The Forgotten Tale Part 1

  It was Christmas Eve when Tifa went to sleep. Dinner was over, and everyone had gone to their rooms to rest.

  Tifa woke with a shiver; a cold chill ran through her wings. It wasn’t the gentle morning drowsiness of the warm bed she shared with César and her sister wives in their cozy winter home. No. This was a sudden awakening, like being torn from a deep sleep. She felt a bit exhausted, as if, despite having slept, her body had not truly rested.

  She stood up, feeling how her tiny body protested. She shook the dress made of furs and wool, but she couldn’t shake the heavy feeling weighing on her. She looked around, and her heart skipped a beat. Her cozy little doll-like room in her beloved’s castle was nowhere to be found, nor were her loving family and the girls she knew.

  She was now in a place that defied all logic. An endless expanse of candy stretched before her, with mountains of lollipops resembling rock formations fading into a night sky that seemed to go on forever. The air smelled of burnt sugar, and an eerie aura hung in the air. The only light came from behind her: a flickering electric lamp struggling desperately not to go out, fastened to a gigantic wall made of crudely bolted, rusted metal plates.

  Fear—an old visitor she knew well—tried to take hold of her. But then she remembered César, her beloved: his outstretched arms waiting to protect her, the smile he used to show as he told her he would shield her from all evil. Even when he was covered in wounds, he always found a way to calm her and make her feel that her life was precious to him. “I have to go back home, no matter what,” she thought, and with that thought tightening in her small chest, she decided to move forward. She found a hole in the enormous metal door and slipped inside.

  What she saw was not the candy factory of childhood dreams. It was an industrial nightmare. A monumental confectionery factory, but one that was dead in life. Rooms so vast that the far wall vanished into gloom, cold corridors that sent shivers down her spine, and mountains of paperwork that told an endless story of failure. The origin of the candy was the most disturbing sight of all: a viscous, pink mass that seemed to bleed from the very walls of the deepest warehouses.

  Confused and frightened, she flew on until the sound of voices made her hide instinctively among dusty stacks of documents above a doorway. Two figures in robes and strange hats passed beneath her. They reviewed papers marked with red crosses, whispering disapprovingly. Yet, their attitude was one of absolute resignation. They had no intention of fixing anything, only acknowledging the ruin.

  Determined not to waste a single moment longer in her search for a way back home, she set off once more through the factory, flying desperately in search of any clue that might lead her out of that place. Desperation grew inside her as she saw nothing but more corridors, candies, and papers—nothing changed, everything remained the same. The realization that this might not be a dream after all, and that she was truly lost far from home, was what terrified her the most. Her story had shifted from the dreamlike “let’s see what will happen” to the nightmare of “I have to get out of here if I ever want to see a normal life again.” The poor fairy flew faster and faster.

  Until the pitiful crying of a child stopped her in her tracks. She looked around, but did not see him immediately—she could only hear him crying somewhere nearby. She flew to a nearby candy warehouse, one darker and more forgotten than the rest, with thousands of boxes and scraps of paper scattered everywhere, barely lit by the weak light from the outer hallway. It was in this place of despair that she found him. In a forgotten machine room, among tough plastic gears and shattered clock glass, a boy was sitting on the floor, hugging his knees. He wore simple clothes—his pajamas—and his body trembled with every sob.

  Tifa approached cautiously, her heart pounding.

  “Child? Are you okay?”

  The boy raised his head, and Tifa held her breath.

  “I’m lost,” the boy said with a broken voice.

  “I went to sleep and... and I woke up here.”

  “I want to go back home.”

  “My brother and I saw something strange in the hallways, and we started to cry.”

  “My mother went to my brother’s room, leaving me behind.”

  “I tried to go with her, but I got very sleepy when I got out of bed and I fell.”

  “Then I woke up here. I’m lost.”

  “I want to see my mommy again,” the boy said as he cried—confused, frightened, and sad.

  Tifa looked at the boy in front of her. He was just a small child, probably under eight years old, and yet he was much bigger than she was—but that was easy, after all, she was only a tiny fairy. Even so, she was the adult in this strange situation. She was no longer unfamiliar with danger and hardship. She had seen her husband rise up in arms against the unknown and return victorious time and time again, always with a smile upon coming back to the home where she waited for him, always with the promise to protect her from evil. This time, she would try to borrow the strength of her beloved husband—even if it was just a lie—to save the child before her.

  “Do not be afraid,” she said bravely, landing on his knee.

  “I am lost too. But… I think we can help each other. My name is Tifa. And you, what is your name?”

  But before the boy could even move his lips, the nearby door burst open with brutal force. Standing before them, a strange mage of the factory had found them. An old, wrinkled face, eyes full of fury, a smile of betrayal. In his hands, a staff ending in a fractured crystal sphere that began to throb with a sinister greenish light. No words were needed—it was clear that his intentions were not good.

  "Intruders!" he roared, his voice sounding like shattering glass.

  Tifa, paralyzed by the ancestral instinct of a nature-born creature before an unnatural predator, could not move—but the boy could. Tifa felt a hand slide around her and grab her; it was the boy’s hand, gripping her tightly as he ran with her, away from the strange sorcerer.

  With a motion that blended panic and a deeply rooted protective instinct, the boy scooped her up and ran, holding her tightly against his chest.

  “We have to get out of here!” he shouted, his voice cracked with fear, but his legs never stopped moving.

  The chase became a whirlwind of shadows and danger. The mage hurled spells that turned the candy floor into sticky liquid or twisted the metal arches as if trying to trap them. The boy dodged, rolled, and sprang back up, always keeping Tifa safe in his clenched fist. Through his fingers, she could feel the frantic pounding of his heart—a terrified yet brave drumbeat.

  With great skill, the boy weaved between mountains of rusted plastic gears and slid beneath worktables covered in strange tools. The Glass Mage followed them with terrifying calm, launching crystal thrusts that embedded themselves into walls and floor with a deadly, crunching sound.

  “Let me go! I can fly—I can distract him!” Tifa shouted, her voice muffled by the boy’s grip.

  “No!” he gasped, running even faster. “He’s evil! He’ll hurt you!”

  They turned a corner and found themselves at a dead end: a massive hydraulic press made of solidified candy blocked their path. The boy turned, his back pressed against the machine, just as the sorcerer appeared at the entrance, cutting off all escape. The mage’s smile was a cruel crack across his wrinkled face.

  “The boy will be turned into candy essence. The fairy… into a lovely jewel for my collection,” he said, and with a final gesture, he launched a long, razor-sharp glass needle straight at the boy’s chest.

  There was no time to dodge. In a pure act of instinct, the boy twisted his body, shielding with his own torso the hand that held Tifa. The glass needle pierced him cleanly—not through the heart, but deep into the muscle of his left arm—embedding itself with a wet, sinister sound. His face was also slashed by the fragments that went flying.

  A heart-rending cry of pain tore from the poor boy’s lips. His arm jerked, and his hand flew open from the shock. Tifa was sent flying, landing softly on a pile of plastic shavings. What she saw froze her to the core. The glass needle, now stained crimson, protruded grotesquely from the boy’s arm. Blood, bright and red, began to soak into his pajamas.

  But the boy did not collapse. With his face twisted in pain and his eyes brimming with tears he refused to let fall, he used his good arm to grab a loose metal pipe. With a scream that was pure rage and helplessness, he hurled it at the Glass Mage. The blow was not strong, but it was so unexpected and filled with such desperate fury that the sorcerer staggered back, tripping over a pile of scrap.

  That single second alone of distraction was enough. The boy, clutching his bleeding arm, ran toward Tifa. “Let’s go!” he shouted, his voice cracked with pain. He scooped her up in his arms once more and slipped through a narrow crack in the wall that led to an old slide which shot them into a storage room outside the factory, near the street that led into the city.

  When the immediate danger passed, the boy collapsed to his knees, gasping. His fist slowly opened, revealing a trembling but unharmed Tifa.

  “Little fairy? Are you...are you okay?” he asked, his voice breaking with pain.

  Tifa flew from his hand and hovered in front of his face. What she saw made her heart stop. A long, shallow gash crossed his cheek from temple to chin. Bright, vivid blood flowed from the wound, staining his neck and pajamas. However, his eyes reflected no self-pity, only intense, relieved concern for her.

  “I’m safe… thanks to you,” Tifa whispered, her voice heavy with an emotion she could not contain. The frightened child’s great bravery, the instinctive sacrifice… it was identical to that of the man she loved. “Why… why did you do it? You could have been hurt much worse.”

  The boy wiped the blood from his chin with the back of his hand, only smearing it further. He gave her a small, awkward smile—a gesture of pure childish innocence that contrasted brutally with the red of his blood.

  “You’re little and you look very fragile,” he said with disarming simplicity.

  “I had to make sure you were safe. I couldn’t let them hurt you.”

  “I like fairies, so I don’t like it when any of them get hurt.”

  “My mom and dad keep scolding me, saying that’s for girls, but I don’t understand what liking fairies has to do with that.”

  “But don’t worry—I’ll protect you no matter what!”

  “I’ll stay by your side no matter what, so don’t be afraid, my little fairy.”

  Tifa felt the world come to a halt. Those words… that absurd, noble, reckless determination to protect at all costs… were a perfect, pure echo of the man she loved. The devotion in his voice, the flawless reflection of the promises her beloved husband used to whisper to her every night, was the final blow. Tifa looked at him with trembling awe—truly looked at him: she saw the boy smiling at her while his face was covered in his own blood; she remembered the face of her beloved and placed it over the child before her, watching how the two faces aligned perfectly one over the other—the iron spark in his eyes despite the fear, the blood bearing witness to a nature that always put others first.

  Tifa’s heart began to race until it hurt. It wasn’t just a child who resembled her husband. This wasn’t a coincidence.

  “And you… what is your name?” she asked, almost out of breath, needing to hear it from his own lips to confirm the impossible truth.

  The boy smiled again, a wider, more genuine smile that lit up his bloodstained face.

  “My name is César.”

  Tifa’s world came to a halt. César. The name crashed over her like a lightning bolt, like the name of eternal legends. Her César. The last emperor of Atlantis, the Dragon of War, the man who had fought and bled through cruel battles for tragic decades, the survivor of the apocalypse. And there he was, right in front of her, with the same heroic essence, but wrapped in the innocence of a past she had never known. A past before the pain, before the deep scars, before the weight of the world bent his shoulders.

  And in that moment, the final piece of the puzzle fell into place. It wasn’t resemblance, it wasn’t coincidence. The blood on his face was not a stranger’s—it was her César’s. The promise in his eyes was not that of just any child—it was the seed of the legend she loved. She was standing before him, in a strange and cruel past, before the world broke him. Before her stood the man she loved, before he was corrupted by the world that consumed him as he tried to save it. The love she felt then was so overwhelming and bittersweet that it nearly made her faint. To see him in the innocence she knew he would lose in the future, to see him in a moment lost to time. Her husband, her warrior, her love… he was injured, frightened, and a child—and in this exact moment, all she wanted was to protect him.

  The icy air of the winter night struck their faces like a slap. The relative warmth of the factory was replaced by the biting cold of the night; before them stood a city that seemed carved from ice, wood, and fire. Victorian buildings with dark wooden facades and steep rooftops lined the cobblestone streets, adorned with holly garlands and candles flickering in the windows, casting warm glimmers over the fresh snow. The carols of a distant choir drifted through the frozen air—but the time to admire the winter wonder ended abruptly when, from one of the factory doors, several robed mages began to emerge. With staffs in hand, they hurried urgently, searching through the snow.

  It was Christmas Eve, and the scent of roasted chestnuts and pine mingled with the metallic smell of frost. But there was no time for wonder. The carols of a distant choir floated through the icy air, but for Tifa and César, it was a labyrinth of shadows and danger. The Glass Mages, like specters born of the very mist itself, pursued them with silent persistence for reasons unknown. Their robes made no sound as they brushed against the freshly fallen snow, and their hats concealed faces that revealed only the sinister glimmer of their fractured crystal orbs.

  “This way!” panted little César, dragging Tifa—who flew close beside his ear—into a narrow alley. His wounded arm was a burning strip of pain against the cold, and the blood on his cheek had dried into a dark, cruel streak across a child’s face.

  They dodged carriages with steaming horses and passed groups of cheerful townsfolk who failed to notice the small tragedy unfolding at their feet. The chase became a whirlwind of flickering lights and greenish reflections as spells were cast—turning puddles into sharp ice traps or causing the branches of decorative fir trees to writhe like serpents seeking to ensnare them.

  Tifa guided César, flying so close to his face that she could feel the warmth of his blood. "Turn right! Down that alley!"

  It was a desperate race through a fairy-tale landscape stained with nightmares. They wove past sleds laden with gifts and bundled citizens in woolen coats, who watched them with surprise and alarm. Little César ran with superhuman endurance, driven by survival instinct and his fierce need to protect the fairy he held against his chest.

  The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.

  Finally, as the boy’s strength began to falter and the mages closed in, Tifa spotted a half-open door spilling golden light. Thinking it was abandoned but warm enough to hide in for a while, they slipped inside.

  The door slammed shut behind them, muffling the sounds of the chase. They found themselves in a stark yet cozy office, with a fire crackling in the fireplace. Behind a desk cluttered with accounting ledgers, an elderly man with a stern face—but an unexpected spark of kindness in his eyes—looked up.

  “And to what do I owe this… Christmas intrusion?” asked the voice, rough but not entirely hostile.

  Before they could answer, pounding on the door echoed through the room, followed by the crystalline and furious voice of the Mage. “Come out! The servants of the witch Vetra No?lle demand the thieves who broke into our factory!”

  "It seems you've interrupted someone else's Christmas Eve besides mine," said the old man, frowning. He looked at the trembling, bloodied boy and the tiny fairy whose fur dress was stained with frost and fear. Then he looked back at the door, which was shuddering under the blows.

  "You seem to have incurred a debt with some rather aggressive individuals," he murmured. With surprising agility, he stood and triggered a hidden mechanism on a bookshelf. A section of the wall silently turned, revealing a small, dark room where money was stored. “Inside. Quickly."

  Tifa and César hurried into hiding just as the front door burst open. They heard the old man’s firm voice.

  “What is the meaning of this interruption at this hour!?”

  “Can’t you see closing time has already passed? I’m trying to make the final preparations for my business so I can attend the party my family prepared for me, and you come to interrupt me!”

  “Or is this just another one of your commercial tricks?”

  “I’ve already told you our business has been canceled! I don’t intend to buy a single one of your candies!”

  “Now leave me alone, or I’ll have to personally speak with the Ministry of Commerce about you!”

  “Sir, we’re only looking for a pair of intruders who stole some valuable items from Mrs. Vetra No?lle,” said one of the mages, before being interrupted by his companion.

  “Hey, leave him alone—don’t you know who he is? Just look at the sign next to the door!” said the other mage, pointing at the sign with a hint of fear.

  “!!!!!”

  “Oh, forgive the disturbance, sir.”

  “We’ll continue searching for the thieves on our own. Have a good Christmas Eve, sir.”

  Those were the last words they said as they hurried away even faster than when they arrived.

  “If you keep bothering me and wasting my free time, I’ll bill you as well!”

  After a few tense moments, the door finally closed. The old man released them from their hiding place.

  “Thank you, sir,” whispered Tifa as she perched on the edge of the desk. “You saved our lives.”

  “Bah, nonsense,” said the old man, though the hint of a smile appeared on his lips. “I couldn’t allow them to ruin Christmas Eve. What would a magical night like this be without a little excitement here and there?”

  “Now, if you’ll allow me the pleasure of knowing whom I have the honor of benefiting this night,” he said proudly, posing with his carved cane.

  “My name is César,” said the boy, still wary.

  “And my name is Tifa,” added the fairy.

  “Oh my, what peculiar names.”

  “Of course, it’s only fair that I introduce myself as well. My name is Ebenezer Scrooge.”

  “I am nothing more than a humble banker on a small journey far from home.”

  “I am here on business to evaluate the… disappointing… candy production of that factory. A matter of dreadful quality and even worse management.”

  “I was supposed to buy the factory’s entire stock for the festivities—I was even thinking of purchasing a large amount for my company’s party—but the quality is dreadful. It leaves a… bitter aftertaste.”

  “Because of the winter storm, I believe I won’t be able to return for a couple of days until it passes. I will miss Stahlbaum's party tonight.”

  Scrooge offered some warm brandy to César—which the boy refused with a grimace—and a sugar cube to Tifa, which she accepted gratefully, feeling the energy return to her tiny body.

  "Excuse me, Mr. Scrooge. This may sound strange, but we don’t know how we got here.”

  Could you tell us where we are?”

  “This city is called Schneestadt,” he replied.

  "I would show you where it is on a map, but I fear that's something rather difficult to come by around here."

  César, still clutching his wounded arm, nodded solemnly. “We’re lost, sir. We want to go home.”

  He stepped toward the window and drew back the heavy curtain only an inch, scanning the street outside. “You cannot stay here. They will track you down. Schneestadt is under their influence, especially at this time of year, when magic is thinner, more permeable.” As he spoke, he approached with a clean cloth and a bowl of water that a silent assistant had brought him.

  “There is a place, a distant city called Zimorodok,” he continued.

  “It was founded as a crossroads—undoubtedly, it leads to many places.”

  “If you want to return home, your journey will pass through Zimorodok at some point.” As he spoke, he began to clean César’s wound with surprising delicacy.

  While tending to the boy, Scrooge cast a glance at Tifa, recognizing her extraordinary nature without flinching, as if fairies were regular customers in his business.

  “And how do we get there?” Tifa asked, her voice weak but filled with renewed hope.

  Scrooge smiled—a small, rare smile that softened his stern face. He opened a drawer in his desk and pulled out a bag of coins that rang with a satisfying metallic sound.

  “Take this. Go to the train station at the end of the main boulevard.”

  “Look for the Polar Express. It’s the only train with the fortitude—or the madness—to travel through these far northern latitudes.”

  “It crosses the eternally frozen lands and, from what I’ve heard, its route even passes through the North Pole itself. If any transport can take you to Zimorodok, it’s that one.”

  “Buy two tickets to Zimorodok.”

  “The engineer… is an old acquaintance. Tell him Scrooge sent you.”

  Tifa’s eyes filled with tears of gratitude. “Sir… we don’t know how to thank you.”

  “Bah! Nonsense,” he said again, though his tone was warm.

  “I’m just doing a bit of charity for Christmas Eve—it’s no great thing.”

  “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I must finish closing my shop and begin the journey back to the home of one of my relatives.”

  He walked toward a back door that opened onto a dark, silent alley.

  “Go this way. The station is at the end of this street, next to the great square. Don’t stop for anything.” He gently guided César toward a discreet exit that led into a rear alley free of mages.

  César nodded, clutching the bag of coins with one hand while, with the other, he protected Tifa, who had perched on his shoulder. The pain in his arm was sharp, but the name “Zimorodok” and the image of the Polar Express ignited a faint flame of hope within him.

  “Thank you, Mr. Scrooge,” Tifa said, her voice heavy with deep gratitude.

  The snow crunched beneath their feet, an absurdly loud sound in the icy silence that had followed the magicians’ escape. César, with Tifa clinging to his neck, quickened his pace. Scrooge’s bag of coins weighed in his healthy hand, a tangible reminder of hope. The lights of the train station—a building of glass and wrought iron at the end of the boulevard—sparkled like a distant promise.

  “We’re almost there, little fairy,” the boy whispered, his breath forming white clouds. The pain in his arm was a constant stab, but the determination in his eyes had not diminished.

  Suddenly, a tearing scream—not of terror, but of fury and exertion—ripped through the night sky. An enormous, uncontrolled shadow plunged down from among the chimneys of the buildings, spinning through the air in a shower of feathers and stirred-up snow before crashing with a dull crunch into a pile of mailbags stacked near the entrance of a shop.

  Tifa and César stopped short, frozen in place. From the improvised crater in the snow and sacks, a figure struggled to rise. It was certainly not human, but not entirely a beast either. It had the torso and face of a beautiful young woman, with disheveled hair and eyes shining like amber, but where her arms should have been, a pair of powerful wings—now covered in a thick layer of black winter feathers—shook to free themselves from the frost. Her legs were hawk talons, sharp and deadly, gripping into the snow. A red scarf, undone and dirty, hung from her neck, and a sword in its sheath dangled awkwardly from a strap around her strange waist. Her plumage was thick and ruffled by the cold, giving her a wild, puffed-up appearance.

  The creature—the harpy—growled, shaking her head as if stunned.

  “Damn inventions of the rat king’s minions!”

  “They almost caught me with their hooks!” Her voice was a harsh rasp, yet laced with a hint of youthful stubbornness.

  At that moment, three strange yet small hooded figures emerged from the rooftops, mounted on odd metallic contraptions that floated with a hiss, emitting a green glow similar to that of the Glass Mages. They were the pursuers.

  The harpy saw them and bristled all her feathers, taking on a defensive stance. Her wings spread slightly, and along the edges of her flight feathers, Tifa could see the faint glimmer of hidden razor-sharp metal blades treacherously concealed within her wings. “I won’t give them back!” she shouted toward the rooftops. “I need these crystals to find my way home! To find him!”

  Without thinking twice, César sprang into action. He ran toward the harpy, who looked at him in surprise. "Quick, this way!" the boy shouted, pointing to a narrow passageway between two buildings that led toward the station.

  The harpy, confused but seeing the urgency in the boy’s bleeding face, nodded with an awkward jerk. With a powerful flap of her wings that stirred a small whirlwind of snow, she pulled herself up and followed César, running in a rather pitiful way with her legs injured from the fall.

  The three of them slipped into the passage just as the flying artifacts landed on the main street. Tifa, fluttering beside César’s ear, asked the newcomer, “Who are you? Why are they chasing you?”

  The harpy panted, struggling to keep up in such a narrow space. “My name is Erina. And they’re chasing me because… I took a few shiny little things from that horrible factory.” She lowered her voice as if sharing a secret.

  “I need them if I want to continue my journey.”

  “I’m a traveling harpy. Right now I’m trapped here, but if I manage to fix these artifacts, I’ll be able to keep searching for my beloved,” she said, innocently showing her bag filled with blue crystals.

  “Are they chasing you too?”

  “We’re trying to leave the city by train.”

  “We’re headed to Zimorodok.”

  “Then I’m coming with you!” Erina declared with the stubbornness of a child. “Zimorodok sounds like an important place—there must be lots of places to go!” She clumsily adjusted her scarf with the beak of one of her wings, unable to tie it properly. “Hey, can you help me with this? With these wings and these claws, getting dressed is… complicated.”

  César, with a small but brave smile, stepped closer. With his uninjured hand, he took the ends of the scarf and tied a simple but firm knot around the harpy’s neck. Erina watched him, and for an instant, an unusual peace took over her features.

  “Thank you, brave boy,” she said, her voice softer now.

  “It’s… it’s a very important scarf. Someone very special gave it to me… a long time ago, in another place.”

  “The same place I’m searching for now.”

  The harpy Erina limped behind them, her claws carving deep grooves in the snow. “But… a train?” she asked skeptically, staring at the imposing station of iron and glass. “I fly! Or… I used to, until those damned hooks tangled my feathers.”

  “Flying made you an easy target,” César said with a seriousness far beyond his age as he pulled open the station’s heavy door.

  “The train is safer. Don’t you want to find your beloved?”

  At the mention of her beloved, Erina lowered her gaze to the bag of blue crystals pressed against her chest. A flash of longing crossed her amber eyes. She nodded, resigned. “Alright. But if this metal thing jumps the rails, I’m taking off and flying away.”

  The interior of the station was a cathedral of steam and metallic noise. Bundled-up families, wide-eyed children, and drowsy travelers filled the platform. Tifa’s heart skipped a beat at the sight of it: the Polar Express, majestic and imposing, snorted like a living beast. Its immaculate black locomotive released jets of white steam that mingled with the icy air. It was a vision of power and promise. The trio of fugitives slipped unnoticed through the crowd, though Erina’s appearance—with her wings awkwardly folded and her claws clicking against the marble floor—drew more than a few curious glances.

  “Quick, the ticket booth,” Tifa whispered, pointing with a flicker of light from her wings toward an illuminated counter at the far end.

  César, gripping Scrooge’s bag of coins tightly, pushed his way forward. Erina followed, casting wary looks around, as if expecting their pursuers to emerge from the crowd at any moment.

  “Two tickets to Zimorodok, please,” the boy said with the steadiest voice he could manage, rising onto his tiptoes to be seen over the counter.

  The ticket clerk, a man wearing a cap and round spectacles, eyed him skeptically, then glanced at the harpy shifting uneasily behind the small boy.

  “Only two? And for… that?” he asked, pointing at Erina with the pen from his inkwell.

  “She… she’s coming with us,” César replied, tightening his grip on the coins.

  “Then that will be three tickets. I hope you understand.”

  “Yes, of course. Here is the money.”

  But just as he was about to hand over the tickets, shadows loomed over them. They were not the Glass Mages, but smaller creatures with pointed faces and ragged clothes made of sacks and wire. They were the rat-men of the Rat King.

  “Eh, eh, eh,” hissed the leader, baring yellowed teeth. “Those crystals aren’t yours, bird-brat. And the intruders from Lady No?lle’s factory are coming with us. The King has… questions.”

  Erina bristled all her feathers, letting out a guttural warning sound. César, pale but resolute, stepped between the rat-men and Tifa, who hovered beside his ear. The tension snapped tight in an instant, and nearby travelers backed away in fear.

  Suddenly, a calm voice with a peculiar cadence sounded behind them. “It seems terribly impolite to interrupt children and ladies on Christmas Eve. Even more so, to soil the station with your presence, wretched Skaven.”

  A tall, slender man clad in a dark velvet cape and a top hat emerged from the steam. He wore an eye patch, and his sharp face bore a faintly mocking smile. In his gloved hands he held a strange object—a pistol of elaborate, fantastical design, its metal carved like a work of art, a revolver as effective as its craftsmanship suggested.

  “Herr Drosselmeyer!” murmured one of the rat-men, stepping back.

  “That is correct.”

  “Now then, I could use the weapon in my hand to eliminate a couple of miserable underground Skaven like you and claim the bounty on your heads.”

  “Or I could perform a small Christmas kindness and let you go without lead holes in your bodies.”

  “You decide how you want the night to end.”

  The rat-men, staring at the gun with a fear that seemed exaggerated for those who had been playing the villains just moments before, did not wait to further test the patience of the man before them and his revolver. With a few hisses of rage, they slipped into the crowd and vanished into the shadows of the platform.

  Drosselmeyer lowered his pistol with a smooth motion and turned toward the group. His good eye seemed to catch every detail: César’s injured arm, Tifa’s fairy nature, Erina’s hybrid form.

  “A most peculiar group, without a doubt.”

  “Forgive my lack of manners, my name is Herr Drosselmeyer. I am a jeweler, a toymaker, and my favorite pursuit and personal passion—an inventor.”

  “I believe I heard that you are headed for Zimorodok.”

  “As it happens, I too am heading to that place.”

  “I was on my way to the Stahlbaum family’s party, but it seems that in some strange way I got lost and ended up in this city against my will.”

  “So you may consider me just another soul searching for a way back home,” said the man with the eyepatch as he checked the station clock.

  “I think it would be best to hurry—I’ve heard the engineer is a man of strict schedules.”

  The man hurried to the ticket window at full speed to buy his ticket and urged the youngsters to keep moving.

  With the tickets finally in hand, the group headed for the platform. There, beside the locomotive, a stout man with a kind yet firm face, dressed in the impeccable uniform of the Polar Express, was checking a pocket watch.

  “Come on, come on! All aboard! The train must leave on time!” he shouted in a voice that echoed across the platform.

  “We have no time for delays.”

  César stepped forward, holding out the tickets. “Mr. Engineer, our tickets are for Zimorodok.”

  The Engineer lowered his gaze, and his eyes rested on them with a spark of curiosity. He took the tickets, examined them, and then fixed his sight on César and Tifa. “Zimorodok, eh? It’s a special stop—it’s not on the main itinerary.” He paused, putting away his watch. “But on Christmas Eve, time is… flexible. The main route is toward the North Pole—that’s non-negotiable. But,” he added with a wink, “after stopping there to celebrate a bit, the train can take a detour. A detour that just happens to pass through the snowy gorges surrounding Zimorodok. How does a little roundabout sound?”

  Relief flooded Tifa. “Yes! Please!”

  “Very well,” the Engineer nodded.

  “Go right ahead.”

  The locomotive whistle blew—a clean, powerful sound that cut through the night. The Polar Express began to move, slowly at first, then with gathering speed, leaving the station of Schneestadt behind and plunging into the endless white landscape.

  Through the window, as the city faded away, they watched the train begin to make brief stops in small, lonely villages, where dim lights shone like hopes in the darkness. At each stop, a few children, still in their pajamas and with faces full of wonder, climbed aboard. The car gradually filled with excited murmurs, with muffled laughter, and with the sound of Christmas carols that someone began to sing in a distant car.

  Tifa, perched on César’s shoulder, watched the scene. The boy, exhausted, had leaned against the window, his breathing growing steadier as the adrenaline ebbed. Erina, beside them, gazed in fascination at the swiftly sliding landscape, stroking her bag of crystals as if it held the answer to all her questions. The toymaker was focused on his new invention, a strange jeweled egg with an intricate mechanism—a Fabergé egg created with the same love and obsession for detail, a gift he planned to present to his niece the following day.