Prologue: Wizards in Winter

Lights illuminated the streets, reflecting softly off the freshly fallen snow. A pair of people walked with arms linked down the street, absorbed in the world around them, smiling at one another, lost in one another's gazes. It would be difficult to find a couple in Paris more in love. Just ahead of them a young boy ran around basking in the falling snow. He ran around catching the falling snowflakes on his tongue, laughing as they melted.

"Adrien appears to be enjoying himself," the woman said, stifling a chuckle as the boy tripped, landing face first in the snow, rolling over and beginning to make a snow angel on the sidewalk.

His father was less amused, seeing the young boy's custom, designer jacket becoming soaked and slightly muddied as he played. "Perhaps a bit too much."

The mother rolled her eyes and unlinked arms with the man. "It's Christmas Eve, Gabriel and we promised him we'd go see the Christmas lights. Lighten up."

Gabriel brought his hand to the bridge of his nose and rubbed it. His wife thought puns and word play were the epitome of humor, something he throughly disagreed with. He only hoped Adrien took after him in regards to humor, but seeing as Adrien appeared to find joy in the jokes Gabriel doubted it. He would just have to educate him on what real humor was when he was older and hopefully snuff out the love of puns before it was too late. The man brought his hand down from the bridge on his nose and felt something assault his temple, suddenly making him cold and knocking his glasses off of his face. He looked up and saw his wife smiling maliciously, their son jumping up and down, laughing because "Mother hit Father with a snowball!"

There was nothing to be done about his wife's antics. He reached down to pick up the abandoned frames and, while crouched down, dusted the lenses off and crafted a snowball away from his wife's sight. He placed the ball in his pocket and rose back up, giving his wife an annoyed glance. "Really? You're going to teach our son to partake in frivolous activities like snowball fights?" He walked over to her and placed his hand on her waist and brought her in for a kiss, pulling the snowball out of his pocket, whilst doing so, crushing the snow on her head when she had completely sunken into him. She pushed him off of her and gave him a betrayed look while the man just looked down at her with a small grin on his face. "If you're going to teach him, teach him right." Gabriel turned his attention to Adrien and crouched so he was eye level with the boy. "Sneak attacks are always more effective than direct approaches."

A snowball in his face and Adrien laughing uncontrollably once again. "I got Father! I got Father!" The walk was abandoned and the three made their way to a nearby park. The Christmas lights and street lamps illuminated the park, making the scene almost as bright as day. Gabriel and his wife were aiming snowballs at one another and Adrien alternated between the two parents, enjoying being able to throw snowballs at both of them. The fight soon became a war and the two adults, laughing all their cares away, forgot about everything around them. They were entirely focused on pegging one another with balls of ice. Neither of them noticed their son wander off, his eyes locked on red and white lights outlining a bakery.

The little boy looked in the frosted windows and saw a mother and father with a young girl eating green macarons with red frosting, happily drinking hot chocolate. The girl was wearing a large red ribbon tied in a bow on top of her head, making the girl look like a present. The mother wore a santa hat and the father wore a red and green striped felt elf hat with fake ears sewn onto the sides. They were laughing at something said by the dad and a dollop of red frosting was placed playfully on the girl's nose. Adrien pressed his own nose to the window and the wife tapped the husband on the shoulder, pointing to where Adrien stood with a smile on her face. He was a shy child, though energetic. His curiosity brought him to the window of the bakery and his shyness brought a blush to his cheeks when he was noticed, but a wave from the girl made everything suddenly okay. He waved back and the door to the bakery was opened, the largest man Adrien had ever seen standing in front of him. Someone of this size would usually send Adrien running for the hills, but the man, with his crooked elf hat, flour dusted shirt and vanilla smell reminded Adrien of a young Santa Clause. "Where are your parents, son?"

Adrien looked around and realized he didn't know where they were. He must have walked farther away from the park than he thought. His eyes started to sting and tears filled his vision, blurring the sight of the kind man. "Hey, don't cry. We'll find them." The man brought the boy in and gave him one of the macarons. A bite from the sweet peppermint flavored cookie and a smile from with girl with red frosting on her nose made Adrien feel a bit better.

"They're good, right?" She gave him a toothy smile and Adrien could do nothing but give her an enthusiastic nod. "I'm not allowed to make macarons yet. Apparently they're hard to make, but I got to make the frosting! I nearly put an entire bottle of food coloring in there."

"It's good," he spoke quietly, returning the toothy smile with one of his own. While he finished his cookie the adults put on their coats and gloves before helping the girl with hers.

"Where did you last see your parents, young man?" The woman crouched down so she was eye level with him, a position he had seen his father in many times, but the kind smile made her look different. She was asking a question, not giving instruction.

"They were throwing snowballs at the park. I saw the lights and wandered off."

"The park! That's just around the corner." The girl gave him another macaron. "These were supposed to be for Santa, but I don't think he'd mind sharing with you."

Tom packed a small box of macarons as an offering for the boys parents, happy to share his baking creation with the young boy's family. They must be worried about him. He held the box with one hand and held his daughter's hand with the other, letting his wife take the hand of the boy and lead them to the park where the evidence of a snowball fight remained. A man stood on a phone speaking rapidly and crossly into the receiver demanding police arrive to help him find his son. A woman near tears had her hands cupped around her mouth, calling out her son's name in desperation. Adrien broke free of Sabine's hand and ran to the hysterical woman who immediately enveloped her son in a hug. The father hastily spoke into the phone and hung up, going to where his wife hugged their son. "Adrien," the man's voice was stern, a complete contrast to the warmth that came from the baker, "where were you?"

Sheepishly, Adrien looked at his shoes, avoiding eye contact with the man. "I- I wanted to look at the lights and you and mother looked like you were having a lot of fun and I didn't want to interrupt."

His mother stroked his hair and placed a kiss on his head, "I'm sorry, baby. We went out to look at lights and we ended up forgetting that." She placed a kiss to the top of his head before giving him a stern look, "That doesn't mean you can just run off, though." She glanced up at the family that had escorted him back. "You're lucky you found such nice people to bring you back to us, but that's not always going to be the case." She stood up and dusted herself off, trying to make herself look presentable to the stranger. "Thank you for getting him back to us."

Tom shook his head, passing the woman the box of cookies. "It was no problem. He's a very well behaved young man. He didn't even realize he was lost until I asked where his parents were." He put one of his large hands on Marinette's head and let out a hearty chuckle. "This one keeps us on our toes. She's always getting into trouble."

"Papa!" The little girl puffed out her cheeks indignantly and turned away from the man, who immediately scooped her up in a hug, causing her to laugh.

Sabine gave the woman a kind smile and Adrien a pat on the head. "We best be off. Come to the bakery around the corner anytime you'd like. We'll give you something on the house."

The woman nodded and the baker's family left, returning home. Gabriel and his wife each took their son's hands in one of their own, swinging his arms with each step. They looked around at the lights, elated that Adrien had returned home safely. When the boy let out a yawn they took the hint and decided to head home for the night.

Three important things happened the night the Agreste family when to look at Christmas lights. Adrien saw the jovial, playful side of his father, something that was foreign to him just days before. Adrien also met the girl he would one day fall in love with, though he didn't know this yet. Finally, Adrien witnessed his mother's death.

The family was walking home when a car hit a patch of ice on the road and slid out of control and headed straight for Adrien. His mother leapt in front of him and pushed him out of the way, sacrificing herself to save him. Lights illuminated the streets of Paris that Christmas Eve, but they weren't the kind Adrien had hoped to see. His father covered his eyes and looked away from the atrocious, gruesome scene. The boy hardly got a look at what happened. He just saw his mother's hair lying on the asphalt, broken bright green cookies surrounding her. That moment shadowed over everything that happened that night and the kind baker's family was forgotten. The loss of his mother was the only thing he could think of.

That Christmas was the most vivid one in his memory, and the one he hoped to forget the most. He opened all his presents, but it took until June for him to do so, crying each time the label said "From Mother."

Needless to say, the Agreste household wasn't keen on celebrating Christmas after that. Christmas time Gabriel would isolate himself from the rest of the house, from his son, even more than usual. Adrien had tried to get his father to come out the years following his mother's death, but he learned it was useless. Eventually he gave up and decided to learn how to cope with the holiday on his own, going and looking at the bright lights every night in December. That was the last thing he did with his mother so he made it his own tradition to go out and see the bright lights for himself. He felt closer to his mother that way.

Thirteen years after the death of his mother Adrien walked outside, letting the snow fall on his shoulders. The shining of the Christmas lights brought a smile to his face. It was a peaceful, though not quite silent, night. The sound of cars driving over the road softly echoed, the sound of snow crushing beneath his shoes, both were music to his ears. He rounded the corner and found his gaze looking at red and white Christmas lights and real music caught his attention. An orchestral variation of Wizards in Winter with classic string instruments and electric guitar brought him close to the window belonging to the owners of the red and white Christmas lights. Inside a girl was preparing the tree. He watched her longingly from the window and he couldn't help but notice something felt familiar about this.

Merry Christmas, all! Well, Merry December at least! If you were here at Halloween and happened to be around for my 13 days of Halloween then you might be able to detect the pattern here. We're celebrating the 12 days of Christmas! I'm super excited for this and went through at least four different Christmas plots before deciding which one to use. Daily updates will start December 14th and the last update will be on December 25th! I hope y'all all enjoy. This story will play out a bit like a Hallmark movie (seeing as a lot of this story was inspired by those) so I hope y'all won't be upset about that. Let me know what y'all think and I'll see y'all December 14th!