Claus

One

This story is exclusive to Wattpad (or the site that likes orange and the letter W if a bot tries to be sneaky). If you are not reading Claus (Copyright Mikaela Bender) on there, then please report it to me and leave the site as you may be at risk of a virus.

For the twenty-second Christmas in a row, Faryn received a bag of reindeer shit.

She shouldn't have bothered opening the green velvet bag labeled To: Faryn From: Santa Claus in horrible handwriting. Nick's handwriting. She had known what it was. The bag was still warm and that was not even mentioning the smell. But it had become tradition at this point, and she already had so few.

Curled up on the window seat in the lounge, Faryn held the bag between her fingers as the other students she lived with who didn't go home for the holidays opened their gifts from her mother's husband. Beyond the frost laced window, the garden was nothing more than patches of dirt separating the yellow stone wall that blocked out Oxford's streets. She caught another whiff of the bag and grimaced. She needed to dispose of the gift soon before her housemates complained.

Slipping off the seat, she made sure the bag's strings were pulled tight and crossed the room, stepping carefully around new toys, books, and matte wrapping paper. Her housemates were a mix of primary and secondary school students as well as a few who were in university like Faryn. Their boarding school had an arrangement with the Acurial faculty members of Oxford. The university-aged boarders were allowed to attend their classes, and if they passed them, they'd earn a degree.

One of the few Fae students, Rhea, wrinkled her nose as Faryn stepped by. The Fae would have been at the school as long as Faryn if Faryn hadn't been here since she was a baby.

"Did they at least have the guts to claim it this year?" she asked, they meaning Nick's sleigh team. Comprised of eight reindeer Thorine, they acted more like they were in a frat than in the most coveted positions their kind could dream of holding. Whenever Nick felt like dropping by and paying her a visit, he'd bring his sleigh team. It was impossible to decide if they were more irritating as reindeers when they honked at her or when they were in their Celvian form—what non-Acurials would mistake as human.

Silla, who held the title of Dasher, and Dimitri, who got Cupid, were probably the worst of the eight. She'd bet this shit belonged to one of them and that they made really terrible jokes as they shoveled it in, if they didn't crap straight into the bag.

"The year they finally claim it will be the year I just get coal."

Faryn took the stairs up to her room. The smell was starting to get nauseating. Her mom would be arriving for her annual visit in only a few hours, and this gift had to be gone.

Christmas, the one day Clora Claus could visit her daughter because Nick was busy delivering gifts with his Elves and reindeer.

Faryn dumped the contents of the bag into her toilet and rinsed out the bag with a bottle of soap and water before dropping it in the trash can. As she washed her hands, she looked up at the mirror and groaned. At some point between her last trip to the bathroom and now, white had threaded its way through her long black curls.

She reached for a box of hair dye she kept under her sink. This was always a hassle, but her mom could not be allowed to see it. One look and Clora would know her daughter had inherited the Morozko white hair. Unlike her mom's family, Faryn didn't have a full head of white. Only strands. Most likely a reflection of her lack of magic. The Morozkos created wind, snow, ice, sleet, and frost, and she got strands of white hair that relentlessly reappeared no matter how much hair dye she doused them in. But she was fine not having any real powers. She didn't want to share any traits with the Morozkos, especially seeing as how Jack Morozko, her uncle, and Jack Frost, her cousin had disowned her without ever meeting her. They even went before the Winter Court to make it official.