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"Werewolves?"
"Why, thinking of switching teams?"
"Just answer the question and spare me the commentary."
Noe raised his hands in an only slightly mocking surrender. "Fine! Real."
"Alright." Laia kept her cool as she made a check beside the first item on her list. She had been prepared for this one. "And never tell either Millie or Cathy about that." Otherwise those two would go into the nearest woods in search of a boyfriend and get themselves killed within 3 days or less.
Completely relaxed on the couch in front of her, Noe mimed a closing a zipper on his lips and throwing away the key. If only, Laia thought.
"Okay. Bigfoot?"
"Real. And very docile too, just ugly. Like Vlad."
Vlad did not deign to give that weak attempt the attention Noe so clearly sought. He just continued reading as if he hadn't heard him.
"Shut up." Laia said on reflex, making another check on her notebook. "Right." She cleared her throat. "Santa Claus?"
There was a moment of silence.
Reluctantly, she looked up. Noe was just as delighted as she feared, clearly thinking how to make fun of her the most efficiently.
"No, no, hear me out!" She interrupted him before he could open his mouth. "Santa is based on a real-life figure. Just like Vlad! The workshop? There could be an entrance to the Dark World located in the North Pole. The elves? Could be imps. Cheerful, non-blood drinking imps. You're telling me God is real but Santa can't be?!"
Noe did not hear her out.
"My view of lifespans may be a little skewed, but I thought this belief was discouraged past the age of 7, in humans? Did you miss the memo, love?"
Laia shut her notebook, resigning herself to her fate.
"Because I've never received even a smidge of coal," Noe continued, "and I know I would have topped that naughty list for at least 600 years straight."
Laia didn't exactly disagree, but she still made sure he saw her eye roll.
"The Three Spirits of Christmas are also not real. But, hey, do you think Mephis would have had a change of heart if they visited him?"
"Noe." He'd finally annoyed Vlad enough. His eyes were doing that sunken dark thing Laia pretended not to like.
"It's okay," she said, waving it off. Vlad didn't relax completely, but he also didn't kill Noe, so it was probably fine. "It's not like I care, really. Angels don't have wings and Christmas magic is a lie. It's no problem."
"Don't worry, Laia. I'm sure good old Nick would have loved you."
She threw the nearest pillow at him, but still his laughter rang through the whole castle floor.
Later, when Noe was back to the peace and quiet of his own place (that lovesick trio was truly insufferable whenever in a room together, and the ginger one had arrived to Vlad comforting Laia and promptly wanted to join, so Noe had to hurry to escape), Noe mused on the naivety of humans. An old threaded topic in his mind, but always fresh with new material.
But still, he noticed the obnoxiously wrapped present on his center table right away. Whoever left it (and only 3 people had the key to his place) pulled out all the stops. Red shiny paper with a thick golden-edged green ribbon enveloped the perfectly square box. The ugly thing was impossible to look away from, with how much of an eyesore it was in his otherwise beautiful room. In a hurry to remove it from his sight, he rushed to open it.
Inside, a single lump of coal greeted him. He almost smiled. Laia truly was a menace under that angel facade, and that's why they would always get along.
Except, an unsettling little thought formed in the back of his mind, Laia was in the castle with Vlad, and neither could have made it here before him. Neither the lion or the witch could even step into this realm. And unless his old master had been hiding things from him, Septentrion wasn't omniscient. Maybe the ugly cat was exactly the demon Noe always suspected him to be? Or maybe Vlad managed to text (an early Christmas miracle) Septentrion without Noe realizing, and they'd organized this little surprise for him.
Yeah, that's what it was. A silly prank pulled by the three least funny people he knew. God bless these assholes everyone, or whatever humans said around this time of the year.
Frowning, he hovered over the stupid present, debating whether to throw it all away through the normal trash can or through the window.
Yet for some reason, he changed his mind. Maybe the thing wasn't as ugly as it'd first seemed, or he had found it a tiny bit amusing, or maybe he just wanted to dispose of it after this mystery had been solved. In any case, he hid it in the first empty cupboard he found and forgot about it.
But, just in case, maybe he would be good next year. Just to see what happened and if he would, hypothetically, be put in a different list by a man (demon? Azure?!) who definitely was not and could not be real. Just out of curiosity.
Or, he thought with a little smile, he could test the bounds of how much worse he could be. Hypotheses needed to be tested, and he was nothing if not thorough.
What a surprise. It was the season to be jolly.