbed one of the sleds and pulled it over to her. “Here, Strix, why don’t you go first?”

“Fine.”

Evelyn stifled a laugh as Strix sat on the sled; she was slouched like some sort of gargoyle, her glowering face poking out of a heap of snow-coated rags.

“Don’t push me yet, I’m not ready.” She said to Diath as he began to push the sled toward the edge of the hill. Though she wasn’t particularly heavy, Diath wasn’t particularly strong; his feet were skidding and he was kicking up a lot of snow, but he wasn’t gaining much ground.

“Do you need any help?” Evelyn asked.

“I got it.” he wheezed.

“Don’t push me over yet!” Strix shouted again as the sled neared the edge of the hill.

Evelyn wasn’t sure whether it was intentional or whether Diath just couldn’t see where the edge was, but one minute he was pushing the sled and the next he had fallen face-first into the snow and the sled had shot off down the hill, Strix screaming as it rapidly picked up speed. She bailed out halfway down, bursting into cloud form as the sled flew off without her, finally skidding to a stop at the bottom of the hill.

“Sorry!” Diath shouted down to her. As Strix was still a cloud she couldn’t make any noise, but based on her flailing arms and stomping feet Evelyn guessed Strix was doing her best to shout back a few choice words of her own.

“You two next?” Diath laughed as he got to his feet.

Evelyn looked to Paultin, who shrugged. He had been so quiet the whole time, she hoped he was at least a little bit excited to try something new. The two of them squeezed onto the sled, Evelyn in front and Paultin behind. Evelyn was glad Paultin couldn’t see her face; they were very close, and she was sure she was bright red. Diath began to try to push them toward the edge, but their combined weight was too much, and he just ended up pushing on Paultin’s back as his feet slid through the snow behind him.

“Hey Diath, I have an idea.” Paultin twisted around to face him, one hand raised and the other still in a tight grip on the sled. “Stand back.”

Diath took a few steps back.

“Uhh, maybe a little further?” Paultin asked. Diath backed up further and further until Paultin gave him the thumbs-up when he was about ten feet away. “Hang on,” he said to her, and the next moment a wave of thunderous force exploded out behind them with the loudest bang Evelyn had ever heard and suddenly they were flying through the air faster than she had ever flown before, even on her winged boots. Her eyes streamed as the wind whipped around them and Paultin was whooping, his hands in the air, and even as they began to lose altitude Evelyn thought she had never experienced anything more exhilarating in her entire life.

The sled hit the ground with a resounding crack and Evelyn was launched off of it, sliding the rest of the way down the hill on her back before rolling to a stop at the bottom. The same had apparently happened to Paultin; he lay face-down a few yards away, arms still raised, his cheers muffled by the snow. Scattered between them were the shattered remnants of the sled; it was a wonder neither of them had gotten hurt.

“That was amazing!” Evelyn called to him as she got to her feet.

“Right?” Paultin stood somewhat unsteadily; Evelyn guessed that having been in the back of the sled, his thundewave must have hit him pretty hard. “Let’s go again!”

“I’d love to, but I don’t think we can.” Evelyn made a wide motion which encompassed the many locations across the hill their sled now occupied.

Paultin nodded somberly, “We were too much for it to handle.”

“It’s alright Paultin, it’s gone to join Lathander in his holy light.” Evelyn patted him on the elbow to comfort him, channeling some of her healing power as she did so. It seemed to perk him up somewhat.

“Rip.” he said.

The two of them watched as Strix, who had finally made her way back up to the top of the hill, passed her sled on to Diath, who took several steps back until he disappeared behind the top of the hill.

“What’s he doing?” Evelyn wondered.

She didn’t have to wait long to find out. She watched as, moments later, Diath sprinted across the hilltop, threw the sled onto the slope and leaped atop it, arms out for balance as he rode the sled, standing, down the hill.

It would have been the perfect run if it weren’t for the pieces of Evelyn and Paultin’s sled still littering the hillside. One of the larger pieces lay wedged in the snow at just the right angle to form a ramp, and Diath’s sled ran up it at full speed, launching both high into the air. They flew over Evelyn and managed, somehow, to hit the only tree on the entire hillside. The sled broke against the trunk and Diath collided with one of the lower branches, the wind knocked out of him as he was practically wrapped around it.

Evelyn flew over to check if he was hurt and found him dazedly clinging upside-down to the bottom of the branch.

“Diath, are you okay? Do you need help getting down?”

“M’fine,” he groaned, and dropped to the ground in an ungainly heap. Evelyn helped him up, channeling more of her healing magic as she did so. “Thanks, Evelyn. Sledding is… certainly something.”

“Well, usually you’re not supposed to hit a tree.” she laughed. “That was a really good first try though!” She looked at his sled, broken nearly as badly as the other one. “It’s too bad we won’t get to go again.”

“Yeah, I only got to go once!” Strix complained as she joined them, “And I wanna see Diath hit more stuff.”

“Same.” Paultin added.

Evelyn beamed. “I’m so glad everyone had fun!”

“Fun.” Diath coughed, still disoriented. “Right.”

As the four of them left, Evelyn tried to memorize every detail: the churned up snow on the hillside, the scattered sled shards, her friends, covered in snow and laughing. It may have been short, but it truly had been the perfect morning for sledding.