This is the final offering in the “Christmas With the Crooked Cats” series. A return trip to the river-bank to hear a seasonal tale from our old friend, Otter. 

Otter leaned against the holt’s mud wall and cuddled two pups to her as the snow piled up outside. The bells from the human village sounded over the fields and they could just hear the crunch, crunch of people making their way to the tall building in the centre late in the night.

“It’s time, tell them the story.” Dog Otter leaned back too. He hadn’t heard this since he was a pup and his mother had told it to him under very similar circumstances.

Otter scratched with a hind claw at her throat and asked the pups,

“Have you ever wondered why we have gold patches under our chins? Well, I’ll tell you.”

Staring into the distance, like the…