It had been one and a half years give or take since Falias had visited the Wonder from which he took his name for the first and only time.

That first time had been a November and he'd been with Camelot. He'd found out that his Wonder was a forest - that it was oddly... Peaceful.

He had found his Knight ring there, close to the stone that had been in a clearing on its own close to the centre of the forest.

Daithi had called it the Lia Fáil, the stone apparently where Knights of Falias were supposed to take oath.

Daithi...

The other man... Ghost... Well whatever it was that other was - had called himself Falias too, had used the title the Mistletoe Knight of the Stone...

Falias was still having problems acknowledging that the brown-haired man that had been garbed similarly to him and who looked to be in his late twenties or so was supposedly his ancestor.

Even so he hadn't meant to stay away from his Wonder so long. Things had just.. Happened for lack of a better word.

First there had been the White Phoenix strike against the Dark Mirror Court where he had gone from Page to Squire followed almost a month later by the city-wide power cut that turned out to be some sort of Negaverse operation.

And then almost a month after that had come Mistral.

Mistral...

Mistral had been and remained a not period of his life, the memories associated with it a tangled thorny mess of anger, hate, self-loathing and guilt.

He hadn't done much of anything powered during that period and had certainly given a thought to his Wonder, much less try to visit. Instead he had spent the period mostly drinking in an attempt to drown out the memories.

He had stopped only because he hadn't like the man he was turning into -stopped because he didn't want to be the sort of man who needed alcohol as a sort of crutch to get him through the day...

But whilst he was no longer spending his days drinking himself into oblivion he had never been able to truly move on, the makeshift metaphorical bandage - if it could even be called that - as thin and as fragile as paper.

He wasn't sure why he had decided this evening that he would visit his Wonder, after all the other evenings of putting the visit off. Maybe it was meeting Hvergelmir that had been the catalyst - her insistence that Sarras was in trouble. Or perhaps it was meeting Merlinite again and finding out that the other had not succeeded in his wish to become a Knight. Or maybe, just maybe it was simply time.

Whatever the reason, instead of heading out to wander around the park as was his wont when powered up, Falias instead raised the mistletoe wrapped wand that was his 'weapon' and said quietly "I pledge my life and loyalty to Earth, and to Falias. I humbly request your aid, so that in return I may give you mine."

Now as back then the words felt right somehow and now as then his surroundings suddenly shifted, the night time sounds and city surroundings fading to be replaced with the silence of the forest.

Something had changed though, was different.

It wasn't anything that Falias could put his finger on, although somehow he knew it to be true. Even the silence felt different - more of a stillness than the peace of before.

And the trees... The trees seemed almost - almost faded somehow.

He didn't know what had caused the changes he could see as he made his way towards the Lia Fáil but he did know that he didn't like them - didn't like them one bit.

He found Daithi at the Lia Fáil, the brown and green-clad Knight facing the stone, his back turned to him.

"So you finally decided to come back" there was a mocking tone to the older man's voice. "I'm surprised that you actually bothered..."

"I..." there was something about the other's voice that set Falias on edge, but it seemed that the other man wasn't finished continuing on as if he hadn't even spoken.

"After all there has been a full passing of the seasons since you last stepped foot here and we are halfway into the next, but then again perhaps it is only to be expected from a Knight that refuses to take oath on the stone."

Falias found himself flushing in annoyance as his green eyes glared in annoyance at the other man's back "Now hang on just a minute"

"No I will not as you put it 'hang on,'" brown eyes glared at him in return as Daithi finally turned to face him. "You are a knight, Squire that refuses to take oath on the stone - defender of the weak and protector of the land and its people. You are Falias' chosen - her Knight and my successor - the next Mistletoe Knight of the Stone... But do you understand what those words really mean?" he sighed, a sound that was in parts frustrated and in others weary " Or what it means - truly means to be the Mistletoe Knight of the Stone? "

He shook his head with another sigh as he stated "I do not think that you do."

And then he was gone, leaving Falias alone at the stone as for a moment his parting words echoed around the clearing. "Because being a knight isn't something you can play at."

-- 919 words --