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  “What in God’s name?” Brian said aloud.

  “Get back! We have a situation!” The nurse said.

  Several hours later the hazmat teams left. Brian and Helene had been checked out and given clean bills of health. The large male nurse that had collapsed in front of them, remained seated on the floor in the hallway. He had an oxygen mask on and stared at the door to the room. He hadn’t moved or said a word.

  Helene approached the man.

  “Excuse me.” She said meekly. “Can you tell me what happened to my son?”

  The nurse seemed startled by the sound of a human voice.

  “He just…it was like…he was ash.” The nurse said hoping he had explained things.

  “What?” Brian asked.

  “He just turned to ash. He started having trouble breathing so we intubated then his skin…it just turned gray and then black and he started falling apart right there on the table.”

  As if to punctuate the statement the last two members of the hazmat team walked out carrying what appeared to be a Hefty trash bag. The smell of sulfur lingered in the hallway.

  “Oh god what have I done?” Brian asked aloud.

  They left the hospital. He wanted to take her home, to his home, and be there for her. She kept saying she didn’t understand how this could happen.

  He was driving and glanced over at her. He couldn’t bear the shame and told her everything. She stared at him in shock. He knew at that moment that he had lost her.

  “What did you say?” Helene asked when he got to the part about the link from Dr. Nguyen.

  “The link was for a company Bells-something. Why, have you heard of them?” Brian asked with hope in his voice.

  “It’s not a them,” she said flatly “It’s a him.”

  She pulled out her phone and went online. A few seconds later she held it so Brian could see the screen.

  It was a picture of what Brian could only describe as a monster covered in hair. The creature towered over a group of cowering children. The creature wielded a whip in one hand and a bag of coal in the other. Brian didn’t comprehend what was going on in the scene but it looked horrifying.

  “Okay not really following,” Brian said.

  “There was a man, a creature really, who was a companion of Santa. Some stories say he delivers coal to the bad children and sometimes flogged them while other stories have a more sinister turn.” She said calmly.

  “Okay,” Brian suspected that grief was causing Helene to lose her grasp on reality.

  “It’s just that…maybe this was for the best. Tanner was never going to know peace and I cannot imagine the horrors he would have unleashed given time.” She said.

  “Helene, Tanner was just wired wrong and I…I don’t know what made me think there was a pill that could cure evil.” He said trying to assuage her guilt as well as his own.

  “I think he killed Dr. Nguyen, and I should be mourning his death but I’m not Brian. I’m not,” She paused and then continued. “In some of the old stories this companion of Santa ruled some children irredeemable and instead of a bag coal, he carried a bag filled with the charred remains of the worst as a warning,” She said.

  Brian looked out of the vehicle window.

  “Who was he?” he asked absently.

  “His name was Belsnickel.” She said.

  A rare and seldom witnessed event was occurring in the city of Austin. It was snowing on Christmas day.

  “Merry Christmas,” Brian said absently as he thought about what Helene had just told him.

  “Yeah, merry Christmas.” She said as they drove through the light flurry of snow.

  About The Author

  Jay Harez was born in Texas. During his early twenties he traveled extensively throughout Mexico and the United States. The majority of the stories he writes are loosely based on the places he has been and the people he has met along the way. His experiences in Mexico were the most influential and second only to his love of history for source material.

  Great writers such as J. MIchael Straczynski, Wilbur Smith, Garry Jennings, Quentin Tarantino, Elmore Leonard, and Aaron Sorkin have had a significant influence on his characters and overall style. Jay is a comic and graphic novel reader from childhood where he was introduced to writers like Warren Ellis, Allen Moore and Frank Miller.

  Jay lives in Austin, where he enjoys scotch, plays chess and travels whenever opportunity permits.

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  Other Books by This Author

  Abandoned

  A Month of Sundays

  Sepulchre

  The Tangerine Merchant’s Tale

  Wet Drive