"Mm-hm!"

And so midnight finds them perched on their thrones with tea and a plate of cookies for Father Christmas if he should happen to want them.

Father Christmas lets himself in through the little door on one side of the dais where the four thrones sit. He is carrying some things, one of which appears to be a book.

"Merry Christmas," he says, nodding to both of them.

"I come when I come, but those who are awake at midnight are likeliest to see me then." He takes a cookie. "The book will always show you what you're looking for."

And he's off, nibbling his cookie on the way.

"Okay."

James takes the book and tries it. It opens just fine. She passes it back.

"I'm not sure yet. It looks like a puzzle." She fiddles with it. It turns out to be possible to turn the various sections relative to one another, like a Rubik's Cube, although doing so quickly causes the tetrahedron to lose its original shape.

"Okay, that's cool," says James. "And I'd say it was way too simple, but there are more colours than sides, so I'm not even sure what would count as a solution. I'll play with it, I guess."

"Merry Christmas!"

James fiddles with her puzzle as she heads for bed.

Over the winter there is a flareup of ex-Witch's-minions activity, as they are more in their element and someone has either cleverly or maliciously let loose a rumor that the winter is there to stay yet again. Many of these creatures are caught - with most of their captors being quite careful to, in accordance with royal instruction, see to their safety first - and also bring them alive to Cair Paravel for James to have a look at. (Isabella talks to the captives, too, but James is the one with the sense-of-people so keenly necessary in deciding who is safe to let out on probation and who is to be kept in the inescapable dungeons to think about their life choices and be re-interviewed at later dates.)

Isabella has a bag made - the backpack doesn't keep things near enough to hand for her liking, and anyway it looks very odd against the sorts of outfits the dryad wardrobe mistress likes to put her in (whether it's breeches and boots for riding or fine queenly garb for formal occasions). The bag, painted silk (for its strength and softness both) slung messenger-style over her shoulder, has a loop to tuck her scepter into and plenty of room for infinity-notebook, pen, and cordial, as well as any incidentals she picks up.

In the spring (which is met with ecstatic relief by the populace) when it is again possible to build things, the rulers of Narnia establish a handful of schools, although unlike those they remember from Earth these neither favor specific ages (which would be quite absurd in as diverse a country as Narnia anyway) nor demand attendance from anyone who does not care to go. These are soon turned into little library-study-halls where people who know things and people who wish to know things congregate. Isabella allows a dwarf to copy bits of her notes to compile into useful books; it turns out that the infinity notebook will cooperatively open to whatever page she is looking for, but it will do this only for her, and so she doesn't much mind having it in the hands of someone else as long as she opens it to begin with to whatever she wishes to show them.

James's birthday, calculated by subjective days, turns out to fall on Narnia's May 7, and when this is announced it is summarily fused with the nearest preexisting national holiday, a celebration of consistent warmth and sunshine and full of all the usual feasting and dancing and games associated with holidays generally. It is also customary to leave anonymous baskets of small presents ranging from flowers to practical gifts on the doorsteps of neighbors on the previously existing holiday. It is renamed "Kingsday".

Isabella doesn't recalculate her birthday, even though it would have fallen at a similar date; she just "turns twelve" four months after James turns thirteen, under the changing leaves. This allows her to co-opt a harvest-and-arts-and-eating-desserts festival associated with large impromptu markets for trade and display of various crafts and other things ranging from preserves to maple syrup, which suits her just fine. She eats desserts and browses art with the best of them. It is, to match James's, called "Queensday".

The giants to the north make a little trouble not long after this holiday, sensing a soft and juicy target, but the Narnians aren't as soft as all that. A small minority of giants are willing to meet with James for diplomacy when a letter is dropped into their camp by an eagle messenger, but the rest of them have to be driven away by force; James's sword and Isabella's cordial come in handy once again, as does Isabella's unicorn bodyguard from the Battle of Beruna. Eventually the giants are routed from the borders of Narnia.

And eventually Christmas comes again.

Isabella stays up.

James's tetrahedral puzzle turns out to conceal additional complications, magically shifting to a new shape every time she finds a solution for one of the previous ones; she quickly learns how to swap it between the five Platonic solids, but when she unlocks the small stellated dodecahedron she is temporarily stumped and only very slowly learns how to convert between this shape and the other five. She remains convinced that there are more shapes available, if only she can find them, and carries the puzzle everywhere she goes so that she can tinker with it in idle moments.

When midnight rolls around, she is busy trying to find another solution to the cube shape.

Isabella's thinking through a minor problem with one of the diplomacized immigrant giants - she is having some small difficulty integrating with her new neighbors that has come to royal attention and Isabella's brainstorming - but she's alert enough to look up.

"Merry Christmas!"

"Merry Christmas," he says. He has a bag over his shoulder today. From it, he first withdraws a little potted shrub of some kind. Its leaves are small and dark and pointed, and it bears one or two small dark berries nestled among its tangled branches.

"Isabella, Daughter of Eve. You have been making good use of the fire-berry cordial, but its supply is not infinite. Keep this plant where it may catch the light of the rising sun, and when you see the level in the bottle begin to drop, pick one of the berries in the morning while it is still shining and put it into the bottle. They are not true fire-berries, but they will serve this one purpose very well."

Next he withdraws a smallish rectangle of card or paper, almost like a postcard. It seems like ordinary paper, if of a very high quality, all around its edges - but in the middle it is transparent, showing the texture of the paper only very faintly over a perfect view of whatever is behind it. He hands it to her along with the potted plant.

"This page will capture a picture if you look through it and wish it so. If you set it on top of ordinary paper, or any other surface that can be drawn or painted on, and wish it to copy its picture there, it will; if you hold it and wish it to clear itself so it can be used again, it will do that."