Just before Christmas, Santa has a new son, Prince Nicky, and it’s prophesied that the next girl born in the Kingdom will grow up to be his Queen.

 

Gelf Spicata, visiting from the Realm of Drear far across Frozen Lake, decides to hurry back to his mistress, the evil Baroness von Drear, who is just about to give birth, to tell her the news.

 

The Baroness forces her doctors to induce labor, and gives birth to twins, the first a baby boy, the second a girl!

 

Discovering that a girl was born to a peasant family hours before her own, the Baroness  sends Spicata to kill her so that her own daughter will fulfill the prophesy.

 

The Black Haruspex, a Seer of Some Things Unseen, arrives to deal with the problem of the Baroness having the boy before the girl, which interrupts the line of succession in the Realm of Drear.