Claus Trilogy (Boxed Set)

by Tony Bertauski

  “Jack?”

  “How do you know that?” she snapped.

  “I don’t, really. Merry and Nog mentioned his name.”

  “Well, if you ask me, he doesn’t deserve a name. He’s a thing, not an elven. He’s the Cold One, and that’s a good name for him.”

  Nog called to them, reminding Tinsel to be under the ice soon. The reindeer were already stomping around, ready to launch away. Tinsel waved to Nog.

  “You’re shivering,” Tinsel said.

  Jon realized he was chattering. That wasn’t like him. He didn’t chatter easily, but the cold had gotten to him.

  “You should be developing a blubber layer by now if you’ve been with us for a week, but you’re still skinny as a warmblood.”

  “I’ll be fine.”

  “You ain’t going to be fine for long without a thick layer of blubber. We better get inside for a hot meal. It only takes a few minutes to make a fatal mistake out here.”

  Tinsel raised her hand.

  The reindeer, on cue, launched.

  Rudy was the last one off the ice. His pinkish snout – so bright it was glowing – streaked through the sky.

  Tinsel led Jon to a hole in the ice. He could hear his teeth chattering.

  C L A U S

  14.

  Jessica slid on her backside with her hands over her chest. She felt Merry’s hands on her shoulders, pulling her to a stop.

  “Icicles!” Nog shouted.

  “Watch your language,” Merry said.

  “The carver was supposed to make the room with a six-foot ceiling.”

  Jessica opened her eyes. They were in a fairly large room, but the ceiling was as low as the tunnels. Most people would be freaking out. She had slid deep into the center of an ice floe. A collapse would bury her.

  Maybe I can’t do reindeer, but I can do this.

  “Wait, it’s not finished.” Nog picked up the disc. “Merry, push our guest into the corner so she doesn’t get wet.”

  “I think that’s impossible.”

  “Well, we can try, can’t we?” Nog frowned.

  Merry grumbled, but knew he was just embarrassed. He’d wanted it ready for her. She gave Jessica a push. Jessica sat up on her elbows and watched Nog toss the disc. It went through the floor. Ocean water bubbled up.

  Now she was a little spooked. The room started to fill up. “Um,” Jessica said.

  “The drain hole, darling,” Merry said. “He’ll cap it.”

  Nog stuck his hand, the one with the shiny glove, into the hole. The water ceased.

  “A magnetic field,” he said. “It creates a one-way door to let water out. Not in.”

  He clapped his hands together and grinned at Merry. She grinned back.

  “Are you ready, Jessica?” he asked.

  Merry leaned over and said, “Oh, you’re going to like this.”

  The carver disc popped out of the hole and spun around the room. Ice chips flew, melting into water that quickly drained through the hole. It became a blur, blasting the ceiling high enough for her to stand. And while it was doing that, Nog began pulling stuff out of his magic bag (er, his science bag).

  First, a battered desk. Next, a feather-stuffed mattress. Then a tattered rug and scratched floorboards. A grimy window stuck to the wall with a view of Industrial Park spewing black smoke.

  “Ta-da!” Merry and Nog said.

  Jessica went over to the desk. Old papers and an ink well. A damaged pen. The surface was scuffed and worn. In the middle, gouged in capital letters, was a name. She ran her fingers over the carving – a piece of work that her mother tanned her hide for doing.

  JESSICA.

  “I knew she’d like it,” Nog whispered. “She’s speechless.”

  Merry frowned. “Darling, I don’t know if she’s–”

  “She’s about to come hug us. She’ll kiss us.” Nog puckered. “Me, first.”

  Jessica whirled around. “How did you do this?”

  Nog had his eyes closed, lips puckered.

  Merry elbowed him.

  He snapped out of it. “Well, it was simple, really. We looked through your memories when you first arrived–”

  “You what?” Jessica covered her chest. She suddenly felt naked. “How did you… WHAT GAVE YOU THE RIGHT?”

  Nog stepped back. The excitement withered.

  Jessica turned away. She saw the books stacked in the corner – her books, the ones she scrounged out of trashcans and hid from her mother or else she’d make her sell them. Books that she would keep under the bug-riddled mattress, that were sometimes missing pages or the corners torn. Books that were her only escape from… from…

  She rubbed the soot from the window. The smokestacks belched into the sky.

  From this.

  “Darling.” Merry took her hand and gently patted it. “We didn’t mean to upset you. We were only looking to bring some of your world back to you. To make you comfortable. To make you feel like you were home.”

  Jessica’s hand was trembling.

  “We’ll change it back.” Merry turned to Nog. “Turn it back, Nog. Start with something that’s a little more like–”

  “Leave it.”

  Jessica was still staring out the foggy window.

  “You meant well; just leave it like this. I don’t want to cause you any more trouble. You’ve done enough for me and my son. This will be fine.”

  If she could survive that sleigh ride, she could live a bit longer in that room. It wasn’t real, after all.

  “Are you sure, dear?”

  Jessica nodded.

  Merry continued patting her hand. Jessica offered a weak smile.

  She just wanted to sleep.

  “A bath?” Nog frowned so deeply his eyes disappeared beneath the bushy eyebrows. “What’s that?”

  Jessica explained how they would fill a tub with warm water to wash and relax.

  “Wash?” Nog looked at Merry. “I don’t understand. Do you, Merry?”

  Jessica thought it strange, but then realized they had a thick layer of hair that covered almost all parts of their body. Perhaps they were like animals.

  “Visualize it.” Nog pulled his metallic glove on and gestured for her to bend down. He put his palm over the crown of her head. “If you can imagine it, I can create it. Don’t leave out any details, now.” He closed his eyes. “Let me see it.”

  Jon sat on the edge of the bed and watched Jessica close her eyes. Nog began nodding. Hmmm, he said. Hummmhuh.

  “Got it.”

  He waddled back a few steps and told the others to stand aside. Then he held the bag at his side and reached in with the magic (science) glove and – with a flicking motion – tossed out an object that landed in the corner. It was small, at first, but then inflated until a porcelain bathtub with claw-footed legs came into shape. A long, silver hooked faucet grew from one end, and steaming water began pouring out.

  Jessica covered her mouth. Funny how something so simple almost brought her to tears.

  Nog crossed his arms on top of his barrel-shaped belly.

  “Hot water?” Jon said. “Where does all the power come from?”

  “Well, we have advanced tidal and ocean current harvesting, not to mention our wind follicle farms that–”

  “Not now, Nog.” Merry hit him with an elbow. “You can lecture the boy later. Right now, they need to relax and take bats–”

  “Baths,” Nog growled. “They will take a bath.”

  “Okay, bath-bath-bath… they’ll take a bath.”

  Merry grabbed him by the arm and dragged him to the exit. “We’ll be back to get you after a spell, dear.”

  “Where are we going?” Jessica said.

  “To see Jocah.” Merry’s voice echoed from the tunnel. “Enjoy your bats.”

  Jessica tested the water. It was as hot as it looked.

  She pulled the curtain around the tub. She undressed. It had been a month since she’d been naked. She hardly recognized the folds of skin
on her stomach and new dimples of fat. She’d gained so much weight.

  She sank into the water and quietly wept so that Jon wouldn’t hear.

  If only Nicholas could be here.

  C L A U S

  15.

  The light, dim as it was, hurt.

  Tears tracked down Nicholas’s cheeks. He wiped them away and kept blinking, staring at the ceiling. It wasn’t until things came into focus that he realized what he’d just done.

  He moved.

  Nicholas lifted both arms above his head. The bands were still around his wrists, but they weren’t holding them in place. His arms began to shake; they felt so weak. He was never like that before. And his belly, look at that.

  Icicles, it was getting big and round.

  Icicles? When did I start saying that?

  “You can stand.”

  The voice startled him.

  Claus was at the bench with his back to him. The dirty coat hung on the wall next to him. He was occupied with his work. Nicholas had to turn away. Whatever Claus was doing, it was too bright. Claus waved his hand and the brightness adjusted.

  There was an image on the desktop, like a scaled-down version of a snowy landscape. And there was a plate of food.

  Real food.

  Claus slid the plate in front of an empty stool. It seemed to go right through the snowy image.

  “Do you need help?” he asked, without turning.

  Nicholas tried to answer, but his throat was sore. He grabbed a handful of curly whiskers. His beard was as thick as tumbleweed. Beneath it were folds of fat.

  “No,” he finally managed.

  He probably did need help, but he wasn’t going to ask for it.

  He was on his back, looking at the ceiling. His muscles were jelly. Not to mention the additional baggage of a new gut. First, he needed to sit up–

  The chair began moving.

  Seconds later, Nicholas was upright.

  He put his feet – bare feet – on the icy floor. For some reason, it wasn’t cold. He couldn’t see his feet, not over the inflated belly, but they felt bigger. Wider. And thicker on the soles. He slid his butt to the edge of the seat and tested his weight on the left leg. It ached a bit but not much worse than a bruise. In fact, the only thing that hurt was breathing. There was still pressure on his left side.

  Nicholas pushed himself up. He teetered.

  Claus never turned around. If Nicholas fell, it was going to be a hard one. But he caught his balance.

  Claus patted the stool.

  Nicholas took several careful steps. He dropped onto the seat, near exhaustion.

  He had a thousand questions – starting with where all the extra weight came from – but moist delicious heat wafted into his nostrils like a Thanksgiving dinner.

  First, he ate mashed potatoes. Next, seasoned chicken and boiled carrots. He downed that with a glass of wine.

  And the flavors…

  Icicles!

  “You’ve been here for nearly a month,” Claus said. “In that time, you’ve been on a diet of fatty foods and other things that make you fit for the Arctic. You had no blubber, little hair.”

  He tinkered with a metal globe.

  “Now you do.”

  Nicholas shoved more food in his mouth. He was breathing like a wolf. Grease glistened on his fingers and on his lips. He wondered where it came from. Nothing grew on the North Pole, certainly not potatoes and carrots. And chicken?

  Or maybe this is polar bear.

  There was noise beneath the bench. Nicholas struggled to look. Cane wiggled his fingers at Nicholas. His eyes crunched as he smiled beneath his thick beard.

  “Santa.”

  He went back to his little project, turning a screwdriver on a small metal piece.

  “Where’s my wife?” Nicholas said with a mouthful.

  Claus finished tinkering with the metal globe and placed it in a metal box. The flaps closed and sealed and appeared seamless. He shoved it to the back of the shelf and paused.

  Claus took a breath, his shoulders slumping. He placed a coin object on the bench. The snowy landscape, which appeared to be some sort of mirage made of light, disappeared. A small body of a man appeared in its place. It was Nicholas’s body, but this time it was only a few feet tall. And fatter.

  “Your bone stitching is done.” Claus pointed at the skeletal structure that appeared in the translucent body. “Leg is normal. Your orbital socket is normal, too. Once you adjust to the additional body weight, your muscles will return to normal. The only thing I’m having difficulty with is the lung.”

  A white dot appeared on the left lung. Claus touched it.

  “That might take some time–”

  “Where’s my wife and son?” Nicholas pushed the plate away, wiping his hands on his legs. “You tell me that first and I’ll listen to whatever else you have to say.”

  Claus nodded for a long time, thinking. He took the coin and the body disappeared.

  “This is a very bad time in our history.”

  Claus stood.

  “You are the first person to be introduced to the elven race. Five thousand years ago, this would’ve been a time to celebrate. Instead, you arrived during the Fracture, when elven brother has taken arms against elven brother. During a time of war.”

  Claus lifted the coat from the hook.

  “You may be our salvation, Nicholas. You may be our destruction; it’s too soon to tell. But I can tell you this, your time here will not be pleasant. It will not be short. And you may bring extinction to the human race. BUT–”

  He held up a single finger – crooked, knobby and stubby – before Nicholas could object.

  “Your only hope may lie in the fact that your wife and son have escaped your fate. They are with the colony. That is your only hope.”

  Claus tossed the coat’s hood over his head. The white fringe was grimy and the red fabric matted. He went to the wall and stopped. He spoke without turning.

  “I will do what I can for you, Nicholas.”

  And then he stepped out.

  When he did, the bench lit up. The snowy scene was back.

  And there was a tent in the middle of it.

  Nicholas saw the polar ice on the bench.

  It was white and pristine. And moving! Snow drifted over the surface, occasionally swirling in small twisters. In the middle of it, he saw a small green tent wedged into a snowdrift.

  Our tent!

  Nicholas reached into the scene and waved his hand through the illusion.

  Small figures appeared in the scene.

  They were similar to polar bears with six legs. They bounded in from all directions. A dozen of them closed in on the tent.

  Something fell from the sky.

  An enormous reindeer – the color of snow – landed near the tent. It crouched and appeared to leap again, flying out of the picture but leaving something behind.

  A metallic globe, similar to the one Claus placed in the box.

  As the six-legged creatures closed in on the tent, snow began to swirl. It engulfed the tent and the creatures. The storm took the shape of a monster with a shifting face that looked around. Arms like paddles swiped across the ice, swatting the six-legged creatures away.

  Nicholas couldn’t see the small figure that emerged from the tent. It was difficult to tell if that was him wandering aimlessly into danger. He didn’t see the creature that got close enough to claw through the rope.

  He also didn’t see himself fall into a trap as two more reindeer dropped from the sky.

  Nicholas watched them pull a woman and a boy from the tent and leap away with them on their backs. Away from the storm.

  Away from the six-leggers.

  “Safe,” Nicholas heard Cane say.

  There were footsteps under the bench.

  Cane was gone.

  There were two mechanical figures in his place. One was female. The other was a boy.

  They didn’t have facial features, but they walked like
the people he knew. The people he loved. Cane’s magical figures walked like Jessica and Jon.

  Nicholas picked them up. The faces were smooth and featureless, but the sculpture was flawless. How did he know?

  It didn’t matter. They were safe.

  Safe.

  C L A U S

  16.

  Nicholas explored the room.

  Boxes and rods and gears… stacks all over. Some in disrepair and others organized like spare parts. The main workbench, where Claus did his work, was the only surface kept clean and organized.

  The surface appeared to be wood, but it felt smooth like glass. He held the mechanical figures of Jessica and Jon, but they were squirming like animals. He held them near the workbench and they climbed off, swinging their legs over the edge like they were enjoying the view.

  How is this not a dream?

  Nicholas buried his fingers into the beard. He’d never had much facial hair. He hardly shaved. Jessica always liked that.

  He was staring at the little green tent – still there with the snowy landscape – thinking of Jessica and Jon, imagining they were warm and safe, that they would find their way back out of the North Pole and return home. The thought warmed him.

  As long as they were safe, he could endure anything.

  Anything at all.

  The room suddenly cooled.

  An elven entered the room. This one was not wearing a grubby red coat but rather darker colors.

  And had bluish skin.

  He stopped just inside the room. The floor crackled as frost crept over the icy surface from under his blue-tinged feet. His toes – like plums – wiggled.

  Nicholas stared.

  “I’m Jack, but call me Your Excellence.” The blue elven flashed a hazy smile. “And we’ll be cool.”

  Nicholas was fat but still stood over six feet tall, towering over the little blue man. Oh, my frosty fat fanny I’ll be calling you that.

  Jack twitched.

  The smile faltered.

  “You’re kind of dumb, aren’t you?” he said.

  Jack walked around him, studying his body. Nicholas remained still.

  “Claus has fattened you up,” Jack said. “It’s about time. You drag your wife and kid up here with silly little wolf furs and you expect to survive. You must have pea-brains. I’ll give you warmbloods credit, though.”