Salt by Ava Max was playing again. The beat echoed off the ice and glass walls of the huge dome which separated the workshop from the arctic cold, thumping off the gears, gizmos, and red-capped mushrooms sprouting from old, gnarled tree trunks. Somewhere amidst the tangled mess of nature and contraptions, a distinctive booming voice was belting out the lyrics: "Got my thigh-highs on, feel like Wonder Woman."

Boris smiled and shook his head. He'd always wondered what people would think if they knew Santa Claus preferred Billboard's Top 100 to Christmas carols.

The ancient elf bopped and bounced to the music, his diminutive figure flitting here and there amongst the enchanted trees as he checked on his latest projects. Even with flashes of bright red in motion and a string of rich bass notes to follow, Boris had a hard time catching up to the little man.

"Mr. Claus," Boris called. "Mr. Claus!"

"I'm all out of—oh! Boris!"

Claus skidded to a sudden stop, but his momentum carried him behind another tree and out of sight. It was only a few seconds before his mushroom cap hat belted in brown leather popped into view again.

"Boris! Back from your trip down south already?"

"Yes, sir."

Boris' long legs closed the distance between the two of them within a few paces. At a mere four feet tall, it was generally quicker to go to Claus than it was for Boris to wait for the elf to come to him. Generally. If Claus indulged in a Starbucks espresso, nobody could outpace him.

"Ah, I should probably take a break anyway before the missus comes fussing," Claus said, sitting on a chair-like structure at the base of a tree. The gears didn't look comfortable to Boris, but the elf's contented sigh said he felt otherwise. "So, how did it go? Do we have a new enchantress on board for your next novel? You're cutting the deadline awfully close, you know."

Boris lowered himself to the ground, covered in squishy green moss with sparse tufts of grass here or there. "Lily didn't give me an answer yet, but I'm hopeful. And I'll have the manuscript for you tomorrow."

"Good, good. Understand, I don't mind you taking your time, but it's the missus, you see. She hasn't been so enthusiastic about an author since Jane Austen." Claus lifted his tinted red glasses and rubbed the bridge of his nose. "And you know what they say: 'Happy wife, happy life.'"

"I'm honored to be in such fine literary company," Boris said, smiling modestly. Claus may have been his publisher, but everybody knew Mrs. Claus held the purse strings, and right now, she wanted romance. Boris didn't want to know what she was like in her Dante phase. "Oh, Pipaluk and Emma send their love."

A wide smile split the curly white mass of mustache and beard hiding most of Claus' face. "That's right! They live next door to Lily, don't they? Tell me, is Pip still blowing up his lab every other day? That Emma really is a saint for putting up with him."

"Yes, he is, and yes, she certainly is."

The resemblance was striking, Boris thought, recalling the images of Pipaluk and Emma as he looked at his employer. Pipaluk had the pointed ears typical of all Claus' underlings, while the original elf had rounded ears that stuck out a bit from the side of his head. The same height, the same penchant for tinkering and experimenting—Pipaluk was more like Claus than most other elves, actually. The majority favored creating the old to inventing the new. And little Emma was rather similar to Mrs. Claus, too, although shorter. More motherly, perhaps. Quieter, more unassuming, but quick to adapt and quicker to take charge if necessary. All qualities necessary in the wife of a mad scientist. Or Santa Claus.

"We'll have to invite them up for a visit," Claus mused. "They have two kids now, don't they? Bobby and Sue. Bobby wants art supplies this year, but Sue is undecided. Although they'll both change their minds several times before Christmas comes, won't they?" He let out his loud, characteristic laugh. "Kids their age change their minds all the way to Christmas Eve. Well, anyway, they can come with Lily when she signs the contracts."

And that was the sticking point. Boris had already guessed Lily lived down south because she wanted her privacy, and with meddling relatives like her cousin Crystal, he could understand that. He now knew she wouldn't come to the North Pole unless someone dragged her there kicking and screaming, and aside from being rude, that would be dangerous. She was far too powerful a snow witch to even consider it—unless one was prepared for her unchecked emotions to alter the world climate with sudden uncontrolled blizzards.

"I'm sorry, sir, but Lily made it very clear she wouldn't come here to sign the contracts," Boris said carefully. "And she hasn't given me a solid 'yes,' either."

Claus waved his hand dismissively. "George is already working on that. She'll say 'yes,' and she'll come. Now, let's see that sample she gave you."

Boris reached into his pocket and pulled out the ice bookmark, not bothering to ask how Claus knew about it. Often, it seemed like the old man knew everything. And he name-dropped people Boris didn't know regularly, so the snow warlock had no trouble glossing over the mention of somebody named 'George.'

"Here. Apparently, she made this while she was reading my last book. I added the anti-melt protection for the trip."

Claus took the thin sheet of ice, humming thoughtfully as he inspected it. An etching of Frosty the snowman smiled up from the bookmark.

"Remove the anti-melt protection, will you?"

"Of course." Boris took the bookmark back and pulled the extra coating of chill into his fingers with little effort. To a non-magician, it probably looked amazing, but it barely put a few ice crystals back into his bloodstream. Now, Lily—she could work some amazing magic. The snow globe encasing her house, for example. She'd constructed the entire thing out of conjured ice in a single night, and the magic had still been active when Boris arrived. A lesser magician would have failed miserably. And died during the attempt.

"Thank you. Now, come with me." Claus leaped to his feet and trotted away, and Boris followed, familiar with the whims of his publisher. They left the forest for a clearing where the grass grew thick and the moss became sparse, and it was here that Claus gestured for Boris to work his magic again. "Go ahead and trigger it."

"Yes, sir."

Triggering another person's magic could be tricky, but Lily's magic had a vibrant strength that made it easy to locate amidst the engraving in the ice. Boris had simply to find the lock and turn the key. Then, the magic would be free to burst forth and display its true form.

The lock was Frosty's smile.

A single ice crystal dropped from Boris' finger, and the snowman's smile widened. He waved a greeting with one stick arm and rotated his pipe to the other side of his mouth, and then he collected himself and leaped out of the bookmark and into reality. Three balls of snow, the largest at the bottom, the smallest at the top; pieces of coal curved up into a smile that almost reached his coal eyes; a button nose; the simple wooden pipe, and the all-important black silk top hat. Just like the Rankin/Bass movie.

The blizzard, however, was not like the movie.

It whipped the still, quiet air into a swirling, howling blur of white, dropping the climate-controlled dome to subzero temperatures within seconds. Being a snow warlock, it didn't bother Boris, and although he could barely make out Claus standing next to him amidst the driving snow, the glimpses he got showed the elf was calm, hands clasped behind his back.

And then it was over, and the music had changed.

A thick blanket of white covered the clearing, and before them stood an arena-sized stage, complete with runway and lights. Frosty stood on the stage now, and suddenly, a breathy baritone voice began singing words Boris didn't understand, and six more snowmen fanned out from behind Frosty, creating an effect like a stop-motion film of a single person's movements. More voices joined the chorus, and the rock beat and guitars hit hard as the seven snowmen spun and danced across the stage, taking positions Boris would never have thought possible for snowmen.

"What is this?" he asked incredulously.

"Fake Love by BTS," Claus replied, wearing a very pleased smile. "Lily has been ARMY since witch's school." He looked up at Boris and clarified, "BTS is a famous K-pop group. Really, you should have heard of them by now. ARMY is what they call their fans."

Boris nodded dumbly as the lights flashed brilliant colors across the dancing, singing snowmen. "How are the lights working without electricity?"

"Oh, some trick of ice lenses positioned just right to reflect and refract the natural light, I expect. She's a very talented girl. Doesn't have to know how things work to envision what she wants, and the magic does the rest. Better stop the show before my trees start complaining."

"Ah—oh, yes."

Isolating the lock, Frosty's smile, was significantly harder when six nearly identical snowmen surrounded his target, all of whom gyrated madly across the stage and spread across the runway to amp up the absent audience, but Boris finally managed it. The scene disappeared in a much less spectacular form than it appeared. In the blink of an eye, Frosty, the other snowmen, the stage, and the snow were gone, and the bookmark was static, a simple sheet of ice with an unassuming etching of a snowman again.

"Santa? Santa! There you are!"

Claus winced at the sound of his wife's voice. "Get me that manuscript as soon as you can," he muttered to Boris, and then he turned to face the approaching woman, making a shooing motion behind his back.

Elven women were small, but a force to be reckoned with, in Boris' experience. Unfortunately, there was nowhere for him to hide in the middle of a clearing, and he doubted the tiny, white-haired woman in a bright red dress would let him go without—

"Boris!" she cooed, her severe expression relaxing into an adoration rivalling any member of ARMY in the presence of someone from BTS. Not that Boris knew that. "You're back! How was your trip? Is the book ready yet? You're torturing me with the wait, you know. I have nothing to distract me from Santa skipping meals and getting himself into snowstorms when he's not dressed appropriately." She emphasized the last two words and cast her husband a sharp glare before returning her smile to Boris. "Why don't you come to dinner tonight? We can—"

"Now, now, Molly, he'll never finish the book if you keep pestering him," Claus intervened, making the shooing motion behind his back again.

"Thank you for the invitation, Mrs. Claus, but I'm brimming with ideas, and I need to write them down before I forget them."

It was the usual excuse Boris gave her, swapping the words here or there to keep it fresh, and it always worked.

"Of course. Go write," she said, her voice peaches and cream. Then she turned her attention to her husband, and her gray eyes hardened. "And as for you."

Boris hurried away as she berated Claus for not putting on his snowsuit before conjuring the snowstorm, reprimanded him for missing lunch again, and then moved smoothly into a heartfelt expression of worry for his health, and what would he do if he didn't have her?

Claus still hadn't gotten a word in edgewise when Boris entered the forest and the trees blocked the couple from view.

She was right. Everybody knew Claus was nothing without her. Left to his own devices, he would invent himself right into the ground, neglecting food, sleep, and all concern for his physical needs.

The North Pole was as busy as ever when Boris exited the aboveground dome into the underground city. He kept his eyes on the ice and cobblestone street so he didn't accidentally run over any elves, dodging in and out of sleds, sleighs, snowmobiles, skis, and skates until he reached the ladder on the outskirts. Then he climbed to the surface again, emerging into the Arctic freeze most of the world's population of snow witches and warlocks called home. The wind cut like a knife through the air, stinging his cheeks and whipping his long blonde hair around his face as he traversed the field of white. Thick blankets of snow covered the rolling hills he passed on either side and froze his feet in his sneakers.

It felt so good.

He pulled one hand from his jeans pocket and caught the snow in his fist, halting the wind and suspending the flakes in the air. Opening his hand with a simple twirl made a flurry of white lift from one hill, revealing a door made of ice. A flick of the wrist, and it opened to an entryway of glistening blues and whites. He let his hand fall to his side, and the snow and wind resumed its path as he headed inside.

Ceiling, walls, floor, all made of ice. Furniture made of ice. Decorations made of ice.

He sighed, and his breath fogged in the air. Silence.

Perfect.

He went to his office and sat down, setting the bookmark next to his mouse pad. Time to write. He just needed to finish the last chapter, and then it would be off to his editor. And Mrs. Claus, of course, for an advance reading.

The phone rang as he opened his laptop. He sighed again, this time in annoyance. Caller ID said it was Crystal.

He sent it to voicemail and silenced his phone.

Time passed to the music of keys clacking and mouse clicking. He'd always been a perfectionist with his writing. It had to be the right word, the right phrasing, especially with the last chapter. This tied the entire book up in a bow, and he wanted it to look like a professional gift-wrapping job, not a child learning how to tie their shoelaces. The content wasn't the issue. The style was the issue. And he had a reputation to uphold if he wanted anybody to read his next book, whatever that may be.

He usually had an idea by now.

"Done."

He sat back in his chair, exhaling his relief as his blue eyes scanned the final lines for the umpteenth time. Yes. That was exactly what he wanted. Hopefully, it was what his editor wanted, too. He zipped the file, attached it to the email he'd prepared a week ago, and pressed the send button. Then he checked his phone. Multiple missed calls and texts from Crystal, who he almost wished he'd never met at that last office party, but then, he wouldn't have met Lily if it weren't for her cousin's misguided matchmaking.

The phone lit up with another call. An unknown number.

"Hello?"

"Um...hi, Boris. This is Lily."

She sounded as awkward and shy on the phone as she'd been when he met her in person. After her explosive reaction to him cutting a door in her snow globe, of course.

"Oh, yes, hello. Sorry, I must have forgotten to program your number into my phone. Have you decided?"

"Well...I like the idea, but...I really don't want to go to the North Pole."

He could picture her chewing her lip nervously.

"You won't have to. I can email you the contract and the manuscript, and then I can come down there to pick up whatever you come up with. We can talk via phone or email, or if needed, I can come down there to collaborate in person."

"Your publisher would be okay with that?"

Well, since his publisher was Santa Claus, the business tycoon who held the unchallenged monopoly on all things North Pole, yes, he would be okay with that. Because the elf was also the only person decent enough to wield that much power and never turn into a tyrant, and if there was one thing he valued above all else, it was the happiness of others.

"Yes, although he would like to meet you."

Silence.

"Lily?"

"Not...right now. Things are...complicated."

He knew she was shy, but she was also very blunt, not mincing words when she decided to speak her mind. Her vague answer was unusual.

"Okay?" he said, the uncertainty ticking his voice up at the end to make the word sound like a question.

There was a pause before she spoke again. He wondered if someone else was with her. Pipaluk, Emma, and their kids were all rather loud, so it wasn't any of them.

"Um...well, let me try something," she said in the same hesitant tone as before.

"Lily? Are you okay?"

This time, she responded immediately. "Look at the bookmark."

"The bookmark?"

"Just...tell me if you see anything different about it."

He furrowed his brow and looked at the bookmark, unsure of what to expect. The magic had been inactive when she gave it to him, preserved in ice but no longer connected to her. What could she do with a bookmark imbued with dead magic when she was thousands of miles away from it?

Frosty the snowman was twirling a lasso above his head.

Boris blinked and looked again. The image was the same.

"What...in the name of Jack Frost?"

"Do you see it?" she asked, a note of hope in her voice.

"If I'm supposed to see Frosty the snowman with a lasso, then yes, I see it. How...?"

"It worked!"

She laughed, the same musical sound of wind chimes coated in ice he'd heard when she was playing with the elf children. It made him relax.

"I don't know how you did it, but this could make things much easier." He picked the bookmark up. The magic hummed under his touch, very much alive. "If nothing else, this proves you have a vivid imagination, which my publisher will love. Why would you think to give Frosty a lasso?"

"I don't know. It just kind of...came to me."

There was that note of shyness again.

"Well, however you came up with it, it's great. Actually, I showed this bookmark to my publisher, and I got an idea when I activated it. Instead of a free-for-all enchantment, what if we put a lock on it? So the reader can activate it when it's convenient for them?"

"I was thinking about that, too," she said, her voice lighting up with excitement. "And we can provide a key with each book for the non-magical readers."

"That's a good idea. I was wondering how to include them."

The only way to tell time in a house buried under several feet of snow was by checking a clock, which Boris hadn't done since he returned from his meeting with Claus, and he didn't look now, either. In his bachelor life as a celebrated author, his time was his own, and he rarely bothered sticking to a schedule. So the length of his conversation with Lily didn't matter. After they'd gotten past the initial difficulties of her magically and forcibly ejecting him from her yard, and after Pipaluk's potion had revived her from the unconscious state she'd ended up in after overuse of her magic, they'd gotten along fairly well, and now, they really seemed to be hitting it off.

Not in the way Crystal wanted, though.

It wasn't that Lily was unattractive. She was pretty, with a slender figure, short black hair, and icy blue eyes Boris' friend Xavier would die for, but she was a bit young for him. And her temper wasn't exactly a selling point. His nose still throbbed a little from the break she'd given him when she'd smashed a solid block of ice into his face. However, now that he had several thousand miles between them to prevent that from happening again, he could acknowledge she was interesting and easier to talk to than her cousin.

They ended the call, and he dismissed the mounting number of missed calls and texts from Crystal.

And then it came to him. His next book. A snow witch making her way in a non-magical society, navigating normalcy and warm weather. With a non-magical love interest for a change. His non-magical readers had been asking for representation in his stories, so this would make them happy and give him the opportunity to try something new. He'd have to do a lot of research, though, which meant he'd have to brave Lily's presence again. But he'd rather face her than Crystal.

His readers would love it. Now, to get Mrs. Claus' approval.

*****

Date of creation: 01/15/2025

Word count: 3,499

Author's note: The prompt was to write a high Sci-fantasy (blend of high fantasy and science fiction) story with a maximum of 3,500 words using an image, the song Salt by Ava Max, and a lasso.

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