Lacey sat down at her own workbench, spilling the parts of the wooden train toy set she planned to build that afternoon onto its surface. The blocks and wheels were already shaped, only the assembly and the paint work was left for her to do. She deftly caught a wheel before it could roll from her bench onto the floor and grinned at it. Oh no, you don’t. She’d already had enough experience picking wheels up from the floor, after Elf had dropped his load when she and Peter had gone to speak to him the previous Sleighday. She supposed that was what had inspired her choice for today. After seeing those little wheels run so freely, she had been itching to build something that could use all that speed. As it turned out, she wasn’t the only one feeling inspired.

  ‘I’m ready, I’m going to do it!’ Cynthie proclaimed, drawing all eyes to her. Having just walked back into the workshop from feeding the swans, she stood in the entry door, hands on hips as if ready to take on the world.

  Gasps rang out all around the workshop floor from the scattering of elves that had chosen to put in a few more hours on this Blessday.

  ‘You’re really going to take it on?’ Danji asked, her eyes shining with excitement.

  ‘Are you sure you’re ready?’ Bethy asked, gazing at her with concern, even though she also clearly wanted to support her friend.

  Cynthie nodded resolutely. ‘Yes. I’m doing this today.’

  There was a scattering of cheers and claps as she marched over to the small storage. There was a hum of excitement in the air, but Lacey wasn’t sure what it meant. She looked around her, settling on Danji who was seated closest to her in the partially empty room.

  ‘Psst, Danji,’ she whispered. ‘What’s happening? What’s Cynthie going to do?’

  ‘It’s the masterwork-toy challenge,’ Danji murmured back. ‘Only one in a hundred elves ever manages to make a piece good enough to count as a masterwork. If you pull it off perfectly, you earn Master Toymaker ranking. That means you’re allowed to start designing your own speciality toys.

  ‘Cynthie and Jinxy have been competing to reach it first. Whoever does will have higher standing. It’s strictly ranked – the elf who completes their masterwork first holds the higher spot in the lineage. Everyone else is slotted beneath them in the order they achieve it.’

  ‘Ooh,’ Lacey said, looking at Cynthie with new respect. It sounded like a momentous task. It also solidified one of Lacey’s suspicions. She had known the two were toymaking rivals, but higher standing on the lineage? That might just be enough motive to want Jinxy out of the way.

  She watched with fascination as Cynthie re-emerged from the small storage, wooden cylinders tucked under one arm and a tray scattered with delicate beads, rolls of thread, and various small objects balanced in her other hand. A tool belt was fastened around her waist, tinkling with what looked like minute pliers and a jewellers magnifying glass hooked onto one end.

  ‘Do we know what she’s making?’ Lacey asked.

  Danji took a moment, actually closing her mouth again before she replied, watching in hushed awe as Cynthie made her way to her bench. ‘It’s going to be a crystal-threaded snowflake kaleidoscope. She and Jinxy had been working on music boxes and codexes for weeks to prepare. I’m actually a bit surprised she’s going ahead without Jinxy – normally they compete on challenges side by side.’

  ‘Oh?’ Lacey said, turning to watch Cynthie. She was carefully unpacking all of the materials onto her desk, arranging everything with care. There seemed to be an order to the little piles, as if she was sequencing it in the order she would need each component.

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  ‘Uh huh,’ Danji nodded. ‘Still, I can’t wait to see it when she’s done, it’s going to be amazing!’

  Bethy walked up to them just in time to hear Danji’s last statement. ‘Don’t count your reindeer before they fly, though,’ she said with a worried frown. ‘If this thing fails, she’ll be distraught for weeks. Remember the snowflake fractal kite she tried to make last winter? It took three days before Jinxy could coax her out of bed and back into the workshop. With Jinxy missing…’ she shook her head.

  ‘Well, even without Jinxy, we’re still here. We could help her if she needed,’ Danji said.

  Bethy just gave her an impossibly tired look, the circles under her eyes cast deeper in the shade of her worry. Lacey felt a pang of sympathy. Bethy’s friend was missing, Elf had been leaning on her with his upset stomach, and to top it all she was dealing with heartache about Melo. And now, she was facing the possibility of dealing with a distraught Cynthie too – how much weight could one friend take?

  ‘How are you doing, Bethy?’ Lacey asked.

  Bethy looked at her in surprise. ‘Why, better, thank you, Lacey. It helps if you can sleep at night without another elf moaning and groaning on your sofa after too many nutmeg clusters.’ She smiled wanly.

  ‘Nutmeg clusters again?’ Danji said, raising her eyebrows. ‘Oh, Elf.’

  ‘Yes indeedy,’ Bethy said.

  Elf had been on her sofa? Lacey noted. So that was what she hadn’t wanted Mathilda to see. Had Mathilda known regardless? Was that what she meant when she’d been trying to drop a clue for Lacey and Peter?

  Lacey made a mental note to remember this revelation, then said, ‘Well, you’ve certainly helped Peter out by confirming Albyrne was in the workshop on Starday when Jinxy disappeared.’ She’d meant it to lift Bethy’s spirits a little, and did not expect what came next.

  ‘You saw him here that afternoon?’ Danji said to Bethy, an odd look flitting across her face.

  Lacey focused on Danji with interest. ‘You didn’t see him?’ she asked.

  ‘What? I, ah no, I mean yes. He was here all right. It just took me a moment to remember.’

  ‘I see,’ Lacey said.

  ‘Well, we’d better get back to work,’ Danji responded, smiling a smile that didn’t reach quite up to her eyes.

  Well, what was that about? Lacey wondered, watching the pair sitting back down at their own benches. It was definitely something. Did that mean Albyrne hadn’t been in the shop after all? And if so, why was Bethy and Danji covering for him? But Albyrne had been sincere that he hadn’t had anything to do with Jinxy’s disappearance. It was odd.

  Add that to Cynthie deciding to attempt the masterwork challenge on her own, without Jinxy competing by her side. Was she too impatient to wait? Or was there another reason behind her decision? Lacey reached down for her notebook, to add these new clues to what they already had.

  At her workbench, Cynthie hummed a tuneless melody, as she scrunched her eye around the jeweller’s glass, meticulously tweezering strings around inside the kaleidoscope’s tube.

  The door from the vestibule swished open and Elf slowly swayed in, still looking quite green around his metaphorical elven gills. Frankly, Lacey was surprised to see him, given that only this morning his stomach cramps had been so severe he couldn’t even get up off the floor. Clinging to the door handle, like it was holding him up, his eyes slid over the workshop interior, fixing on Bethy at her workbench.

  Bethy gave a large sigh, getting up and heading over to him. They spoke too softly for Lacey to hear, but there was no mistaking the annoyance on Bethy’s face. Lacey quietly narrowed her eyes at him as well. Couldn’t that disagreeable elf tell that Bethy needed a break? She guessed not.

  Finally, Elf shuffled back out. Bethy returned to her seat, lips clamped together with frustration.

  Lacey looked back down at the train wagon she was working on, and slowly slid the axle into place before picking up the first wheel. Maybe she’d judged Bethy prematurely this morning. She at least appeared to be honest in making her feelings known to Elf, and not just talking about it behind his back. Even in her frustration, she was handling him with more integrity than Cassie had done for Lacey.

  She silently shook her head. Cassie again. She swore, that girl – who, just like her, must be a woman by now – was haunting her. She even heard her voice at the end of her dream this morning, repeating the exact words she’d said to Lacey so many years ago.

  She’d thought she’d put that chapter of her life behind her years ago. So why did it keep popping back out over and over again here in Santa’s Village, of all places? If you couldn’t be at peace with your past in a magical place like this, where could you?

  With a deep breath, she refocused, feeling the weight of the finely calibrated wheel in her one hand, the slightly larger wagon in her other. The past might tug, but the present demanded precision.

  Pouring her concentration into the task, she pressed the wheel, hearing it click cleanly into place. She needed to stay focused on the present, not the past.

  ??????

  If you were creating your own master-level toy, what would it be? Something intricate? Magical? A toy only the bravest elves would dare attempt? I’d love to hear your ideas.

  follow to see how Cynthie's attempt turns out??