Monday 17 November

Yay! My first day of training to become a Christmas Elf!

I dropped Leaf, Twig, Pin and Plum off early at school, and headed up to Christmas Place. Unfortunately a delivery sleigh had shed its load of cabbages on The Broad Way, so I was a teensy bit late. Steinar, the Right-Hand Elf, was outside the gate, waiting to meet me.

‘Tog Harket, I presume?’

‘Call me Tog,’ I said, trying to keep my cool. Inside, of course, I was boiling with excitement.

‘I was about to give up on you. The other students are already inside. Stand still, please.’

He pointed a little hand-held machine at my forehead. It bleeped and he checked the reading.

‘Hmm. That’s strange.’

He took a second measurement, then a third, and frowned. ‘I think my Spirit Gauge is playing up. It’s what we use to measure Christmas Spirit. Can’t have a Christmas Elf without Christmas Spirit, can we? No. Never mind, time’s a-ticking. Let’s go and join the others.’

Inside the front door was an enormous reception hall, where lots of important-looking elves were rushing around looking very busy indeed. Steinar escorted me to a large desk, where a snooty Reception Elf gave me a security pass. Then we went to a large metal door, where an even snootier Security Elf checked my rucksack. The Security Elf pushed a button and the door slid open.

Beyond it was a tunnel, and Steinar marched ahead.

Cantering candy canes! I thought. Christmas House goes right back into the mountain!

‘Keep up!’ called Steinar, disappearing round a corner.

I scurried after him, as the tunnel swerved left and right.

We passed an open doorway.

‘Mission Control,’ he announced, without breaking stride.

I peeked into an enormous cavern filled with row after row of whispering Tech Elves. There was a giant map of the world on the wall, covered with tiny flashing red and green lights.

‘What happens in there?’ I asked excitedly, once I had caught up with Steinar again.

‘That’s where we track Father Christmas round the world on Christmas night.’

I had a hundred questions, but before I could ask them, we passed another doorway.

‘Candy Caves,’ he declared.

At the end of a short passageway I saw a large service lift clanking to a halt, the doors sliding open to reveal a dozen or so Mining Elves. They were all chattering excitedly and their helmets were dusted with sherbet. I guessed they must be finishing their shift.

By the time I looked back at Steinar, he had gone. I had to run to keep up.

‘Mail train,’ he shouted, as he passed a brick archway. Beyond it was a long railway platform, where Postal Elves were unloading mail bags from an enormous steam train.

Once again, I had to run to keep up.

‘Watch your backs!’ called an urgent voice. A caged trolley full of brand-new toys was trundling towards us.

‘Morning, Ola!’ called Steinar.

The trolley swerved, and Father Christmas’s Left-Hand Elf emerged from behind it. For a second, I thought he recognised me, which was impossible, because I had only ever met him once, and that was in a dream. All of the elves in the Arctic Hills knew who Ola and Steinar were – they had the most important jobs in Elf Land, but I was just a Trainee Christmas Elf.

‘First load of the day,’ he grunted. ‘And who’s this, then?’

Steinar introduced me.

‘A pleasure to meet you, Tog,’ growled Ola, shaking me by the hand. I saw that he had a tattoo of criss-crossed candy canes on his hand too. ‘Now if you’ll kindly step aside, I’m on my way to the warehouse.’

Then he put his weight behind the trolley and pushed past us.

‘Does everyone here have one of those tattoos?’ I asked, as we hurried on.

Steinar looked at me quizzically.

‘Of criss-crossed candy canes,’ I explained.

Steinar glanced in Ola’s direction, and smiled. ‘That’s a prison tattoo. You’ll see plenty of those around here. Father Christmas is a firm believer in Second Chances. Everyone’s welcome, even ex-prisoners, so long as they pass their training.’

I was about to ask whether the candy cane tattoo on Father Christmas’s hand meant he had been to prison, too, when Steinar pulled me to a halt.

‘And this…’ Steinar turned to face me, and a tiny smile of pride curled at his lips. ‘This is the workshop.’

He pushed his way through, and I scurried after him.

North Pole Radio was playing at full volume, and the air was thick with hammering, drilling and sawing. The smell of fresh paint filled my nostrils, mixed with the scent of wood shavings and the tang of fresh-cut metal. I took a deep breath, as if I was taking a lungful of fresh air in the Arctic Hills.

‘Keep up!’ called Steinar, as we passed bench after bench of green-jacketed Toymaking Elves. One was packaging an action figure; another was testing bubble mixture; yet another was checking the tension on a catapult. Everywhere I looked I saw masters at work: pasting labels on miniature cans of baked beans, sewing fluffy sprouts, tacking pink fluff on to the tails of unicorns, and painting the spots on miniature plastic cows. The room was filled with every single toy you can possibly think of.

For the first time in my life, I felt like I belonged.

The room was filled with every toy you could think of

‘This way,’ said Steinar at the end of the aisle, opening a door with a sign on it that said Training Room.

I stepped inside. There was a blackboard on the far wall, and facing it, marooned in a sea of empty work benches, were two lonely figures.

One of them turned and I recognised a familiar face.

‘Holly!’

‘Tog!’ she exclaimed, giving me a big hug. ‘You made it!’

‘Sorry?’ asked the elf next to her. I was disappointed to see it was her skating partner and all-round perfect-pants, Max Grimmsson! ‘Who’s this?’

‘One of the kindest elves I’ve ever met,’ said Holly with a smile. ‘He wrote to Poppa, asking to be a Christmas Elf. But his letter went missing – so I asked if he could join us.’

‘Poppa?’ I asked, a little bit confused.

Max gave me a funny look. ‘You know that Holly is Father Christmas’s daughter, right?’

I hadn’t known that, and I told Holly all about bumping into him at the gates.

Holly smiled and shook her head. ‘I don’t think that was Poppa,’ she said politely. ‘He was in Antwerp yesterday, at a Christmas fair.’

‘It was, I promise,’ I said earnestly. ‘He had this huge sack of presents, and I helped him pick them up.’

Max looked at me strangely, then said quickly, ‘So your letter went missing?’

‘Seems that way,’ I agreed.

‘It’s very strange,’ announced Steinar, and we all turned to look at him. ‘Usually these benches are full of elves, eager to learn the secrets of toymaking. But this year hardly anyone applied. Perhaps their letters got lost like yours did, Tog. Shall we?’

I quickly took a seat at the bench across from Holly and Max.

‘Now I understand you would like to become Toymaking Elves, is that right?’

The three of us nodded.

‘Very good. Now, as I’m sure you all know, there’s a special kind of magic here at Christmas Place which helps us work at lightning speed. That’s how we can read millions of letters and make gazillions of toys in the run-up to Christmas.’

We nodded again.

‘Well, that same magic means you can learn faster too. By the end of this week you’ll be experts in – amongst other things – plastic injection moulding, digital electronics, metal die-casting and extrusion, and advanced packaging: in short, everything you need to know to make every single toy in the world.’

I put my hand up.

‘Yes, Tog?’

‘When do we get to join the workshop?’

I couldn’t wait to finish my training and start making toys for real!

‘I’m coming to that. At the end of the week, as a test of the skills you’ve learned, I’ll ask you each to make one of our showstopper toys. If it’s satisfactory, you’ll join the workshop and start making toys for Christmas. The first letters from children are already arriving, so there’s lots to do.’

‘And if it’s not?’ asked Max.

‘Not what?’

‘Satisfactory.’

Steinar smiled.

‘Just make sure it is,’ he said.