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“The Ice King is sad today. There is snow in the summer.”
Lemongrab blinked, the words falling from him without much thought behind them. One of the tea-server lemons looked up from his tea brewing and nodded before returning to his task, stirring and stirring and stirring. Certainly, it was snowing outside, very softly glazing the lemon trees and lemon houses and lemon people with frost. A few brave lemons tried to catch the flakes with their tongues and hands, but most walked to their homes to stay warm and safe in light of the recent atmospheric change.
Lemongrab drank his tea and stared, watching small bits of ice build up on the walls, the boughs, watching one lemon person get pelted with a snowball from another. It was serene and even quieter than normal, the snow muffling the sounds and turning the earldom into a tiny recording booth. He hummed to himself.
“I cannot allow it.” He said after a moment of silence, setting down his finished tea and getting up from his seat. A line of lemon people formed automatically, but he ignored them, walking by and down the hall as they raised their collective eyebrows. “I can’t allow this snow day to last more than a day.”
He was matter of fact, he knew it could last weeks and weeks if Finn and Jake weren’t involved. The sadness of the Ice King, with nobody interfering, would reach the abandoned desert, far, far away, back before lemon people and back before him… And The Earldom of Lemongrab was ever closer now. They needed to plant more plants, as it was fairly early in the summer and the trees would grow in enough to weather the winter by the time they sprouted, but as it stood… He could not allow some sad wizard to ruin their crops, not now that he knew where food would come from.
That, of course, and he wished to leave the earldom for a moment. He was itching for something, but he wasn’t sure what. He was sure that, if he left the earldom for just a second, he’d find a solution, even if it meant Finn had to save him again, like with Matthew. He was going to travel to the Ice Kingdom and confront the Ice King.
And do what? He thought to himself, draping a blanket over his Lemon Camel’s back. Do what for the Ice King? His Lemon Camel didn’t answer, even when asked, and he turned in on himself for the answer.
‘ You could speak to him. Comfort him. Lemons can do that. ‘
Comforting was not his strong suit. He didn’t know what those of ice-stylez needed, nor if he could provide that care. He was getting better, certainly, but he was not confident in his abilities, definitely not confident enough to help a man so cold that his very sadness made his kingdom stretch and encroach upon others’ like a rude omelette touching his hash browns. His Lemon Camel shivered in the cold as they reached Ice Kingdom proper, trudging even slower now in the knee-deep powder snow.
Lemongrab looked up at the towering icy mountain. The window atop was quiet and dark, just as the world around them was due to the hovering thunder clouds and unpacked snow softening each and every sound. He dismounted his Lemon Camel, giving it instructions to return home. He could handle this himself, and would get home himself. His steed turned and made its way into the warmer distance without a glance back, and he stared after until he could not see yellow anymore.
He continued his trek to the Ice Kingdom’s palace, trudging just as slowly as his camel had through the soft snow. It was up to his thighs, the snow now steadily falling from the sky and threatening to bury him. He continued to push through, soon reaching the base of the tall icy mountain, the castle of the Ice King. He needed to find the entrance before he fell to the cruel elements.
He took some time following the base of the mountain, tapping the face for the hint of hollowness, which he could take advantage of with his sound sword. There was nothing but thick ice for as far as he could see, and he made an upset sound at the concept.
“Conceited mountain.” He cursed the mountain, leaning his back on it. He needed to focus, as the wind had begun to pick up, carrying the snowflakes into his face, making his nose numb and form icicles. He thought, and thought, and thought…
He heard quacking in the distance as he curled in a ball to think better, the snow forming a shell around him and quietly turning off the lights.
Lemongrab woke in a cold place, but much, much warmer than the place he was before. In fact, as he looked down, he realized there was a blanket wrapped tight around him, swaddling him into immobility. The itchy feeling of being trapped took hold and he wiggled his way out, pushing the blanket off of him and onto the ground with a cry and a thump and a puff of black and white feathers. He then pulled back and curled up on the soft platform he was on, glancing back and forth and down and up as he pushed away the edges of the fuzz of passing out.
He got off of the bed quickly after gaining some bearing, examining his environment more clearly. He was in a large room made of ice, full of furniture both made of ice and not. Piles of clothing and trash sat willy-nilly, frost coating it like dust. There was a large open triangular window, and he approached it, leaning out slightly into the cold whirlwind of the outside world and immediately regretting it. He flinched backwards with an upset grunt, clutching his nose and finding that frost had already begun to grow, with only a gust of wind. He’d found the center of the sadness.
A quack caught his attention, and he looked to see a squat, black and white bird standing in a doorway. It quacked again, waddling toward him, and he stood still as he appraised it.
“Huh… Are you one of the Ice King’s servants? Did you come to my aid?” He asked, and the bird reached him just to pull on his pants leg. It stared upwards, and he stared back.
“Wenk.”
“Hrm. That isn’t an answer, but I suppose I shall listen to your request. I don’t like owing others.”
The bird walked off toward the exit, and he followed, listening to his footsteps click along the icy floor and echo along the walls of the halls he was led through. There were more birds about, some quacking to each other, others sitting alone in rooms, but he saw the most of them around one door, peeking in. The bird leading him shoved past them and into the room, turning slightly to make sure he was following. He managed to step over the hoard of birds with minimal tripping and minimal noise, and his guide showed him what he was there for.
The room was empty, if you ignored the whirlwind of paper and pencils and little disks spread across the floor. In the very middle sat the Ice King, laying face first against the ground with sharp icicles growing around him like the bottom jaw of some great beast.
“Wenk? Wenk?” The bird shook the Ice King’s body from between the icicles, and the icicles grew upward and ever sharper, causing the bird to retreat backwards with a startled quack. The bird turned to Lemongrab, eyes full of worry, and it gestured at its master with an anxious vigor.
He heeded it, walking close with his hand ready to draw his sound sword. He could break all the icicles in one fell swoop if they grew further, but he was willing and hoping to try a different way. He wasn’t sure if the sound would upset the birds, and he didn’t need to be hoarded by a bunch of squat quacking birds, not when he had gotten this far. He knelt beside the Ice King’s self made cage, reaching a hand in and setting it on the Ice King’s back. He gave him a good shake.
“...gunther leave daddy alone… he’s tired today…” Was the low murmur, and the ice retreated a few inches back into the ground as the Ice King pulled his limbs in and cuddled closer to himself.
Lemongrab hummed in thought, his gaze reaching one of the icicles. He pulled and it broke rather easily under his strength, and he did the same with a few more, giving himself room to move without the fear of being impaled. He didn’t wish to become a frozen sorbet, not today.
He then scooped up the Ice King (“what, oh, who are you?… ”), and he tried to ignore the blistering cold that affected even his rind, and he tried to ignore the grasping of cold, cold fingers on his back, the cold reaching through his clothes and going up his spine and spreading like a poisoned water line through his essence. The birds around the entrance parted for him, following him and Gunther as he carried away their master.
He tried to set the Ice King down again upon the bed in the first room (“don’t let go of me, come back, keep holdin’ me…”) and it proved difficult, the icy hands grasping him pulling him all too close into the freezing magic just oozing from the sad wizard, even as he pushed and pushed away.
‘He’s giving you instructions. Heed them, hold him.’
“Nn, it’s easier said than done, me!!” Lemongrab said out loud to the thought, the cold hands grabbing at his arm now and pulling it close. He could almost feel ice crystals forming inside of his arm’s fluids, and he stopped himself mid-scream, biting his cheeks to keep himself quiet and focused. He looked back and forth before he found a solution, reaching as far as he could with his arm held tight, nearly frozen in the wizard’s grip.
The quilt was heavy and warmish, he remembered, and he looked down at the light and cold wizard still clutching his slowly dying arm like a lifeline, realizing what he had to do. He swung the quilt around his shoulders, and he dove in, wrapping his free arm around the king and pulling the quilt around them both, cutting off the outside world.
Immediately he regretted it, the cold now captured in between them, and the icy fingers of the Ice King now icy arms that wrapped around his middle and pulled him ever closer. The Ice King cuddled his face into his chest, humming appreciatively, and Lemongrab did not know what to do other than wait for the warmth to return to him, but it didn't feel as though that was possible; he could only feel cold, as though he put himself into a very soft ice box.
“Oh, who are you even… Are you a guardian angel?” Babbled the Ice King as he pushed his cold face into the lemon’s chest. “You’re so warm… So, so so warm…”
“Mnn… I’m not your guardian angel.” Lemongrab grumbled.
“It doesn’t matter who you are, as long as you keep doin’ this for me… I must be dying, for real this time, this is heaven…”
“No dying!” He whisper-shrieked, trying to find a good place to put his arms. He wasn’t feeling any warmer, and wanted to sleep he was so cold, but he knew it was a bad idea. He bit his tongue to force himself awake, his needly teeth providing more than enough hurt, but he couldn’t make his now mostly frozen arm move at all, even with the new focus.
“Whatever, warm guy… Lemme just lay here for a while and pretend, alright? Nobody’s touched me in ages, platonic or otherwise... Can you, uh, wrap your arms around me?“ The Ice King’s voice tapered into meekness, and Lemongrab tried to move his arms in the tangle of hair and blanket and mumu he was trapped in, only successfully wrapping one arm around the wizard. He whined under his breath as he tried to make his other arm move, but it was completely unresponsive. Why was he doing this again? It was such a bad idea… He was going to freeze to death and nobody would come save him, not even Finn.
‘This is for the lemon peeps, and us too.’
The inner voice reminded him softly, so soft he thought of his brother who was him, during the later stages of the fall, where he couldn’t speak above a whisper… He teared up instinctively before shaking it off and focusing on the icy man he was trying to comfort, pressing his arm closer and squeezing him tight.
It felt as though the Ice King was just skin and bone underneath the mumu, and another flash entered the lemon candy’s mind, just enough to remind him of past mistakes. He hissed loudly at the memory and shook, his other arm starting to feel softer around the edges and his fingers twitching in slow response. His eyes were wide like saucers as he physically forced his arm to thaw by pure willpower, and ignoring the severe amount of pain he was in, he quite literally shook it loose from the grasps of the sad, sad ice. He wrapped his newly freed arm tight around the Ice King, squeezing him close as he shooed off bad memories.
The Ice King squeaked and clung back, moving up a bit to bury his face into Lemongrab’s shoulder and gasping.
“Hoo, too much, too much-” The Ice King huffed, wriggling, and Lemongrab begrudgingly eased up his hug. The Ice King sighed and relaxed into the now comfortably tight squeeze, laughing a bit into his shoulder. “Man, you smell lemony fresh, it’s real nice… This is the best cuddle I’ve had in awhile…”
“Mm, I am lemon, so I smell like lemon.” Lemongrab pointed out, leaning his head away from the pointy crown and nuzzling man attached to him. Instead of the all-familiar emaciation, he tried to focus on the long, now warming up hair of the Ice King as it gently wrapped around his wrists and legs like weak-willed tentacles, clinging just like its owner to anything that would touch him. It was really sad.
The Ice King snuggled in more, sighing softly. They fell into a semi-comfortable silence, the most uncomfortable one Lemongrab as he tried to keep his fingers and nose from going numb. He ended up burying his face and fingers into what part of the Ice King’s mane he could, closing his eyes and trying to relax. Relaxing was a thing he could do, now, but he had to really force himself, and that was the opposite of relaxing. Being functional was strange.
Occasionally the Ice King would shift, wrapping his arms tighter or higher up around Lemongrab’s chest or nuzzling his face further up against his cheek. He made appreciative noises and was slowly but surely warming up, the ice magic returning to his insides and allowing warmth to build up from Lemongrab’s body heat reflected in the quilt.
Persuaded by the growing warmth within the quilt, Lemongrab soon fell into a gentle sleep, bored as he was by the act of comforting.
He woke up once more in the cold place, though this time weighed down by a snoring wizard alongside the heavy quilt. The Ice King had relaxed to a state of drooling comfort, his hands only vaguely grasping at Lemongrab’s shirt and his legs tangled up with the earl’s. Lemongrab’s arms and hands were trapped in white tangles of hair, so he instead shook the quilt off his head and out of his vision to get a clear picture as to whether or not he’d fixed the issue.
He was quite surprised by how warm it had grown in the quilt shell in contrast with the very chilly room he and the Ice King were in, and looking to the triangular window, he got what he needed to know: There was a heavily clouded sky, though there was no snow, no storms… Just the typical overcast of the Ice Kingdom. He hummed in victory as he leaned his head back on the bed, allowing himself a moment of stillness.
...Though that stillness quickly gave way to a familiar itchy anxiety, and he wiggled his limbs to get them un-stuck from the Ice King’s many wiles, only succeeding in freeing an arm from his beard before the wizard on top of him stirred. He froze up and stared as the Ice King sleepily raised his head, rubbing at one of his eyes with a large yawn as the quilt uncovered more of the two.
“Wooh, man, that was a great sleep!” The Ice King plopped his head onto Lemongrab’s chest again, smiling sweetly up at the lemon candy and running a finger in a circular pattern on top of his remaining trapped arm’s shoulder. “Howdy there, pal-o-mine, thanks for the cuddle sesh. I reaaally needed it, I was gettin’ a little ridic-u-lous there.”
“Hnnn...” Lemongrab responded, popping his other arm out from behind the Ice King and away from his gestures. “‘Little’ is an understatement! Yoooou nearly froze my earldom. I did what I had to.”
“I don’t really care why you did it, I’m just glad ya did.” Ice King looked to the side, out of his room’s window. “Wait, what did I do?”
“Your kingdom reached to touch my earldom with its chilly, chilly fingers.” Lemongrab hissed, though not with any real malice, “So, I took it upon myself to stop your sadness from ruining our crops. You are welcome how dare you.”
“Oh.” Ice King began to sit up, and Lemongrab took his chance to scoot out from under him, curling his legs up against his chest as he leaned against the icy wall of the bedroom. Ice King plopped down, pulling his quilt up around his shoulders. “What do ya grow over there?”
“Lemonjons.”
“Can I have some?”
“I don’t have any on my person.”
Ice King threw his arms in the air, throwing off the quilt and flying slightly into the air. “Oh, I know! You can just give me some when I drop you back off at your house!”
“Hhyeh?” Lemongrab hadn’t thought about how he would get home, besides a vague notion of ‘walking back’. It took him slightly aback that Ice King would offer such a thing. “You… Are offering to take me home?”
“‘Course, bestie! And then, we could have lunch, or go see a movie, or… I dunno. Whatever you lemon-peeps do for fun!” Ice King floated around his room, giggling, “Oh, I’m all giddy now! I’ve only ever seen the Lemon Kingdom from afar! When I was watching you and your other you.”
“... You wha?”
'He wha?' His inner voice echoed.
“Don’t worry about all that, let’s go!” Before Lemongrab could stop him, the Ice King swooped down to pick him up, scooping him up from under his arms and carrying him out of the window.
Lemongrab had to physically force himself not to flail, reaching up to grasp the Ice King’s arms and marginally fix his precarious position. From that height, Lemongrab could see over a large portion of the Ice Kingdom, from the ice mountains glimmering dully in the low light, to the heavy plumes of snow sliding down surfaces, pushed by their own weight. The Ice King whistled some sort of song as they flew over the sights, and in the moment, Lemongrab was able to recognize the beauty inherent to the silent ruffling of the billowing grey clouds above and muted puffs of the soft, still ground below. Something in his lemon heart murmured happily at the contrasts, and his face twitched into a small, genuine smile, relaxing just barely in the wizard’s grip.
It hadn’t taken long for the horizon to split into the land beyond the ice, the clouds dissipating to show the sunset dyeing the world orange and pink.
“Wow, It’s late! Maybe we should get dinner instead… No, that’s a little too forward, isn’t it...” The Ice King wondered aloud, and Lemongrab felt a pang of worry, knowing that sunset meant that he’d possibly missed the dinner call, and that his people must have missed dinner without his instruction… All of their schedules would be off! Unacceptable!
“Nnnn, fly faster, King of Ice! I must return to the Earldom at once!” Lemongrab shouted up, swinging in his arms. The Ice King startled slightly, but swooped down without a word, flying even closer to the forest surrounding the Earldom, close enough that Lemongrab felt tree branches slap against the tips of his shoes. The dull brown walls of his home emerged, and Lemongrab braced himself as they flew over… Before he let go of the Ice King and slid from his grasp, falling into the Earldom proper.
Much of the snow that had fallen had melted into puddles, leaving the ground wet and soft as he squished into it, sinking down to his ankles in muddy, sticky soil. He quickly unstuck himself, shaking as much mud as he could off of his boots before giving up and taking them off once he reached the main path. He barely heard the Ice King swoop down behind him to ask if he was ‘cool’ and to compliment his ‘sick flip’ as he marched up to the castle doors, pushing them open himself as the guards startled themselves out of their late-afternoon nap.
It wasn’t too late! The sun was still up, if barely, and he could call in everyone for a meal and then nine hours bedtime, no trial, effective immediately-
By the time he reached his post in an uppermost window, the sun had sunk below the earldom walls, casting harsh blue shadows in contrast with the orange-red of the sky.
“Dinner!” He called out, but nobody responded. His teeth ground in his mouth. “Dinnnnnner!” He called out again, but again, no response. No movement, no murmuring of most likely very hungry workers, no hushed footsteps down the main path. As the shadows deepened, the color leaching from the sky, the lights in the various lemon-houses extinguished, all on their own.
His hands shook as he gripped the windowsill. Not only had he missed the dinner call, but he missed the lights-out call as well. His people went to bed alone, without a meal, all because some stupid wizard couldn’t keep his kingdom to himself. He felt a familiar, dangerous frustration boiling in his chest-
“Wowza, thanks bud.” Lemongrab heard the slapping of bare feet across the floor, and turned harshly, eyes wide, teeth grit, to be faced with the Ice King… Holding out a bowl of lemonjons and holding one of his own. Out of the corner of his eye, he caught a lemon servant hurriedly exiting the room, the tip of a night cap the last thing he saw. He felt the rage bubbling out of him, leaving his wide eyes and grit teeth to ease into a look of mild confusion.
“... They fed themselves? Went to bed themselves?” He looked down at the bowl that was being held out to him, reaching both hands to hold it. “... Am I the lemon that needs constant care?”
“I dunno, the guy had been sitting at that table in his bed clothes with that bowl and ran off to get me one when he saw me. He had a lil candle too, just adorable! Wish my penguins were nearly as cute, but they hate pajamas.” Ice King shrugged before taking up his wooden spoon, poking at the bowl of candy. “... This all you eat?”
“I eat mostly lemon, yes.” Lemongrab felt a strange feeling in his chest, thinking of a single servant staying behind, guarding his meal, waiting for him to return, even at risk of losing sleep… A pride, a sadness, a strange, swirling, full feeling in his very center… “Let us take to the dinner table, but then we must go to bed.”
“Woah, a sleepover!? I didn’t pack an overnight bag, though…” The Ice King followed behind him, waiting for Lemongrab to take up the tallest chair before choosing a smaller chair right next to him.
Lemongrab looked at him, then back down to his bowl, the feeling in his chest pushing the sides of his mouth up into a small smile; different than the one when he witnessed the contrasts of the icy land before, but still, a second smile in a long day of peril and difficult acts.
“You may borrow some of my hand-me-downs for rest, if you wish to stay.” Lemongrab said before eating a spoonful of lemonjons, looking to the Ice King again to watch his face twist in reaction to the sourness of the candy. He let out a loud ‘Ha!’ without even realizing, and dodged a playfully thrown hand by the Ice King.
In the back of his head, his inner voice murmured a 'Told you so.'