Ruritanian Tales For Christmas

A story for Halloween, written in 2012.It tells the story of a strange and secretive family and the man who tries to help them and who discovers that man's best friend might not be a dog.It was inspired by an actual experience I had while staying one summer in Sandwich on Cape Cod. Walking back from the sea along the walkway across the salt marshes, we heard a train whistle and then a blood-chilling cacophony of barking and yowling somewhere off in the dimming twilight.The next day I sat on the beach and wrote this story.I'm a real riot on holiday.All the images are from Unsplash (https://unsplash.com/collections/1063...) and I should credit:Steve Halama, Dominik Rešek, Andrew Charney, Fabian, Mikel Ibarluzea, Giovanni Bianchi, Marek Szturc, Thomas Lardeau, David Martin, Stefano Ciociola, Senor Sosa, Mark Boss, Kevin KandlbinderThe sound effects are from Freesound (https://freesound.org/people/redskeli...) and come from:eric5335, foongaz, samwd, Mrthenoronha, felix.blume, buzzatsea, 16F.Panska.Capek_Tomas Get