Elf Orientation
Santa’s Village: Late September, 2025
Bernard hadn’t expected life in Santa’s Village to be confusing, but it was. Not in the way cities were confusing, with noise and signs and strangers shouting in markets—but in a quiet, cozy, unspoken way. The kind of confusion that came when everyone else already knew the steps to a dance and no one had written them down.
Take breakfast, for instance.
On his second morning, Bernard sat at a long wooden table in the Hearth Hall with a plate of thick-sliced gingerbread and a small bowl of candied walnuts. He had just taken a bite—chewy, warm, and full of spice—when the elf across from him leaned in with wide eyes.
“You forgot your cocoa,” the elf whispered in mock horror. He was short and round with a sprig of mistletoe tucked into his hat and a beard that curled like frosting.
Bernard paused mid-chew. “Should I not eat this first?”
“Gingerbread goes with cocoa. It’s one of the Three Cozy Pairings,” the elf replied, gesturing broadly. “Gingerbread and cocoa. Snowberries and shortbread. Bellcake and fir-milk. Everyone knows that.”
“Not me,” Bernard muttered, standing sheepishly.
The older elf gave him a reassuring nod and motioned toward the cocoa station along the far wall. “Left ladle’s for cinnamon. Right’s for plain. Middle is marshmallow—it’s for birthdays only.”
Bernard returned with cinnamon cocoa and a mental note: Ask about the other Pairings.
The next few days followed a similar pattern. Bernard was eager to help—folding linens, stacking sleigh bells, fetching ribbon—but more often than not, he did things the human way. He folded blankets into squares, not triangles. He sorted sleigh bells by size, not pitch. He greeted people with a polite nod rather than a pine-sprig wave.
And still, the elves around him didn’t seem annoyed. Bemused, maybe. Delighted, even. Every mistake became a teaching moment.
At one point, he helped line up painted blocks in the toy finishing hall. An elder elf named Grindle Pepperson tapped his shoulder gently.
“Colors go in Wish Order,” Grindle said. “Red, green, gold, blue.”
“What’s Wish Order?” Bernard asked.
“The order kids write colors when they make their very first holiday list,” Grindle said with a wink. “Don’t worry—you’ll pick it up.”
He did.
By the second week, Bernard had filled half a notebook with things most elves had learned before their fifth birthday. Some entries included:
- “Tinsel NEVER gets folded.”
- “Reindeer oats are not for porridge.”
- “Clockwise candy canes = peppermint. Counterclockwise = spearmint.”
- “Don’t touch the blue fairy dust. Ever.”
He listened closely, practiced carefully, and accepted his mistakes with a kind of quiet humility. Despite being taller than most adult elves—even with his shoulders slouched—he moved gently among them, trying not to knock into low beams or hanging lanterns.
One afternoon, while restocking the paper curlers in the wrapping room, a small Shoe Elf named Elvira Silktouch gave him a soft nod and handed him a folded scarf.
It was deep green, thick and soft, woven with a subtle fir-tree pattern.
“What’s this for?” Bernard asked.
“It means you belong,” she said. “You’re not a guest anymore.”
Bernard blinked. “Oh.”
He wrapped it around his neck, unsure of the words to say. Elvira just smiled.
A few days later, as the first real snow of the season blanketed the rooftops in glimmering white, Bernard was moving crates outside the marshmallow cellar when Rudy Winters approached. Rudy—head of Reindeer Operations—had become something of a mentor figure. He was sprightly, sun-weathered, and always carried a smell of hay and peppermint.
“Bernard,” Rudy called, brushing snow off his sleeves. “You’ve adapted fast.”
“Trying,” Bernard said modestly. “Still not sure if I’m folding snow socks right.”
Rudy chuckled. “Nobody folds those right. Listen—we’ve been thinking. Elf Orientation starts next week. Every young elf goes through it. Since you’re still figuring things out, seems like a good fit.”
Bernard hesitated. “Isn’t that for kids?”
“Mostly,” Rudy admitted. “But it’s also for elves new to Village life. And besides—you’ve got something to offer.”
“I do?”
Rudy nodded. “You grew up in Dromstad, right? You know things most of us don’t. Wood-stove repair. Chimney sweeping. Fire-starting without fairy dust. We’d like you to teach a little workshop. Just a small one. Call it… I dunno, ‘Human Know-How.’”
Bernard thought for a moment. His mind wandered back to the frostbit mornings in Dromstad—hauling kindling, sealing windows with beeswax, cleaning stove pipes with bundled birch.
“You think elves would come to something like that?” he asked.
“Sure,” Rudy said. “Curiosity’s one of our better traits.”
Two days later, Bernard stood outside Cedar House, one of the main Orientation buildings just beyond the Sleigh Yard. A carved wooden sign hung above the door, its letters neat and worn: ELF ORIENTATION – CEDAR HOUSE
The path was lined with tiny lanterns and fresh snow, and the building itself smelled of cedarwood, cinnamon, and ink. Inside, Bernard could hear the rustling of satchels, soft voices, the clatter of chair legs.
Most of the other students were much younger. Some looked barely ten. A few stared at him when he entered—not out of rudeness, but wonder. Tall, scarfed, clearly not a typical elf.
Bernard found a spot near the window and sat down, adjusting his scarf. The instructor—a willowy elf named Junie Brookwhistle—welcomed everyone with a lilting voice and passed out lesson books, each with a different forest animal on the cover.
Bernard’s had a fox.
The lessons came quickly. Morning sessions taught giftcraft and glitter safety; afternoons covered kindness exercises and seasonal etiquette. They learned how to mend ribbon with pine resin, how to read a child’s wish list by the slant of the handwriting, and how to respectfully decline second helpings of tinsel pie.
Bernard listened, learned, and took careful notes.
And when his own workshop was finally announced—“Warmth & Woodsmoke: Human Habits for Elves”—he had more attendees than he expected. Even Junie stopped by for part of it.
His lesson included:
- How to split kindling without splinters.
- The three best woods for clean-burning fires.
- The secret to fitting down tight chimneys (spoiler: soot is inevitable).
- How to tie a chimney-sweep knot with mittened hands.
The young elves sat cross-legged on the floor, wide-eyed and amazed. One asked, “Why would anyone sweep a chimney themselves?”
Bernard grinned. “Because if you don’t, the chimney sweeps you.”
They laughed.
By the third week, Bernard no longer felt like an outsider. He was still different—taller, broader, less sure of some things—but that difference had stopped feeling like a flaw. It felt… useful. Welcome.
On the last night of the first term, as snow gently tapped against the windows of Cedar House and the room buzzed with elves weaving their own scarf tassels, Bernard opened his notebook.
On the first page, he had once written:
“How to Begin.”
Now, just beneath it, he added:
“By Listening. By Learning. By Lighting the Hearth Yourself.”
And somewhere beyond the lanterns and candlelight, the bells of Santa’s Village rang the soft, clear notes of a beginning well underway.