Work Text:
The night was clear and mounds of fresh snow banked the frozen pond. Methos looked up. The stars looked back. He hunkered down on his log, unwilling to give up the mug that was warming his hands. The steam that rose from the hot rum and melted butter floating in fat round globules on the surface was sharp to his nose and rich with smell of cinnamon and cloves. "Come on," he said. "You dragged me out here, now show me what you can do -- make it worth my time."
Skates laced tight, Duncan stood up and began sliding across the ice. Moonlit. Starlit. Black on white. His shadow found its rhythm and began to turn and spin, arms spread, gliding backwards and beckoning.
Methos remembered the ice fair on the Thames in the winter of 1562. Iron blades. The Seine frozen over the winter of 1310. Wooden blades. A mountain pond frozen in the winter of -- he couldn't remember the year -- but the cracked shins of red deer had been strapped to his feet. He tucked the mug securely against the log, where it stayed lost until the spring, stood up and went to meet his lover, catching him around the waist, spinning them together.
It's an old, old sport.