"So do you actually know how to snowboard?"

"Are you kidding?" Jack scoffed. "I, Dollface, am a snowboarding prodigy."

"Really," Merida drawled out.

"Do you know how to snowboard?" Jack asked, continuing his little doodle on the corner of his math notebook.

Merida snorted. "Do I look like I know how to snowboard, Winter Prince?"

Jack shrugged. "You're full of surprises. I wouldn't know."

Merida looked up from her notebook, giving him a slight smile. "No, I really mean it. I have no idea how to snowboard, and I'd no doubt be terrible at it."

"I can…I can teach you," Jack suggested.

Merida furrowed her eyebrows. Jack held his breath, excited for the opportunity to watch her embarrass herself. "What's in it for me?"

Jack huffed. "Tricky, tricky. Always a catch."

Merida giggled and flicked his head. "There's always a catch with me, Winter Prince. Better get used to it."

"Okay. If you let me teach you snowboarding, I'll let you...teach me archery!" How embarrassing could archery be? Not as embarrassing as snowboarding, Jack was pretty certain.

Merida nodded. "Deal."

Merida gripped the board a little nervously and looked around. There weren't many people around, because the weather outside was probably subzero. She rubbed at her reddening nose and squinted at Jack. He grinned and lazily flipped her a thumbs up. "We're starting at the easiest slope, okay? Watch me."

He stepped on his board and pushed off, then coasted easily to the bottom of the gentle slope. "D'you think you can manage this one without smashing your face onto the snowboard and ruining the pretty thing?" he called over his shoulder to her.

"My face is pretty now?" Merida muttered.

"Talking about the snowboard," Jack corrected, grinning. Merida rolled her eyes, stepped on the board and pushed off like Jack did. It started off easy enough, but near the bottom Merida felt herself tipping backwards. She flailed and tried leaning forwards, but instead managed in throwing herself off the board and spectacularly faceplanting solidly in the snow.

"Aagghhh," she groaned and sat up, brushing ice crystals from her hair.

Jack clomped over and grabbed her by both hands, pulling her up. He shook with barely-silent laughter. Merida growled and swatted at him. "Screw off."

"Not b-bad for a first attempt," he gasped out between cackles.

Merida hated not winning at things. She grabbed her board from where it was half-buried in the snow and smacked Jack's shoulders with it. "Ow!"

Merida stomped uphill. "This was just a ploy to make me look like an idiot, wasn't it," she muttered.

"Hey-hey, wait up." Jack grabbed her hand and spun her around. She looked down at him.

"Now what?"

He curled his fingers around hers- her hands were warm and soft, and he tugged her to the top of the hill.

"Let's go together."

"How?"

"Just hold both my hands- like this, okay?" Merida looked at him suspiciously but did as he told her. "Now, push off when I say so. One, two, three."

They glided down the hill, facing each other, Jack holding her steady. "Hey," Merida said, surprised, "it's working!"

And that was sort of when things went wrong. Merida began tipping over again and leaned forward hastily. This made Jack tip backwards, and before he could right himself, he found himself thudding onto the snow on his back for the first time in three years.

Jack tried to take the brunt of the impact, but Merida forgot to let go of his hand until she was almost on the ground, and how they ended up was the most awkward situation Jack had ever been in. Merida's hands landed solidly on his chest, and Jack's hands had accidentally wrapped around her shoulders, their faces inches away from each other. Jack couldn't help but notice that she smelled like evergreens, sharp and clear, and that her cheeks were bright red (from the cold or from their situation?) and he couldn't help that his eyes traveled down further (her lips. her lips were bright red and full and they looked soft and he remembered how they felt on his cheek and whoa there Jack where did that one come from)- Merida cleared her throat, which was when Jack noticed that they'd been like this for five, maybe ten seconds, and rolled off of him.

Merida took a deep breath. "That went well."

"This can't be so hard," Jack muttered, reassuring himself. Merida demonstrated nocking an arrow on a bowstring and shot the thing straight into the bullseye.

"Your turn," she said, smirking.

"Okay." Jack nocked his arrow like her, and pulled the arrow back slowly. He had failed to notice the fact that Merida used her mouth as an anchor, and anchored his hand under his chin. He let go, and the arrow flew a few feet before embedding itself into the ground. "Damn."

Merida, to her credit, tried not to laugh and walked over to Jack's right side as he nocked another arrow. She grabbed his right hand, making him yelp, and pulled back on it firmly. "The mouth is your anchor," she told him, and stopped his hand at his mouth. Jack's eyes flicked sideways, and Merida looked up at him, holding her breath. He had faint freckles on his nose, and Merida could nearly count each one.

She dropped her hand, and Jack let the arrow fly. It thudded into the blue ring and Jack let out a whoop.

"Yeahhhh!"

Merida rolled her eyes but grinned anyways. "Good job, you scored five points. Better than the ground, at any rate."

"This is really cool, you know that?" Jack commented looking around him. Merida shrugged. She ha set up a target in the middle of the woods that surrounded their estate a while back.

"I gotta admit, I didn't really think you'd show up," she told Jack.

"Well, you embarrassed yourself massively by utterly failing at snowboarding, and now I've embarrassed myself, too. I think we're even."

Merida hummed, then slugged him in the arm. "Now we're even."

A/N: Hehehe

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