Damien lay on his bed, watching the snow fall outside his window. The room was smaller and simpler than any other room in the house for reasons Damien was unsure of, but he had his theories. The most likely reason was that Thanatos knew the large, ostentatious rooms would make Damien feel undeserving and out-of-place. He was more comfortable here.

The room, which was the size of a suburban bedroom, was painted a powder blue, which Damien believed was Thanatos’s psychological attempt to calm and soothe. On the whole, it worked. But, despite the calm, despite the knowledge that his past was technically in the rear-view, despite the fact he was told he was home, he didn’t believe it. His life had been as unstable as the shifting sand of the desert.

He watched the falling snowflakes. He was waiting for the other shoe to drop past his window too. This happy-family act wouldn’t last long. It never did, and if Damien stayed here any length of time, it wouldn’t be long until Thanatos put him back in the basement.

The nightlight by his bed flickered, and his closet creaked open in the dark.

"Pst. Hey. Mate,” came a voice from inside the closet.

Damien examined the sliver of darkness visible through the crack.

"Psssttt!” came the voice again. “You coming or what?”

Damien got up and walked to the closet. He flung it open and folded his arms. Dream was hunched within the hanging shirts and pants. Hunched, but still towering over him.

“I don’t know.” Damien was smug, “Thanatos says you’re a bad influence.”

“Yeah. But... we were going to play Krampus.” Dream looked like a sad kid.

Damien shot a look over his shoulder at his bedroom door, knowing he couldn’t appease both Thanatos and Hypnos simultaneously, and he had known Hypnos longer. As flaky as Dream was, he was somehow still consistent. Damien cautioned, “Okay, but if I get busted-”

“I’ll take the fall, alright? That’s what best mates are for.” Hypnos materialized a bloodied burlap sack. “C’mon. Get in.”

Damien pressed his lips together. He did not want to get in that sack, but he looked back up into Hypnos’s boyish smile. Damien sighed and began to crawl into the bloody bag Hypnos was holding open. “You owe me.” Damien conceded.

“Trust me. You’re going to love where we’re going.” Hypnos said. His eyes glittered with wonder.

Damien crouched down in the sack, which was then drawn tight over his head. Damien felt the bag lift as Dream flung him onto his back.

Only seconds later, Damien heard the sound of a fiddle and laughing, and the bag was ripped off over his head to reveal dance and revelry in a small bar in the realm of Dream. Dream himself was wearing a waist coat and a top hat like most of the other men, while the women wore corseted dresses and curls.

He blinked. “Dude, you said we were playing Krampus, and this looks more like a Dickens novel.”

“Surprise!” Hypnos smiled. But, then, he crouched to Damien’s ear and whispered, “No, Krampus comes later-” Dream held out an ancient dagger to Damien and said, “...and we have to kill him.”

Damien eyed him and took the dagger with a shrug. It was a tarnished silver with Dwarven scroll inlaid in the wooden handle.

“Until then, a few lads over there look like they could use me expertise.” Hypnos walked over to the group of men by the fire, and they greeted him like an old friend. He pulled out tiny little vials from his pocket, and they pulled out wads of cash from theirs.

“Subtle.” Damien said to himself, concealing his new weapon in the jacket he was now wearing. He began to meander the room, but became distracted by the young woman singing next to the fiddler. She sang a sad Irish song.

Damien sat down at a table to listen, avoiding eye contact with the beautiful woman at all costs, feeling inadequate. Under his childlike visage, he was still the same deformed, scarred Jinni as before. Soon, he was jolted by a hand landing on his shoulder.

“Pretty lass, ain’t she?” Hypnos sat down next to him.

Damien coughed, “Yes. She is- Her voice is... lovely.”

“Well, if you’re looking for love, I know a friend of mine could help you out.”

“No. No. I don’t want that.” Damien waved away the thought.

“What do you want then? And don’t give me the ol’ I want for nothing bit.”

Damien leaned back in the wooden chair and said, “I want to drink, and I want to kill Krampus.”

Hypnos materialized two pewter tankards of ale and raised one. “Cheers to toxic masculinity!”

“Hear! Hear!” cried the rest of the men in the barroom.

Damien raised his tankard to Hypnos’s and gave a less enthusiastic, “Hear. Hear.” They drank, and the moment they set down their empty tankards, a child screamed from a room upstairs.

“Off to work then?” Damien stood.

“Yep. Just need a bump.” Hypnos took a vial from his pocket. He sprinkled the sparkling silver contents onto his balled fist and snorted. He shivered and sniffed and said, “Alright, let’s go.”

Damien followed, asking, “What is that?”

“Unicorn glitter.” Hypnos responded as he ascended a wooden spiraling staircase that was twisting and groaning, growing taller as they went.

“Is it like cocaine?”

"Is it like cocaine?” Hypnos mocked, stopping on the stairs. The stairs continued to grow. “It’s unicorn glitter, mate! It’s out of this world. Like, literally, I have to go into Fairy Tale World to get this stuff.” Hypnos continued up the stairs. “It makes you feel like a majestic, rare, magickal creature.”

“Right. So, you don’t take it from unicorns, do you?”

“Yeah.” Hypnos answered. “Have to grind up the horn into a fine powder and cut it with pixie dust.”

Damien raised an eyebrow. “I take it that neither the DEA nor PETA know anything about this?”

They rounded the top of the dark staircase to Damien’s relief. He thought the stairs would never end, and now he was facing down a never-ending hall of doors.

A sharp scream came from down the hall.

Damien and Hypnos ran towards the approximate location of the scream. They began to rip open doors to inspect the rooms beyond for a bloodied demon Santa with horns and cloven feet.

The first door Damien opened led to a room of mirrors. The second was a room filled with bunnies. Hoppy, white, red-eyed bunnies. He wanted to ask, but decided against it, and closed the door. The third room was comparable to the Dickens-period theme of the bar downstairs.

Damien crept into the darkened bedroom. The fireplace embers glowed, casting impish shadows across the rocking horse in the corner and the porcelain dolls on the shelf. The lace curtains muffled the light of the moon, reflected on the newly fallen snow.

On the other side of the bed was a dampened shuffling and a beast-like snorting.

Damien carefully slipped his knife out from his coat. He crept across the floorboards, his fingers testing his grip on the handle of the dagger. He could now make out the stained fur suit hunched behind the bed.

Damien held his breath.

The beast was grunting and snorting like a lion tearing bloody flesh away from bone.

He didn’t make a sound as he slipped closer and closer.

Five more feet to go.

“Oi! Any luck?” Hypnos bellowed from the hall.

Krampus jolted up. Goat-headed, demon-faced, blood-matted Krampus met Damien’s eyes. The monster snarled with sharp teeth and roared.