Day 2

Jack Moffitt's confusion quickly escalated to annoyance as he closed the door of his tea cabinet. The house had been quiet up until then, so everyone heard him shouting, "Where are my bloody dunking biscuits?!"

He got no response, however. He first stormed into the parlor, where his teenaged son, Jules, was having his own cup of tea, with a package of chocolate-raspberry crème-filled biscuits sitting open on the table. "Jules, have you seen my dunking biscuits?"

"I don't pay attention to where your dunking biscuits are, Dad," Jules sighed. "And before you ask, these are mine. Why don't you just open a new package?"

"Because I had one already open! I refuse to open a new one until I know happened to the first one." Moffitt went back into the kitchen, and started searching every cabinet again, cursing to himself the whole way. Eventually, he gave up, and went into the bedroom. He plucked his bathrobe off the edge of the bed, revealing a jet-black Egyptian cobra curled up underneath. "Where are my dunking biscuits, Anah? I just know you have something to do with why I can't bloody find them!"

"You ruined a perfectly good nap, dear," Anah said, raising her head from her coils.

"You can go back to your nap when I find my blasted biscuits."

"You can have a cup of tea without dunking biscuits, dear."

"No."

Anah sighed, and slithered off the bed. "If you must know, I did use them in this year's gingerbread house."

"Again?!"

"Yes. Again. They make lovely walkways."

Moffitt clenched and unclenched his fists. "Anah… you…" He let out a growl of frustration. "I told you last year, ask permission to use my biscuits!"

"Fine. You can have your biscuits back. If you do not mind the marshmallow fluff under them." Anah climbed up to the counter, and up the side of the refrigerator. Above the fridge was a small cabinet. She opened it with her tail, and her jaw dropped. "Where is the house?!"

"What do you mean?" Moffitt only had to stand on his toes to see inside the empty cabinet. "Looks like it disappeared."

"How could it have disappeared?"

Moffitt went back to the parlor. "Jules? Where is Anah's gingerbread house?"

Jules shrugged. "Don't know. Troy and Dietrich were in the kitchen a while ago. Not sure where they went."

Moffitt and Anah exchanged a look. "The only place they could have gone is the stable," Anah said.

"Why would they bring a gingerbread house to the stable?" Moffitt raised an eyebrow.

"To eat it without us knowing. Perfect timing, too, as all the horses are out in the pasture."

"Indeed." Moffitt put Anah around his shoulders before going to the entryway and putting his coat on. He cursed to himself while storming out to the stable, and threw open the doors. All the stalls were empty, but in the tack room in the back, Moffitt could see two figures by his workbench. "Troy! Dietrich!"

"Oh, crap," Troy said.

Moffitt walked into the tack room, catching Troy and Dietrich standing over the gingerbread house. The roof had been removed, and nearly all the candy-coated chocolates that Anah had hidden inside had been eaten.

"Look at what you did!" Anah cried. "This was supposed to be for Christmas Eve!"

Dietrich's face reddened. His mouth was full of chocolate, but he still pointed at Troy. "It was his idea."

"It was not!" Troy glared at him. "And you're one to talk! You've got candy in your mouth, you ate the wafer bar chimney, and the chocolate-covered cookie walkway-thing!"

Moffitt suppressed his rage. "You ate… my dunking biscuits?"

Dietrich looked like he wanted to disappear. "…Maybe."

"You ate my bloody dunking biscuits?!"

"And destroyed my gingerbread house!" Anah slithered onto the workbench to assess the damage.

"For the record, I decided to help so Dietrich didn't destroy the whole damn house," Troy said. "I made sure the roof was taken off in one piece so it could be easily glued back on."

"Yes, but he ate the chimney."

"To be fair, it broke. Those wafer bars can be fragile."

"So you glue it back on with more marshmallow fluff! Do not just let him eat it!" Anah sighed. "Just… why? I put so much work into this every year, and you decide to ruin it!" She glared at Dietrich with her hood spread. "I told you developing a sweet tooth would get you into a heap of trouble, and it looks like you found it! Shame on you!" She turned to Troy. "And shame on you for helping!"

Troy gave a defeated sigh. "Fine. We messed up, Anah. We'll help you rebuild it."

"Finally! Some sense with you!" Anah angrily slithered off the table, and headed back to the house.

Moffitt glared at both Troy and Dietrich, especially when big smiles crossed their faces. "What? This isn't funny. You both are in a lot of trouble for this."

Troy and Dietrich started laughing. "She has no idea, does she?" Troy asked.

"About what? What did you do now?"

Dietrich snorted. "We never touched her gingerbread house."

Moffitt frowned, then motioned to the gingerbread house on the workbench. "Then… what is this?"

"A fake!"

"See, the real gingerbread house is hidden in Jules's closet," Troy said. "He helped us put together the fake gingerbread house, just so we could mess with Anah."

"That was mean and you two idiots know it," Moffitt muttered. "You ought to tell her."

"It'll be fine once she sees that the real gingerbread house hasn't been touched."

"No, she's going to be furious." Moffitt looked at Dietrich. "Honestly, I'm shocked Troy talked you into doing such a cruel thing."

Dietrich shrugged. "I figured it was harmless since we were not actually destroying Anah's hard work."

"You still made her think you did." Moffitt sighed heavily. "I'm going to go tell poor Anah the truth."

When he returned to the house, Moffitt found Jules showing Anah the real gingerbread house on the kitchen table, explaining to her that everything was alright and that what happened was a prank.

"…I told Troy that I'd hide the house. That's it," Jules was saying.

"This was very meanspirited," Anah said. "I seriously thought they wrecked my gingerbread house."

"No. They'd never do that. You know that."

Moffitt closed the door and started taking his boots off. "Shall we get back at them?"

"Is that really the right thing to do, Dad?" Jules asked.

"No, but the results will be very amusing."

"What are you suggesting we do?" Anah asked.

"Have you made the Christmas cakes yet?"

"Yes. They are in the refrigerator."

"Make extra." A devious grin blossomed on Moffitt's face. "But there actually won't be extra. We'll disguise two balloons as pieces of cake, so when Troy and Dietrich cut into them—pow! They'll be covered in frosting."

Jules frowned. "Mum's not going to be happy with the mess."

"I doubt she'll be happy with the fact that those two tricked Anah. Besides, I'll clean up the mess afterward. It'll be fine."

"To be honest, I want to see the looks on their faces now," Anah said, smiling. "I will make those extra 'cakes.'"

Jules sighed, shook his head, and went back to the parlor. He highly doubted such a plan would end well. "You're both bonkers."