Chapter Text
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For years, each morning upon awakening, Maleficent would find a little snack next to her nest.
Diaval was, true to his original form, an early riser. He would always awaken at the crack of dawn, and he would leave his slumbering mistress to perform his morning rituals. Preening, cleaning, foraging, checking if anything was amiss, listening to other birds chattering…and always, without a single exception since the day he had started doing it, bringing her a little something to sweeten the start of the day.
In his bird form, he couldn't carry much, so it would be a few berries, or nuts, a small apple or a plum. But if he'd spent the night in his human form- an occurence which, with years, had been becoming gradually more and more often, until at some point it became his preferable form to sleep in- then, he'd return with a bowl of fruits or nuts or honey, and another bowl with fresh water. Even in winter days, he'd always find something sweet, or at least edible enough for her.
Maleficent was puzzled at first, but accepted the small token of kindness without question. Well, except the worms and beetles he also tried to bring, in the earliest days, but after the second time she had left them uneaten, he learned not to bother with them.
With time, it became a habit, finding his treats next to her first thing in the morning and enjoying them in peace and solitude. He was rarely present himself when she'd awaken. He would bring his treats, silent like an owl (he would detest the comparison) while she still slept, and disappear until she'd call for him.
So it became an ordinary part of her morning. Like wrapping her hair or washing her face. She didn't think about it much, and she certainly didn't spend time musing over it, or appreciating it. It was just... there.
Which is why it came like a surprise- a shock, if she was to be honest with herself- how much she’d missed it this morning, when the first sunlight bathed their nest, and the snack bowls next to it were empty.
And she wasn’t the only one to be disturbed by the abrupt change in the morning ritual. Pixies fluttered around her nervously, while she was picking hazelnuts. The wallerbogs were uncharacteristically serious and quiet when she leaned down to fill her bowl with cool spring water. The water nymphs didn’t dance today; they remained in the streams, but she was aware that they were looking pointedly at her. Everything had gone quiet when she had emerged from the rowan tree instead of Diaval, and the silence was filled with confusion. She could feel the myriad of anxious eyes observing her from the trees and bushes and shadows. But nobody dared to approach her.
It was Balthasar who finally did.
“What happened to him?” he asked in the language of his folk, towering over her, yet managing to convey such gentleness and worry that Maleficent lost every inclination of letting some of her steam off by snapping at him. But she wasn’t in the mood for talking either.
“Make sure that there is no excessive noise around the Fairy mound today”, she answered and went back for her tree, a bowl of hazelnuts in one hand, a bowl of water in another. Rather than flying back, she walked, so she wouldn’t spill any water.
How did that impossible bird manage to find the patience to do this every morning, for seventeen years?