The day before solstice is snowy, and the sky is slate-grey like the brooding
rock of the mountains. I wake to the sound of Billa screaming at Bobo for
messing up her fur, and grimace as I dress in the cold, for the fire has gone
out in the night.

Solstice! I fear there will be little enough to celebrate this year, for there
has been unrest and a recent uprising within the village. Against such great
matters, what is the Solstice cheer of a few little cubs? They should be home
for the Solstice, but there is no news from their families, so that my daycare
has become a full-time lodge. I suppose we shall all have to make do. Unhappy
thoughts for an old furrikin, but such is the way of things.

I scurry out to the hallway, and find Bobo sulking in the corner. "What
happened?" I ask him briskly, trying not to show my annoyance.

"She yelled at me and broke her hairbrush over my head, Mrs. Trundle," Bobo
complains.

"What were you doing to get her angry in the first place, then?" I ask, and he
looks slightly guilty and shakes his head.

"Can't tell," he whispers conspiratorially, and I groan inwardly. Gods help us
if he's smeared mud over her again, I think, remembering the unfortunate
episode which ended in Billa locking Bobo in the laundry room and hiding the
key. After much scolding, she agreed to give up the key, but with typical
absent-mindedness forgot where she left it. I'd had to get Naggle all the way
from Serenwilde to open the door, and we found the key six months later when
Little Boo rummaged it out from goodness knows where and chipped a tooth trying
to chew on it.

I seek out Billa, whom I find by following the trail of red marks left on the
floor by her feet. I have no idea who told Billa that pretty ladies paint their
nails, but she has painted her toes with redtint every day ever since, and all
my exasperated comments about the state of my floors have fallen on deaf ears.
Children are children, whether furrikin or Tae’dae, and I've seen enough in
my time to know when I'm fighting for a lost cause. I can hear you asking right
now why I didn't just give her a solid cuff and scold her until she wiped her
feet, but the truth is that when your charges are taller than you are, some
child-rearing methods simply don't work.

When I enter her room, Billa's back is turned towards me. She turns around when
I enter, and I see with alarm that she is covered in tufts of what appears to be
pink wool.

"Did Bobo do this?" I ask her, and she looks flustered and shakes her head. I
look with suspicion at the drawer she was bent over, but do not press the
matter. "What did he do, then?"

She babbles something incoherent and nudges the drawer shut with her foot. I
give up trying to find out what happened - no doubt it is some tiny matter
between the two of them. Just then, a wail breaks the relative silence of the
Daycare centre. I know the voice - it is Bebe, and she sounds quite distressed.

I rush out of the room, and indeed Bebe is crying on the floor, nursing her
paw. On the ground beside her is one of my knitting needles, red with blood. I
bite my lip, trying not to show my frustration. I sit down on the floor beside
her and take her paw in mine. "Bebe," I say, "I thought I've said to keep away
from my needles? You know you tend to poke yourself with sharp objects at
times."

Bebe's stops sniffling for a moment, and her eyes dart quickly away from my
face. She is the shyest little cub I have ever seen - worse than some of the
mouse-kin children. "I only wanted to - " she begins in a tiny voice, only to
stop short as Billa gives her a not-so-gentle poke.

"To do what?" I ask, but Bebe only hides her face behind her paws and refuses
to say anything more. I have the feeling that this will be a very long day.

"Girls," says Bobo in a voice of supreme annoyance as he comes in. He has
dressed himself in his tattered old coat, and with characteristic Bobo-ness has
put all the buttons in the wrong holes. "I'm going out," he says.

"No, you're not," I retort. "You'll catch your death of cold."

"But Mrs. Trundle," he protests too reasonably, "The fire's gone out so it's
just as cold in here as it is out there."

"That's no excuse," I say irritably. "Stop arguing, my boy, or Ironbeard will
give you a present that explodes in your face."

The words have the exact opposite effect that I wanted. Bobo whoops and laughs.
"I knew it!" he cries. "Old Yojimbo's Ironbeard in disguise!"

"Wait, what?" I say stupidly. "I feel that I've lost my mind somewhere during
the first sentence. Do explain."

"Well," he says, "he's old, plump, and makes things explode! Doesn't Ironbeard
do that?"

"Ironbeard's a dwarf, stupid," says Billa caustically.

I rub my temples in frustration, wishing for a bit of peace. Bobo notices, and
seizes the opportunity. "If you let me go out, I won't be able to bother you if
you're in here," he says hopefully. I give up and wave him away. He darts
through the door and is gone in a flash.

I bind up Bebe's paw, even though the cut is really very small. I tie the
bandage in a little butterfly knot, and Bebe cheers up at this, inspecting her
paw with satisfaction and letting a small, shy smile creep onto her face. I
give the cubs their lunch. After the meal, Billa disappears into her room
again, no doubt resuming her post at her mirror. Bebe shuffles out of sight,
and Bruno wants more, as always. I keep Bobo's lunch in the oven for him,
reminding myself to check it from time to time to make sure Bruno doesn't make
off with it.

I settle in my chair and think. All the talk of Ironbeard and my earlier
thoughts of Solstice cheer come together, and an idea occurs to me. Though
Ironbeard has not been seen in Estelbar for many, many years, so that some
wonder if he exists at all, there is no reason why we cannot give gifts
ourselves. What could be better than giving the cubs things they like on
Solstice day?

I have many chests of old things which I hardly use. Some are things my mother
left me, some my son's old toys. I know that in the chests there will be
something perfect for each cub. Bobo wishes to be a warrior when he grows up -
it is the not uncommon dream of many Tae’dae boys - and though one day he may
choose otherwise, I decide to give him a wooden sword, painted with silver and
gold tints. I imagine him oohing and aahing over it, and rushing outside
promptly to slay imaginary enemies - more likely than not the apples in the
orchard - and a small smile creeps unbidden onto my face.

For Billa I choose a bracelet I liked in my youth. It is too flashy for me now,
but I think she would enjoy it. It is a little small for her, but perhaps when
she grows up she will be able to wear it as a ring. Though she spends too much
time preening herself in front of the mirror, perhaps vanity is the common
nature of all girls that age. At least, if my memory of my own childhood serves
me well.

Little Boo likes to draw. He scribbles upon the walls of his room at times with
charcoal, and it used to drive me insane. I find some comfort in the fact that
he is getting better at it, and I wrap up several paint palettes for him.
Perhaps when he grows up he will be a great artist. Who knows what will be,
twenty years from now?

Bebe is only shy when she is around other people. When she is alone, or thinks
she is, she tells herself stories, such flights of imagination as I have seldom
heard in a child that young. I have heard her talking to her stuffed animals and
her dolls, pretending to be a princess, a mage, a bard. For her I choose a
collection of animal tales. I feel sure that she will spend many hours poring
over the brilliantly coloured pictures and the simple, sweet stories.

I hide all these presents in the half-finished socks I have been knitting all
winter, then remember that I have not yet chosen a present for Bruno. Indeed,
it is most difficult, for sometimes it looks as if Bruno thinks of nothing but
food. In the end I give in and decide to bake him a cake. I tie my apron around
my waist and set to work, and so I do not even hear Bobo return.

It is almost dark by the time I have finished all these things. I stretch my
aching back, and settle back in my rocking chair when all of a sudden I find
myself pounced on by a pile of yelling, giggling Tae’dae cubs. I struggle out
from under the flailing mass, and peer at them, wondering what provoked this.
Bebe is the first to stop her exuberance long enough to proclaim, "We made
something for you."

And so, before my wondering eyes, their present to me was revealed: a rather
lopsided sweater made of lumpy wool dyed an eye-searing shade of bright pink.

"I went and asked for the wool!" Bobo declares proudly. "We ran out this
morning, so I had to go ask for more. thinks it's -funny-, for some reason."

"I twisted it into yarn," says Billa. "It wouldn't stay together, though, so I
put glue on it."

"I dyed it with my berries," grins Bruno, showing his berry-stained teeth. I
shall have to ask him -where- he got those berries from.

"I knitted it," whispers Bebe. "I broke the needle, though, so I went and took
another one this morning. Only the needle was mad at me and I got poked."

Little Boo just grins and points proudly at the charcoal figure smeared on the
front of the sweater. It's a rather bear-like, indistinct dark shape. "It's
supposed to be you," Billa volunteers helpfully. Then, anxiously, "Do you like
it?"

For a moment I am speechless, and then something warm and bright rises in me,
and I laugh with a carefree joy that I have not felt for many months. I gather
them into my arms one by one, these little cubs, the children who are not mine
but who are dear to me as my own littles. "Yes," I say. "Yes, I do." And I know
that no matter how hard and dark the year has been, Solstice cheer has come to
one old furrikin at the last.