Santa Claus: The Christmas Song

By Todd Graham

It has been eight long years since eight-year-old Nicholas Claus was last seen disappearing in a flash with the worlds Christmas spirit stored safely within his very being. Now a strapping teenager, Nicholas struggles to find his way among his new brethren, the Sugar Plum Fairies, until one day a special reindeer and snowman bring Nick a treasured snow globe containing The Christmas Song. This snow globe and song just may be the key to helping Nicholas discover his forgotten past and realize his ultimate destiny.

Meanwhile, the evil Ice Queen has enlisted the aid of Jack Frost and recruited him to join her and her troll warriors in destroying Christmas once and for all. As her power grows, people all over the lands must heed her demand to declare their Christmas beliefs and have them removed or suffer dire consequences. With the supreme strength of the Nutcracker war machine at her disposal, it seems that nothing can stop the Ice Queen from ending Christmas forever. That is, unless Nicholas Claus and his friends, including Prince Hero, the Kringles, and especially Nicholass big sister, Shelby, can stop the queen before its too late.

This fantasy adventure tale is the follow-up to the story begun in Santa Claus: The Spirit of Christmas. The tale is sure to delight readers of all ages as so much surrounding the greatest holiday icon ever is explained in joyous yuletide splendor.

• Language: English
• Publisher: iUniverse
• Release date: Nov 7, 2014
• ISBN: 9781491752746

Todd Graham

Todd Graham earned his bachelor’s degree in education from Central Michigan University. He is a retired school teacher and author of the first two books in the Santa Claus series, The Spirit of Christmas and The Christmas Song. Todd resides Winter Haven, Florida.

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Santa Claus

The Christmas Song

Copyright © 2014 Todd Graham.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the publisher except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

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Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

ISBN: 978-1-4917-5275-3 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4917-5276-0 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-4917-5274-6 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2014919650

iUniverse rev. date: 11/03/2014

Contents

Chapter 1   Over the River and through the Woods

Chapter 2   Nuttin’ for Christmas

Chapter 3   The Christmas Song

Chapter 4   The Dance of the Sugarplum Fairies

Chapter 5   And Since We’ve No Place to Go

Chapter 6   Chestnuts Roasting on an Open Fire

Chapter 7   Jack Frost Nipping at Your Nose

Chapter 8   Yuletide Carols Being Sung by a Choir

Chapter 9   To Face Unafraid the Plans That We Made

Chapter 10 There Arose Such a Clatter

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Chapter 1

Over the River and through the Woods

‘Twas yet another night before Christmas, and in the bedroom of one particularly large house, there were creatures stirring all right, and a mouse—a computer mouse—was just one piece of technology that these creatures used while stirring. For anyone familiar with teenage boys, the stirring of these four creatures captivated by the technological marvels of the day was a stirring almost void of any physical movement.

Sure, a few thumbs twitched, and some hands moved slightly. A head may have bobbed a bit, and some eyes darted back and forth. For the most part, though, the teenagers remained motionless as they entertained themselves as best they could on a cold winter night that happened to be Christmas Eve.

Larry, a sixteen-year-old, shifted the computer mouse on its pad to enable him to navigate the wonders of Facebook. Jerry, a fourteen-year-old, was all thumbs as he texted on his cell phone faster than the quickest drawing gunslinger of the old Wild West. Dustin, a thirteen-year-old, sat perched in front of a large television artfully directing the action on a screen infested with flocks of birds who did not appear to be very happy. AJJ (AJ Junior), a twelve-year-old who simply declared himself a teenager, swayed his head ever so slightly in what was supposed to be a cool manner as he listened to his latest collection of jams on his iPod.

All four teenagers rested comfortably within mere feet of one another in their grandmother’s bedroom, all in distinct spots of the room—one at the computer desk, one at the television, one in the rocker, and one lying on the floor. The four boys looked nearly identical with the exception of height. All four were strapping young lads with dark hair short enough to be socially acceptable to their peers but long enough to warrant remarks about getting haircuts from adults. A variety of T-shirts with assorted phrases on them were hidden by the hoodie sweatshirts that kept the boys rather warm in the somewhat chilly bedroom. They all sported some freckles about their noses and cheeks, and they were all tall and lanky, suggesting basketball was in their future if not already in their present.

There was no basketball in the present of this particular evening as the boys did their best to entertain themselves while being forced to stay with their grandmother at her home in Barrow, Alaska, for the holiday. The boys were not too pleased with this development. Their mother and father had gone to great expense to fly them this far north to be with their grandmother on Christmas Eve, but that only irritated them more as they calculated how many presents this trip probably cost them.

So at that moment, the four brothers were thoroughly detached from one another and anything to do with Christmas while being completely connected to the outside world with their separate modes of entertainment. They entirely missed or fully ignored the amazing white snowfall that dropped outside the big circle window of their grandmother’s bedroom.

Meanwhile, their grandmother was downstairs in the kitchen peering out the window above the sink, watching and loving every second of that glorious snowfall.

Let it snow, let it snow, and let it snow some more, thought Shelby Claus.

Yes, Shelby wished it would snow to its heart’s content, whatever the it was that was making it snow. Shelby loved every flake of the wintry whiteness that drifted down from the sky, and she marveled at the sheer impossibility of it all. How could each and every single, solitary snowflake be different from any other that floated to the ground? How could each flake be a unique masterpiece of form and design? How could there be no end or repeat to the beauty and splendor of gazillions (probably more) of tiny sculptures of frozen water?

Wow! It mystified Shelby but in a good way. You see, Shelby didn’t need to have an answer to any of these questions. She didn’t have to understand how snowflakes were formed. She didn’t want anything to spoil the simple joy of just appreciating snow for what it was. No, she didn’t need any of that. After all, that might just ruin the magic and wonder of it all.

Of course, if there was anyone around who could really appreciate the magic and wonder of winter, it was Shelby Claus. Shelby Claus, the one and only sibling of jolly old St. Nicholas, already understood all she needed to know about the magic and wonder of everything associated with this wintry time of year.

Shelby was an old woman. Her hair was almost as white as the snow, and she seldom went anywhere—even across the room—without her glasses perched on her nose and her cane in her hand to keep her rock steady. After her husband’s death several years earlier, she had taken back her maiden name of Claus as the last name was pretty well sacred to her. She had seen many years in her life, but there was no doubt that some of her favorite years were those in her youth. Shelby thought about a few vivid and fond memories that she had from about the time she was twenty years old. They were not only special memories to her but also an extremely important part of holiday history. Not many people knew that, but Shelby Claus did. She was just itching to share them with some special people in her life.

Hold on—was that itching coming from somewhere else? There was that rash after all, but … No, it was simply a mental itch that Shelby felt. She was prepared to tell the many events of her story, and she was filled with anticipation about doing so.

As Shelby smiled at the images swirling in her mind, she walked up the stairs to her bedroom where her target audience waited. Shelby reached the top of the stairs and didn’t hear a sound from her bedroom. She slowly opened the door and stood in the doorway.

Her grandsons barely moved, and they may or may not have known that she had joined them. Yet they were all in close proximity to her chosen location for telling her story, a massive feather bed in the middle of the room.

The bed was huge, over six feet wide, and the canopy towered up to over nine feet. The mattress and pillows were stuffed with goose feathers—it probably took somewhere in the neighborhood of forty ’leven geese—which made the bed as soft as a downy chick.

All right, everybody, Shelby called out as she clapped her hands together several times, turn off your gizmos and gadgets, and come sit up here on the bed with me.

The four boys each took a moment to finish doing something with their techno-toys before turning their heads to their grandmother.

What? asked Larry.

Get on the bed? followed Jerry.

Oh, why do we have to? whined AJJ as he quickly moved to get up on the bed, which somewhat contradicted his whining.

Dustin put it right out there. Are you serious? All get on the bed with our grandma? What’s the point?

As the boys asked their questions, they all turned off and put away their diversions, suggesting it wasn’t that troublesome to them.

I told you all when you arrived that I had a special Christmas Eve story to tell you, and it’s time for that story, Shelby said as she herself climbed up onto the bed and took her place in the center.

The boys looked at their grandmother sitting there in her old-lady flower-print dress that looked as if it was from the 1800s but that also looked as if it could do for just about any occasion. That same dress could work for church if need be, a party or family gathering, shopping or running any number of errands, or simply just hanging out at home and relaxing. Larry was impressed that one dress could pull all that off and was more impressed that he felt impressed about it. His grandmother’s functional yet pristine panty hose and indistinct black shoes completed her outfit.

Shelby gazed at each one of her grandsons in turn without saying a word. Each boy not yet on the bed set down whatever was left in his hands and reluctantly crawled up and onto the bed. The two youngest took positions next to Shelby so as to have pillows propping up their backs, while Larry and Jerry sat as close to the foot edge of the bed as they could. There was more than enough room on the bed for the five of them. In fact, you could have added another four kids and just as many hound dogs, and there still would have been some room—maybe just enough for that old pig of Shelby’s from the shed in the backyard. Of course, the boys would have loved to go down to the shed to steal the pig and bring it up to their grandmother’s bed, because it was more of a pet to them. However, the pig was pretty dirty and muddy that time of year, so maybe it was just as well it wasn’t invited onto the bed.

Much of the four boys’ bodies disappeared into the fluff and blankets of the feather bed, but Shelby was hoping to see anticipating faces peering at her from the cozy confines. They might not get much sleep on that bed, but they were sure about to have some fun. The two younger boys had little difficulty almost melting into the folds of the bed. Larry and Jerry kept close to the foot of the bed, almost as a precautionary measure, yet they too found themselves somewhat lost in all that comfort.

Shelby hoped she had already whetted their appetite for the tale. She so wanted to tell this story and so wanted her grandchildren to hear it. What kid in his right mind wouldn’t want to hear the true story of Santa Claus? That was a no-brainer. If that wasn’t enough, finding out that your grandmother was Santa’s sister and was an instrumental part of the story of St. Nicholas would be more than enough to make you giddy with excitement. Of course, the four boys didn’t know any of that yet.

Shelby looked at each of her four grandchildren, and the look in her eye told them that she was serious about what she was about to tell them. This was no ordinary story they were about to hear, and this was no ordinary gift they were about to receive from her. No, this was the first time Shelby Claus had decided to share this tale with anyone. Even her own children had yet to discover the full truth about their mother. On this night, though, Shelby Claus would let her grandchildren know the how and the why of Santa Claus and his all-night trek to deliver Christmas gifts around the world. Shelby Claus began the story …

Long ago city sidewalks were busy sidewalks, and they were dressed up in holiday style. In the air there was definitely a feeling of Christmas in a small little village not too far from the North Pole. Children were laughing as people were passing each other on the street meeting smile after smile. On every street corner you could hear little bells ringing and ringing. Bells on sleighs pulled by reindeer were ding-a-linging. The reindeer that pulled the sleighs were also adorned with many little bells that were jing-a-linging. Townsfolk would pull their sleighs to a halt, jump out to walk into shops, and set off another round of ringing from the bells attached to the shop doors. If all those bells didn’t mesh as they did into a sweet and melodious sound, they very well could have driven anyone crazy with the overwhelming power of their chiming chorus. More than anything else, though, those bells allowed the people of the town to know and appreciate Christmas.

One man was responsible for bringing all those bells to that village. He was a man adorned with several bells himself that hung from a red-and-green lanyard around his neck. He was a grand gentleman indeed. In point of fact, that was his name, Grand—RP Grand to be precise. RP was a grandfatherly man in his sixties but looked much younger than his age would suggest. His short brown hair with graying edges was held in place by a colorful red-and-green top hat. His hat was matched by prim and proper clothes, as though he might have been heading to church or to some social function. His clothes were also red and green but a darker shade that did not appear too flamboyant. Of course, he was bundled up for the winter weather with his long, dark-green overcoat supported by purplish-red mittens and matching scarf.

Silver bells, sang out RP Grand, silver bells—it’s Christmastime in the city!

RP danced around the streets of the town drawing many stares and smiles.

Ring-a-ling—hear them ring, he continued. Soon it will be Christmas Day!

Uh, Grandma, AJJ interrupted.

Yes, dear? Shelby answered with just a hint of annoyance in her voice.

That’s not how you start a story.

That’s right, Dustin said. Any good story has a structure that includes a major event at the beginning of the story.

A major event? Shelby asked.

Yeah, Dustin said, something big has to happen to get your story started off in a big way—some exciting action. It draws people into your story and gets them interested. All you have is some guy singing a Christmas song.

Boring, AJJ flatly stated.

And RP Grand singing ‘Silver Bells’ isn’t exciting enough for you? Shelby asked.

All four grandsons raised their eyebrows, half-smirked, and shook their heads in the best manner they could so as not to insult their grandmother.

Hmmmm, well it just so happens that at that very moment that RP Grand was singing, there was a pretty action-packed event happening not too far away, Shelby told the boys. It was a pretty important event in the story, so maybe I’ll lead with that then.

That’s better, Grandma, AJJ said happily.

Well, Shelby began again, the weather outside was frightful …

The weather outside was frightful, and it was most certainly not lovely weather for a sleigh ride together or alone. Of course, that’s the way the weather was a lot of the time so far north. In fact it was so far north it must have been only twenty miles or so from the North Pole. The wind was biting cold as it whistled along at a brisk thirty miles an hour, and that brought the already frigid temperature of zero degrees down even more—that’s the windchill for you. There was a wet, heavy snow falling hard, so it truly was not a day for anyone to be out and about in a sleigh.

Yet paying little to no attention to the weather was an old man focused on driving his sleigh as fast as his four-reindeer team could take him. The old man was bundled up in coats, scarves, and gloves that were old and tattered, but fortunately he had several layers of those clothes on to battle the cold. His head peeked through those layers to reveal a chiseled pale face wearing the stress of many hard years. A few wisps of hair snuck outside of his cap. The gray hairs matched the grayness of his unshaven face that told the tale of a once flowing and impressive beard. The old man slapped the reins on his reindeer, prodding them to go even faster as he took a quick glance behind him, nervousness and determination crossing his face at the same time. Tonka Mattel, the North’s most creative and curious toy maker, turned to face his reindeer and gave yet another slap on the reins.

Come on, boys, come on! he half screamed, half encouraged as he drove his medium-size sleigh across the barren, frozen tundra. We can’t let them get this back! Faster! Faster!

The sleigh struck a rock and caught some air before coming back down hard, sending shock waves through the already rickety sleigh.

Are you okay? Tonka yelled to the back of the sleigh. Looking behind him, he saw no one sitting in the second seat, though he could see the tops of toy bags in the very back of the sleigh protruding above the second seat.

Two snowy hands carefully gripped the back of Tonka’s seat. A black silk top hat rose cautiously behind the seat before the face of a concerned snowman appeared. The snowman’s button nose wrinkled as he squinted his two eyes made out of coal. Any corncob pipe he may have had was long gone.

Frosty, are you okay? Are you still there? Tonka repeated.

Yeah, man, I’m still here, Frosty cried in an uncertain tone, but I’m not cool with this at all.

It’ll be okay, Tonka told him, as long as we can reach those trees.

Tonka motioned up ahead with his head, and Frosty peered into the whipping snow to see what looked like a forest about four hundred yards away across the open space of the tundra.

Frosty spun his head around to look back at their pursuers. Slushballs, we’re not gonna make it, dude! Frosty said. They’re right on our heels! Tonka took another quick peek behind them to see that Frosty was probably right. Three other newer, larger, and faster sleighs were gaining ground on them quickly. Each of those sleighs in pursuit had strong eight-reindeer teams with huge, beefed-up reindeer with some of the bulkiest reindeer muscle Tonka had ever seen. Their fur was dark black, which made them easy to spot amid all the snow on the ground and in the air, and Tonka quickly wondered if even their fur had muscle.

Driving the sleighs was a group of about a dozen ornery and impatient trolls. Trolls were big, scary creatures that most men and snowmen did not care for at all, and Tonka had had about enough interactions with these beings. The trolls screamed and howled as they chased the old man, and as they did so, they bared their sharp fanged teeth, which were easy to see against a backdrop of white snow because most troll dental plans left their teeth with a nasty yellowish hue. The trolls drooled in anticipation and raised their arms in threatening ways, putting their thick black armpit hair on display, which looked even more threatening. Their heavy coats of orangish-brown fur were matted down and wet from the snowfall, but they wiped them clean on their suits of armor. You wouldn’t know it by their look, but trolls were master thieves. Most anything that had ever belonged to them they had stolen.

In an interesting twist of fate, the trolls were chasing after something that had been stolen from them or, more precisely, chasing the man who had stolen it from their boss. They knew it had to be in the sleigh with the old man, and they were bound to get it as soon as they caught up with that sleigh that looked ready to fall apart.

A lone hooded and cloaked figure stood as still as he could in the back of the lead troll sleigh, though he had to brace himself with his hands from the jolts of the sleigh chase.

Tonka knew it was only a matter a time before the trolls caught up to him. It was useless. He couldn’t outrun them. His only chance was to get to that forest and hide in the tree cover. It was only about fifty yards away, and the trolls were double that behind him, so if he could just …

Fudge-covered peanuts! Frosty bellowed and pointed directly ahead to the forest. Tonka looked and spotted two more troll sleighs coming directly out of the forest blocking his path.

What do we do now? yelped the snowman.

Tonka Mattel was not typically known as a quick thinker, but he somehow managed to devise a plan in about a half second.

Up here! yelled Tonka before he even had the whole plan mapped out in his mind. Frosty, come up front here to the passenger side of the sleigh—now!

Frosty fumbled as he climbed over the seat. He was shaking all the while but did as he was told. He grabbed the front rim of the sleigh and held on for dear life as he saw that the two sleighs that had blocked them from the forest were only twenty-five yards away … fifteen yards … ten …

Tonka pulled on the reins, and his four reindeer swerved sharply to the right. In doing so the sleigh’s skids thrust mounds of snow up and onto the two forest sleighs. Now Tonka and Frosty were speeding along the edge of the forest. The move gained them a few seconds as the three troll sleighs behind them had to slow more than Tonka had to make the same turn and stay in the chase.

Yeahhhhh, boyyyyyyy! Frosty happily chimed as he leaned over the front of the sleigh to compliment the reindeer. "That was an awesome move! Hey, Tonka, what about the other three … Aaahhhh!"

Frosty was shoved in the back and found himself airborne for a second before landing on the lead reindeer on the left. After landing on the reindeer, the snowman pushed himself up off his belly and then swiveled around into a most interesting position. He looked forward, which in this case was actually backward, toward the sleigh, because he had landed sitting backward on the reindeer. He saw that Tonka had been the one to shove him off the sleigh.

Frosty was a bit ticked off now. What gives, man? What’s your malfunction?

There’s no time! answered Tonka, and it was absolutely true, as the three troll sleighs had already made the turn and were charging hard up behind them. We’ll buy you a little time. Unlatch Rudolph. I won’t make it, but the two of you can! Tonka yelled to Frosty. Tonka looked Frosty straight in the eye. There would be no arguing anything at this point.

Frosty looked down to see where Rudolph was hooked to the other reindeer, and it seemed simple enough. He reached down to pull on the pin that should release the smallest of the four reindeer from the group. Nothing happened. The snowman looked back up to Tonka who was now barking orders to the other two passengers in the sleigh.

Tonka’s two wild poodles, Fisher and Price, wagged their tails furiously as they hopped up from the back of the sleigh by the toy bags and into the backseat. Their tails wagged with increasing momentum as they listened to the toy maker’s commands.

Throw the toys out, boys! Throw the toys! Throw the toys! Go get ’em! Tonka commanded and encouraged at the same time as one does with dogs.

The two little bundles of brown poodle fur yipped excitedly and scrambled to the back of the sleigh where a pile of strange and creative toys sat in a collective pile of sacks. Fisher grabbed a toy train engine connected to another engine facing the opposite way in his mouth and flung it back and out of the sleigh. Price followed his brother and flung a large, plastic, triangular-shaped object with hula written on it off the back of the sleigh. In no time at all, toy after toy after toy was flying off the back of the sleigh and bouncing up high into the air and striking pursuing sleighs and the trolls who had nearly caught up.

The trolls shook their fists and howled in anger as flying toys smacked them in their chests and arms and faces. Toys also burst against the troll sleighs, causing cracks and holes that slowed the sleighs down. There was no time for the trolls to swerve out of the way of the barrage of toys, so their sleighs ran over a number of toys, damaging the sleigh skids and further slowing the trolls’ pursuit.

That little bit of time bought Tonka all he needed to finish up with his rather hasty plan. With one hand, he reached into his coat and carefully pulled out a snow globe. He had just a second to take a last quick look at what was inside. He smiled.

Frosty, here … catch! The globe was already in the air before Tonka was even done yelling the three words.

As Frosty watched the globe, he wasn’t sure if the globe was flying through the air in a shaky manner or if it was just him shaking all over from riding on the reindeer’s back. Yet somehow the snow globe landed perfectly in Frosty’s hands almost as if his hands and the globe were two attracting magnets.

Man, what do I do with this thing? Frosty asked.

You’ve got to find the boy—get the globe to the boy! Everything depends on this. You can’t fail! Tonka sounded confident in the snowman’s ability to accomplish this feat with the exception of the last few words. He wheeled around to the dogs. I need a little more time, fellas!

Fisher and Price understood immediately and nodded their heads. However, the toys were all gone, and there was nothing left to toss out of the sleigh for an obstacle. Fisher looked at Price, and Price stared back at Fisher. If dogs could smile, it would have appeared that the poodles each put a devious smirk on their doggy faces before climbing up onto the back rim of the sleigh. The poodles stood carefully on the rim of the sleigh, balanced themselves on three of their legs like a tripod, each with a fourth and back leg poised high in the air. Fisher and Price took careful aim … and fired!

The troll sleighs all seemed to slow down at exactly the same time as their drivers all began spitting and trying to clear off their tongues. Something sure did not taste good at that moment!

The dogs barked up to Tonka, and the toy maker knew he had a few more seconds.

Frosty, listen! We only have a few seconds, Tonka hollered as the sleigh continued to speed along the edge of the forest. Find the boy! You and Rudolph must do it now. Find Nicholas! Get him the snow globe!

What if I can’t find him? the snowman asked, not expecting an answer he would like.

Then look for a hero! Tonka said. He can take it from there!

Frosty raised the side of his top hat and stuffed the snow globe inside before returning the hat to his head. But I can’t unhook this complicated—

Clink!

Frosty looked down and saw that the little metal pin that he hadn’t been able to pull loose was gone. Frosty twisted around to see that Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer was looking back at him with the pin in his mouth and a disgusted look in his eyes. Rudolph snorted at Frosty.

Frosty responded with a sheepish smile and a shrug of his snowy shoulders. Well, I must have loosened it, he told the reindeer.

Rudolph kept pace with the other three reindeer without breaking stride at all, which was not so easy considering he had the hefty weight of the snowman pressing down on his back. The reindeer was waiting for the right moment and knew Tonka would give him the order.

As Tonka looked back one final time he saw that the trolls had shaken off that last little bit of yellow caution and were now as far back as they were going to be before catching him and his sleigh in a matter of seconds.

Now, Rudolph! the toy maker screamed. Go find Nicholas!

The glow in Rudolph’s nose dimmed, and a split second later the reindeer pushed with his back legs as his front legs led him off to the left toward the trees and cover. Frosty barely held on and had a doubly hard time doing so since he was riding the reindeer backward. With just three powerful leaps in which Rudolph only skimmed the snow-covered ground, he and Frosty were into the trees and out of sight of the trolls.

Tonka Mattel let out a heavy breath of relief and allowed his other three reindeer to slow down. He saw no reason to run them into the ground and completely exhaust them. Still, he made sure he was a good hundred yards away from where Rudolph and Frosty had disappeared into the woods before he finally came to a stop.

The trolls were a bit surprised at this development. A couple of them were also extremely disappointed as they figured a continued chase meant more damage they could cause in order to catch their prey.

The three troll sleighs circled Tonka’s sleigh. There was no way Tonka would be driving his sleigh out of that circle. The trolls’ nasty reindeer bellowed and snorted in triumph with the prize of their chase neatly