Page 1 of Chasing Cheer
ChapterOne
Holly Claus made her way down a well-worn path deep in the woods. Her forest-green velvet dress, which was lined with white trim like piping on a sugar cookie, billowed softly on the snow around her. Elves followed her in a line, holding their lanterns aloft.
Slipping through a thicket of trees, Holly entered a clearing. Inside stood two tall evergreens, their branches magically lit with shimmering candles. They illuminated the night as perfect year-round Christmas trees.
The elves formed a semicircle around her and waited. They were all familiar with the yearly routine. Holly’s parents, Santa and Sylvie Claus, weren’t buried there—they weren’t buried at all. They had passed through the spirit portal together when their time at the North Pole had drawn to a close. A small portion of their spirits had remained behind, illuminating the two trees forever.
Holly set down her lantern and approached. She pressed a hand against each trunk, letting the magic of the place surround her.
She didn’t cry or even feel sad as she rested her hands on the trees. The cycle that brought Clauses through the North Pole and eventually into the land of everlasting Christmas was filled with joy, not sorrow. If anything, Holly came to her parents with questions. As always, she wanted to know more about the Cheer and the precise way it was powered.
She wanted to know about the magic that ran the North Pole and gave her the ability to speak any language. And cycle after cycle, year after year, Holly hadn’t been able to shake the sense that she was doing something wrong.Why was Cheer so much easier for my father to gather?
He had been able to spend the majority of the cycle at the North Pole, only needing to venture out to gather Cheer a few days each time. Holly’s production strategy was nearly the opposite. And the North Post had always seemed to glow more brightly when her father was around, though Holly had become less certain of that. It had been so many seasons since she’d seen him, and her memory might have been playing tricks on her.
But any explanations her parents had known had gone with them to the land of everlasting Christmas, and Holly had to do her best to discover the answers on her own. Still, she came to the clearing each year on the anniversary of their passing and hoped it would be the year the answers came.
Holly murmured a quick thank-you to the trees then turned back to face the elves, whose glowing faces sent cheer through her that was different from what she captured in her Cheer meter. The elves loved and respected her, as they had loved and respected her parents, and more than anything, they loved Christmas. It was for them and all the people on Earth that Holly must figure out the secret to maximum Cheer.
She began to walk back through the forest, her boots not leaving so much as a mark on the powdery snow, ready to take on a new Cheer cycle.
* * *
Holly had beento Disneyland more than most humans, with the likely exception of those who worked there. Her magic allowed her to travel there whenever she liked, free of charge, and it was also the reason she needed to frequent the so-called happiest place on Earth. To her, it was just a place in Anaheim, California, USA, that proved an effective way to do her job.
Her magic was perfectly suited to the task she needed to do nearly every day. If she wanted something, she had only to ask. Of course, there were exceptions. She didn’t have the power to make people do something they wouldn’t normally do. Instead, they thought Holly was one of the nicest people they had ever met and, therefore, someone they should trust.
So when Holly asked the man at the turnstile outside the amusement park to please let her through, he did, no questions asked. Holly brushed through the entrance with the ease of someone who knew where they were going.
She swept past the lines for food—they were minefields of mixed emotions. Queues often brought negative feelings, which could suck power from her Cheer meter, but they could hold anticipation as well, which ranked in the middle of the Cheer scale.
She continued walking, crowds of people in colorful clothes and mouse ears swirling around her. Holly didn’t stop to take any of it in. She never did. She was on a mission.
A swath of shiny blue fabric caught her eye.
There,Holly thought.
She got within range of the princess and took a seat on a well-disguised retaining wall to wait for the joy to appear, glancing at her Cheer meter. To humans, the meter looked like a simple gold watch engraved with delicate snowflakes, but it functioned like an advanced machine.
The Cheer meter took in all the emotions around her—sadness, joy, confusion, anxiety, excitement—and sifted through them. It sought the energy source known as Cheer, and the delicate bracelet, in Holly’s estimation, was the most important object on Earth.
A little girl in a blue dress and a red wig, which matched the princess’s exactly, approached in excitement.
“Hello there,” the adult mermaid princess said. Her voice was as sweet as the syrup on Holly’s pancakes at the North Pole.
The little girl smiled at her and said hello while her parents snapped pictures. Holly barely watched. She had seen the same scene hundreds of times before. Her watch was vibrating rapidly, the Cheer meter soaking up emotions that were instantly converted to power, and that was what held Holly’s attention. She allowed herself a small, satisfied smile.
The next day was the full moon, which meant it was time to return to the North Pole for a few days, and she was sure she would meet her Cheer quota for the month by then. Holly was already looking forward to the approval and admiration that always came from the elves after a particularly good Cheer cycle.
The smile slid off Holly’s face as her Cheer meter vibrated again. The vibration was subtly different from the previous one. The ones that fed the meter felt pleasantly warm and jubilant, like atoms were bouncing around in a dance. But the current ones were cold and frantic, as if particles were being dragged into a deep chasm. She looked up in alarm.
A few feet away, a scoop of a child’s ice cream cone had fallen off and splatted to the ground. Holly’s watch had clocked the emotion before the child even started to cry. His low whine of surprise turned into a wail of devastation. His mother picked him up, but the child was inconsolable.
Holly peered at her watch nervously. The Cheer numbers were dropping fast. Though the nearby mermaid princess was thrilling the young guests, a strong negative emotion could counteract that rapidly.
Holly stood abruptly. Most people, aside from the mother, ignored the child’s despondent wail, but Holly couldn’t. She had to get far away from the situation quickly. With one last reluctant look at the mermaid princess, Holly headed toward another surefire Cheer magnet.
Minutes later, having easily been escorted to the front of the line, Holly got in a boat, not exactly thrilled to be doing the ride again, packed in with tourists. Still, the colors and music of the boat ride were guaranteed Cheer bringers. And no food was allowed, so a ruined ice cream cone wouldn’t be able to threaten her numbers.
