Melancholy skidded down the stairs and was making a beeline to the kitchen.

“Hold it right there young man.” 

“Huh? What did I do??”

“Go outside and wail.”

“But Ma, I just want breakfast!”

“Not a single bite, you’re starting to moult, the Death Energy is backlogged inside you. You’ve been holding your Keens in again haven’t you? Hanging around that Hound friend of yours  chasing each other all over the Mound til the wee hours of the night. That’s all well and good, but I won’t have your sad, scabby hands all over my prepared meal. So go outside and wail.”

“Yes ma’am.”

At that the young beansidhe turned on a heel and made his way outside into the snowy forest to wail and sing his soul free of the Deathly build up and danced as he felt the decay shimmer and shimmy out of his body. The death keen was shivering free of his cells, and by the time he returned from his wailing wander, he looked renewed, refreshed and vibrant.  

“Okay, I’m back. Oh that smells so good, I’m starving.”

“I kept your breakfast warm for you, enjoy, my beautiful beansidhe boy,” she said as she kissed the top of his head, once he sat down to enjoy the prepared plate of food. Then she went over to tidy the front room and dust and humming idly to herself. 

“Are you going to invite your hound friend over for Yule this year, or are we going over to share a meal with his family?”

“I dunno, haven't asked him yet,” Melancholy replied.  

Whack!

“Ow! What was that for?”

“Talking with your mouth full. I’ll not have you exhibiting those unseelie manners in a High Court family household.”

“He’s no higher sidhe than us, Ma! That really hurt!”

“Chew then talk. Talking is no different than wailing. You cannot wail a full sound with food in your mouth, and I cannot understand your words clearly when your mouth is half chewing on food.”

The two of them fell quiet, as he ate his food and she folded the laundry sitting on the nearby couch. 

The silence awkwardly knelled on, only to be broken with the sound of howling. Melancholy started to push away from the chair to go run out into the snow to meet his friend. His mother gave him a look.  

“May I go out to play with Hound if I wash off my plate and wear my long winter veil since it's snowing?”

“You may. Thank you for showing me you have manners.”

“Thanks, Ma!” He scurried off to rinse his plate and then wrapped his veil over his body and  dashed outside. The silence in the snow around the ravine between mounds was bright-loud with mumbling snowflake chatter. Melancholy didn’t see anyone. He knew he had heard the howl. But why didn’t he see his friend?

“Hound?” he called out. 

Silence.

“Hound, are you out here?”

Deep in the trees the wolf named Hound was well hidden with his thick arctic coat as the seasons of the wheel turned.  He was normally so brown he was black with a light sandy colored fur on his underbelly and the pads of his paws.  Now he was white as snow, except for his dark void eyes, and the tip of blood bright on the tip of his tail.  

He’d been blooded at his coming of age ritual over the second harvest of Mabon. He was excited to tell his friend. But at the moment, he wanted to see if he could surprise him. The veiled beansidhe wandered in the loud silence of the snowy ravine. The Hound was keeping to the trees around the border of the valley. But choosing his moment, right as Melancholy turned, Hound howled a loud bark that made the beansidhe jump nearly two feet into the air before he spun around. 

“Hound!” Melancholy beamed, and ran to hug the dire wolf. “I forgot your coat changes with the wheel… wait.  What’s this?”

“I’m blooded now!”

“That’s fantastic!”

“It really is. Means I can finally hunt on my own without my parents.”

“Oh speaking of parents, mine want to know whose house we’re eating Yule dinner at?”

“Oh, I can come over. I will spare you the drama of my pack brothers. They still have that higher pitch to their bark and it hurts my ears, though now that I think about it, if I invite you over and you wail a keening note low enough, it may scare that pitch right out of their throats.”

Melancholy laughed. “It is nice to do the snowball fight after and before. Maybe I can come over there. I think my mom is hoping for some time to chat with your high court parents.”

Hound rolled his eyes and growled an annoyed sound before looking up at the sky. “Did you feel that?”

“Yeah, the earth just dropped. Solstice days are beginning.”

“Wanna run a bit before we have to head back inside?”

“Thought you’d never ask.”

“How are you gonna run with that heavy veil in the way?”

“Easy….”  Melancholy adjusted the wrap of his veil til it looked more like a cape or some sort of gliding wings.

“You run, I fly. We’ll see who gets tired first!”

“You’re on!"

And as Melancholy took a running start to fly, as  Hound ran full out, howling as the beansidhe wailed, any not endowed with the Sight would be unaware of what it was exactly that made the sound of the silent snowing Yule night so loud.