"Hey Molly!" Lady A smiled, bending down and picking up Molly. She twirled her around, skirts flying, then settled the little (well, not so little any more) gargoyle on her hip.

"Well, aren't you just growing up to be the cutest gargoyle," she said, then looked up at Erik and Abby. "And how are her parents doing?"

Molly reveled in the attention Lady A gave her, cuddling up to her and wrapping her little arms around Lady A in a hug.

"We're doing good, thanks for asking," Abby replied with a big smile. "Better than good...great," she added before leaning over toward Lady A and stage-whispering, "We love being parents. We've been talking and who knows, Molly may have a baby brother or sister coming to this party next year!"

"Baby?" Molly whispered.

"She's totally on board with it," Erik said with a grin, running a feather-light touch over one of his daughter's little red pigtails. "So, Lady A, how are you?"

Joe cheerily took the broom from the fair Lady A, "I've always wanted one of these, so useful for cleaning up the glass from all those skylights I've wrecked." Thus he set about sweeping up his mess whist humming Joy to the World. One thing led to another and Little Joe ended up sipping his Moxie straight from the two liter jug as he cleaned, he really only brought it for himself anyways, no one else liked it.

Once he had finished his task, Joe meandered over towards the Wyrm of Books and extended his hand in greeting. "How goes the trouble making this year? Aside from the unfortunate setback with those Gerbils, of course."

Lady A's eyes widened and she smiled, then, pressed a finger to her lips.

"Is it still a secret, Molly?" she asked, tickling her lightly.

"I'm doing well, thank you," she replied. "It's been a busy year. Ended up, quite accidentally, spending some time in the Monstropolis Military Academy. I'm still not sure if I was supposed to be an attendee or a substitute teacher."

She shrugged.

"Strange things are always happening, as usual."

Bookwyrm took Joe's hand after surreptitiously checking it for joy buzzers and the like.

"Oh, it had its ups and downs. I enchanted all the toilets in Hogwarts to talk and taught the trees around Thranduil's underground palace to sing dwarven drinking songs. Then I TP-ed Dol Guldur and emptied out a few dozen humane live traps full of mice into a mûmakil pen and videotaped the ensuing chaos for YouTube, which incidentally became one of the top ten YouTube videos of whichever year I uploaded it in, which is not necessarily the same year as this one."

Outside the faint sound of carolers could be heard slowly approaching the building.

"Late again! Why am I always late?" Anne berated herself, as she pelted hard along the snowy path to the mansion door. She was carrying an immense basket full of small vials of liquid. At her side, half-running, half-flying, was her faithful little pocket dragon, Trevor, who seemed to regard the whole affair with resignation. Anne was always late; he was used to that.

The door blew open just in front of the ginger-haired young woman, although she had not touched the handle. In she came, basket, dragon and all, and hoped very hard that someone would invent an alarm clock during the course of this party, so she might not be late for the next one.

Molly giggled as Lady A tickled her.

"The Monstropolis Military Academy?" Abby repeated. "I bet you have some stories to tell about your time there. What did you teach?"

"Sounds like that would be an interesting place to visit," Erik added. He turned to Abby. "Maybe we could - "

Just then the door blew open and a red-haired young lady entered carrying a basket. Was that a little dragon peeking out? That certainly got the gargoyles' attention!

Trevor, being a dragon, had a natural propensity for curiosity. So when he stopped sniffing among all the little glass vials in the basket Anne was lifting onto a table, the first thing he did was look around. And what to his big black eyes should appear but three gargoyles! (And no tiny reindeer) The little pocket dragon let out an excited snort of flame and fluttered over to see the living stone creatures.

"Trevor!" Anne protested, "no fire inside! You'll set off the potions!"

The dragon simply purred at Abby's feet, rubbing his scaly tail against her in his most winning way. Anne sighed, and set down the calligraphy page that went with the basket, and ran over to the grargoyle family. "I'm so sorry; he forgets to wait until he's introduced sometimes. I'm Anne - very pleased to meet you - and this impulsive little guy is Trevor." She curtsied to Lady A. "So nice to see you again! Merry Christmas, and how are things?"

The card, left on basket of many-colored vials, read thus:

Travel Party Favors
Each little sip of each little drink
Is a miniature whirl
To the one place you think
Is best in the world

Side affects may include brief hyper-intelligence, inability to speak without emoticons and craving for exotic food

"So nice to meet you!" Abby replied, reaching down to pet the friendly dragon at her feet. I'm Abby and this is Erik, my mate, and this little lady is our daughter, Molly."

The hatchling remained on Lady A's lap but leaned over to try to touch Trevor. Abby grabbed her before the curious child could fall over onto the floor, and then held Molly closer to Trevor. "Do you mind if she pets your dragon a little? She can be a little rambunctious but she loves new things. And she can be surprisingly gentle too."

"Oh, by all means! Trevor loves attention, and he can take a little rough-housing if it comes to that." Anne paused to grab a cookie from a tray on the table, not noticing that the cookie tray was monogramed with BW.

Trevor, without waiting for permission, made a jump up to little Abby and licked her cheek with his warm, wet tongue. As he landed back on the floor, he swished his tail back and forth, almost as if he was trying to say, catch me if you can! He then proceeded to dart a few feet forward and hid in the train of Lady A's skirt.

OOC: ... assuming Lady A is wearing a skirt. If not, he ducked under my skirt.

Molly erupted into laughter at Trevor's antics and crouched, ready to leap into the air to follow. Lady A would have had a close encounter with the girl's tail if not for Abby snagging her daughter upon launch.

"Let's let Trevor come out from there, shall we?" Abby said, touching her child's little nose.

Erik, meanwhile, consulted his pocket sundial (which was quite worthless as a timepiece, especially for creatures who spent most of their days asleep, but was still a great conversation starter) and said, "Hey, it's midnight somewhere! Merry Christmas to all!"

"Maybe we could try a few carols in honor of the day," Abby said.

"I'm not so sure. Remember last year? Molly's screeching reminded us of a banshee and was said to be enough to cripple a weeping angel." He cringed at the memory but then chuckled at the mental image.

"But she's a lot better now. I think she'll just coo along with us like she did when she was young."

Molly, however, wasn't interested in singing as long as there was a dragon around, and continued to squirm in her mother's arms.

Varna had hoped to finish her book purchasing trip well in time for the Ditto Town Christmas Party.

No doing, though. She had got back this morning, and now the party was about to begin.

She had been to England again - not to London this time, that had been earlier in the year - to her favorite bookshop in Oxford. Mostly new books on this trip, including a 50th anniversary edition of an old favorite of hers - "Christmas", a picture book by Dick Bruna. She just had time to make it the main feature of her Christmas window display before she had to run to the Christmas Party.

Inside the Mansion she looked around her, smiling as the first people she noticed, were her old friends, Erik and Abby. Where was Molly, though? Oh yes, there she was, right by them - but her mind seemingly completely occupied with some small creature. A dragon? Dragon?

Whatever it was, it licked Molly's cheek and then ran away and hid under a skirt. Molly seemed not to pleased with its disappearance.

Varna went closer and smiled at her friends.

"Merry Christmas," she said.

Lady A laughed, and gently crouched down and pulled her skirt up slightly.

"Hey, little guy," she said, putting her hand down to let Trevor smell it. "How are you doing?"

Trevor growled in puzzlement when Abby didn't let Molly follow him, but happily licked Lady A's hand - much like lizards, dragons smell with their tongues.

"Come on out, Trev," Anne coaxed. "Molly can't play down there."

The little red-brown dragon scooted out from the train of Lady A's skirt obediently.

"Up, Trev," Anne told him, holding both hands cupped together. Trevor jumped up, using his little leathery wings for a boost and landed neatly in her hands. Anne then held him out for the little gargoyle to pet. On hearing a new seasonal greeting, she turned her head to say Merry Christmas to Varna. Unfortunately, in order to cup both her hands together, she had needed to pop the cookie she had been holding in her mouth. And once the cookie was in her mouth, her tastebuds sensed something off and very... Bookwyrm-ish.

Oh, snap, she thought.

"Wow, he's quite smart," Erik commented upon watching Trevor jump into Anne's hands.

Molly relaxed with the little dragon now within reach, stretching out a hand to pet him. She giggled again as Trevor licked her hand, then let her pat him on the head.

"Gently, Molly, gently," Abby said.

Then Erik turned to greet their good friend Varnafinde. "Merry Christmas. Glad you could make it!"

"Any luck finding new books?" Abby asked, even as she kept an eye on Molly's behavior with Trevor. This time, though, it was unneeded as Molly was surprisingly gentle.

"Cookie?" Molly said, seeing Anne eat one.

"Doesn't miss much, does she?" Erik said with a wink.

"Not when it comes to food," Abby quipped. "Just like her father."