It was a cold evening. The sun had set long before the ball even started, and Caedes and Claireholm walked to the ballroom guided only by the lights of the stars and lamps.

It had long been the city custom to host the city’s Christmas Ball at the house of the presiding mayor, which for the last quarter century had been Mayor Rella. (Mayor Rella was popular with the citizens, which partially explained his exceptional longevity as nominal ruler: the other, and more important part was that training a new mayor took time and effort and the ruling Families and Sects were interested in expending neither.)

As the reader may expect, this was a mansion located in the centre of the city. Not the Bridal Path - the mayor didn’t like to be fenced off from his citizens - but certainly in the rich end of town. The living quarters of the house were not particularly large, and the ballroom proper was larger than the rest of the estate. (We will ignore the underground tunnels, bunker, and dojo.)

The building was low-slung, designed in the style of the Gothic Revival. It was lit up like a torch, with tasteful strings of lights criss-crossing the garden. There was a small but persistent bustle of guests and waiters going in and out, and the two were able to gain entry to the ball without any trouble.

The ballroom had been masterfully decorated. It was bedecked in pure white, with strings of silver cloth hanging from the rafters and edging the tables. A number of potted Christmas Trees had been placed around the sides of the room, interspersed among columns of Victorian design. The guests' tables - round and small, for intimacy - came next, in a semicircle around the dancefloor. At the very back of the room were a row of rectangular tables containing food and drinks.

Caedes and Claireholm were too unimportant, and thankfully were able to enter without being announced. Having arrived at last and made it across the room (out of the crush of people greeting each other), they split up: Claireholm wandered over to the corner, to fulfil his obligatory social appearance without doing anything particularly social, and Caedes went to find the love of his life.

She was near the entrance of the room, with her father. Cindy’s mother had disappeared under suspicious circumstances (a fancy way of saying she had been murdered, and that Cindy wouldn’t tell Caedes who did it quite yet), and she ended up filling in as the hostess at parties. She looked absolutely delighted as she shook the hand of Lord Such-and-such - Caedes thought he ran a peanut farm for the rich - and Caedes had to keep back a laugh at the sharp contrast between her dripping enthusiasm and the totally dead look in her eyes.

He waited until after the ball had well and truly started and Cindy could excuse herself - the seriously late could greet themselves - before he approached her. He bowed to her father, Mayor Rella, and to Cindy. She looked at him incredulously.

“You couldn’t save me?”

“You’d never have forgiven me,” he said seriously as he began to lead her to the dance floor. He was being perfectly sincere - she had too great a sense of duty, even when it involved behaving hospitably with people she’d rather were dead.

“Of course I wouldn’t have, but that’s no reason not to - sometimes, you should flatter me, and do what I want rather than what I need.” She quipped, following.

Her father, who was still at the front door and well within hearing distance, burst into laughter. Cindy glowered at him. He winked at her. Like her, he had no interest in hobnobbing with his own guests, but unlike her he had nobody to escape to the dancefloor with, so watching from afar was his only choice.

At the edge of the dancefloor the two paused, and Caedes once more bowed to Cindy. “May I have this dance?”

Cindy gave him a dimpled smile, and curtseyed. “Of course.”

And the two stepped onto the dancefloor.

Neither of them were poor dancers. This wasn’t only because they knew how to - Cindy had been trained in the art since she was young, and Caedes had taught himself so he could keep pace with Cindy - but because they both got so lost with each other that they forgot everything else, and moved only with the beat. Not that they were amazing dancers, but fortunately they had the excellent trait of not getting in others’ way, so nobody noticed.

Cindy examined Caedes’ suit approvingly. He had managed to match the theme she’d made for the ball perfectly, in a simple, but not simplistic, white suit with subtle gold trim. She nodded approvingly, prompting him to raise an eyebrow.

“It’s the suit, isn’t it? I’m glad you appreciate the effort I put in - and may I just say your dress is uncommonly lovely this evening. The off-white, beige hue draws you out of the surroundings perfectly, yet somehow makes it seem as if the ballroom is merely a backdrop to you.”

She giggled. She knew he knew she only wore the colour because it would minimise any stains from white wine, the only wine they served at the Christmas Ball. (They served red wine at the Spring Ball, which as luck would have it was when she wore burgundy. No wannabe villainess would ever surprise her.)

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“Your silver tongue matches the theme,” she jabbed. “But enough about me - we have business to discuss.”

Caedes pouted - couldn’t it wait until later? - but acquiesced. “Well, if we must discuss businesses, we must. I’m afraid I haven’t had time to visit those stores you sent me-”

“Not that business,” she snorted. “I’ve been receiving more and more files by the secretary of Das Gleiche.”

Caedes immediately used his qi to blanket them in an aura of silence, only to realise that Cindy had already been doing that (though not for security reasons; she had no mind to listen to other’s gossip).

“I cannot count the number of murder requests and corruption registries I’ve had from them in the past month, but they’ve filed a particularly dubious request today - one for the mass movement of troops and illegal weaponry. You don’t need me to tell you to what end.”

“When?” Caedes growled, and she told him. He cursed, and she put a finger on his lips.

“Language. You’re around a lady, you know,” she said, smiling. “Fortunately registering the illegal buildup of weapons requires mapping their distribution. Of course, I can’t give you the plans, but as luck would have it someone with an identical name to my own filed a thievery request and stole them. I’ve even heard she’s at this very ball.”

He looked at her. Though the current fashion was big, poofy dresses, hers was slim, and it left nowhere she might put pockets or papers.

“She has them in a storage ring, presumably,” Cindy said, but she wore no rings.

“And would appreciate it if you'd stop looking, since she’ll give them to you later, privately,” she finished wryly. Caedes coughed.

“Is there anything else?” He asked, moderately embarrassed.

“Oh, I don’t know…maybe dancing with me?” She said, fluttering her eyelashes.

“Well, if you insist,” Caedes sighed, as if he was being greatly put upon.

And there beneath a starlight of candle flames the two danced for the rest of the night.

***

But while all this was going on, what was Yaaroghkh doing?

“Wait, yesterday was American Thanksgiving?” Yaaroghkh asked incredulously. Lug nodded, buttering a warm roll.

“It’s still celebrated in some of the immigrant quarters.” He said.

Yaaroghkh narrowed his eyes. He knew American Thanksgiving was inferior to its Canadian counterpart (which fell a month and a half earlier and therefore didn’t interfere with Christmas season), but it still didn’t seem right for it to have passed so… greyly.

Yaaroghkh excused himself, stroking a beard of scales and feathers as he left.

***

Jebediah sighed. It was another frigid night of pretending his stomach wasn’t rumbling. For weeks now, they’d been subsisting on a thin mix of gruel and sludge; his parents had hoped to buy a turkey for Thanksgiving, but then their employers-

And then his thoughts were interrupted from a clatter in the main hall. Slowly, nervously, he got up, stepping over his brothers and sisters as he walked towards the door to peer into the dining room.

There, wiping off the ash of the chimney, was a short, squat thing in a turkey costume. The ugly little man looked at Jebediah, beamed, and before the boy could say anything started clanging a bell twice as large as he was.

Jedediah’s family came staggering, bleary eyed, into the room.

“Jed, what’s going on-” his mother started, and then froze as she saw the hideous dwarf. The bulbous thing, for his part, seemed untroubled by the reaction he’d caused.

“Ho ho ho- er, I mean gobble gobble gobble. I am the Thanksgiving Turkey Spirit, and I’m here to bring belated Thanksgiving joy to all the good families. (Gobble gobble.)”

And so saying he reached into a bag at his waist, and pulled out as if by magic an entire table laden with food - a turkey, mashed potatoes, green beans, and stuffing.

“Bon appetit, gobble gobble” the Thanksgiving Turkey Spirit said, and turned to climb back up the chimney.

“All- all this is ours?” Jebediah asked in disbelief, licking his lips. The Thanksgiving Turkey Spirit turned to look at him.

“Why, is it not sufficient? I can produce more, gobble gobble” he said, pulling another entirely full table out of thin air and slamming it on the floor. His vile countenance tried to give a smile, although it looked more like a leer, with a mouth of cracked, grimy teeth.

“Happy Thanksgiving, gobble gobble” he said, sticking his head up the chimney. But Jebediah wasn’t done.

“But… Mr. Thanksgiving Turkey Spirit, why is it you’ve only come now? Why didn't you come last year, or the year before? We were equally hungry then,” Jebediah said, in childish confusion.

The look on the Thanksgiving Turkey Spirit was equally confused, albeit for different reasons. “Because that’s not my job.”

“Bringing toys to all the good little children yearly is Santa’s job; mine is to bring them freedom,” said the Thanksgiving Turkey Spirit, cocking his submachine gun. “Gobble gobble.”

Jebediah said nothing. It hadn’t occurred to him there were holiday spirits who had jobs other than giving out gifts to deserving children, but he supposed it made sense.

“Well, if there’s nothing else, I’ll be off. I have lots of families to give dinners to and not much time to do so (gobble gobble),” the Thanksgiving Turkey Spirit said, and finally vanished up the chimney.

On the roof of the building he met his loyal second, who had the list of houses in his hand.

“How did it go?” The aforementioned second asked.

“Excellently. We have a lot of homes to get to, and not much time, so let’s be off,” the Thanksgiving Turkey Spirit said, then paused.

“Oh, and thank you for telling me about this.”

“No problem. It was my pleasure as much as yours,” said his second, Yaaroghkh, and off they went.