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“What’s all this?” Juline asked, poking her head into the darkened library after Kesler.
The other elf turned back to smile at her, his face just barely lit by the dim colorful light behind him. It looked like the kind of light Cyrah sometimes made with her Flashing ability, when she used light patterns to act out a story, but there wasn’t anyone else in the room to be making it happen, unless they were a Vanisher too.
“It’s called a movie projector,” Kesler said, running his hand over a gadget that Juline could now see seemed to be the source of the light. “It’s a fun little human invention, and I thought you might like to see it. It’ll tell us a story with light and sound.”
“I’d love to,” Juline said. “Is it the same story every time, or a new one?”
“There are only so many stories, and I only have the film -- that’s the part the story’s actually on -- for some of them, but you can choose which one to play,” he said.
“And you chose one about snow,” Juline said, grinning at the pattern the light was currently holding.
Kesler grinned back. “I did,” he admitted. “This one’s one of my favorites, for a few reasons, and reminding me of you is certainly one of them.”
Juline blushed slightly and flicked her fingers towards him, engaging her Frosting ability as she did.
Kesler laughed as a fine dusting of snow settled over his hair and shoulders. “Come on,” he said, taking Juline’s hand and leading her over to the largest armchair, which had been moved to have a good view of the rectangle of light.
Juline tucked herself into the chair beside Kesler and giggled as the talking snow creature began the story. The moving pictures were charming, as were the characters it showed - a deer with an odd nose, an elf (or so he was called, though he was so different from the kind they knew) with different gifts than the rest, a boisterous human with a sled, and a whole island of interesting beings that for some reason or another had been told they couldn't belong.
“Like Exillium,” Juline murmured as the winged lion explained, thinking of the rough, wandering school that their society banished those they deemed too much trouble to.
The ending at least was happy, even if it seemed unfair that only the right circumstances had made the society reconsider their treatment of the misfits.
“I'm not sure I would have helped, if I'd been Rudolph,” Juline admitted. “I might have left them to it, and say it served them right.” She looked over at the elf she loved, the elf their authorities told her was a bad match for her simply because she’d manifested an ability and he hadn't, never mind that he was the brightest alchemist anyone had seen in centuries. She thought about how hard he worked, how many things, both practical and whimsical, he'd already invented, and the plans he'd shown her for a shop of his own. “But you would,” she murmured, reaching up to stroke a hand down his cheek. “You'd help anyone who needed it in a heartbeat, no matter how unfair to you they'd been.”
“I would,” Kesler agreed, taking her hand in his. “If only because I hope it would make them more accepting of the next odd kid to come along, or put me in a place to be able to help those kids.”
Juline nodded as she leaned against him again. “Maybe you’ll become such a legend that any kids we have some day won’t fear being Talentless,” she said.
Kesler squeezed her hand. “If not ours, then their children, or theirs,” he said. “We’ll make them see there’s more to us than abilities. All of us, even those who have them, are so much more.”
“And then it’ll be you going down in history,” Juline said, nodding with a smile at the ending image, which still lingered on the wall.
Kesler grinned at it, and then back at her. “Maybe it will,” he said. “Just maybe it will.”