Nico's Story: A Legacy in Motion
Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4 Chapter 5 A Gift Within Circuits & Curiosity The Young Engineer The Midnight Workshop The Legacy Path
The Young Engineer
Santa’s Village - February, 1965
For nearly two years, Nico Kringle’s mind had been full of angles and arches, rafters and rooms. It began with a simple thought—We need more space—but like most of Nico’s ideas, that thought had grown legs, then wings, then sprouted into a full-blown blueprint of dreams.
Ever since baby Clara arrived, the cozy upstairs room at the Elf Inn had grown tighter by the week. Clara’s cradle had been tucked into the sitting nook at first, but it quickly became apparent that the Kringle family was outgrowing their space. Even Nico’s parents, Chris and Merry Lou, laughed about it. “We never meant to raise a family out of a guest room,” Chris had chuckled once, balancing a sleepy Clara on one arm while dodging a stack of Nico’s model sleigh parts.
Now twenty-one years old, Nico stood tall—nearly as tall as his father—and carried himself with a quiet intensity that never really left him. His mind, forever in motion, bounced between sleigh mechanisms, toy designs, and something entirely new: home architecture. It wasn’t just blueprints and framing he was sketching. It was dreams made tangible.
He had started with modest ideas—just a small house on the edge of the Village green, close enough for his father to walk to the Toyshop in winter. But every month brought new inspiration. A breakfast alcove tucked under a sunlit dormer. A wide hearth for winter storytelling. An arched porch flanked by icicle lanterns. The design grew each time he sat down with pencil in hand, and by early 1965, his sketches sprawled across three full notebooks.
Still, he hesitated to show anyone the final version. It wasn’t just a house anymore. It was a gift. A place worthy of the Kringle name.
Nico finally unrolled the plans in early February, beneath the golden glow of lamplight in the back room of the Toyshop. His father had just finished reviewing a new sleigh design when Nico cleared his throat.
“I’ve been working on something,” he said, and carefully laid out the drawings. Page after page. Floorplans, elevations, roof pitches, chimney drafts. Chris Kringle leaned in, eyes widening.
“This... this is a house,” Chris said slowly.
“It’s our house,” Nico replied. “I started sketching it not long after Clara was born. At first it was just... ideas. But it’s grown. I think we’re ready for this, Dad. I think the Village is ready too.”
Chris took his time with the pages, nodding, tracing a finger over the wraparound porch and the central hearth. “You’ve been planning this all along?”
“For two years. I redrew the foundation three times and the chimney twice.” Nico grinned. “I finally gave up on keeping it small.”
Chris let out a low whistle. “Your mother’s going to cry when she sees this.”
And she did. Merry Lou sat at the dining table that evening, wiping her eyes as she stared at the plans. “You thought of everything,” she murmured. “A room for Clara, a workroom for you, even... is that a garden window in the kitchen?”
Nico nodded. “You said once that you missed herbs from the greenhouse back home. I figured this way, you could have fresh mint and lavender even in December.”
Merry Lou touched the edge of the paper like it was something sacred.
Within a day, word spread through Santa’s Village. Nico Kringle was building a house. Not just any house—a Kringle house. Volunteers began appearing at the Toyshop and the Inn. Rudy Winters arrived with his toolbelt before breakfast the next morning. “I hear there’s a roof to raise.”
Breezy Nell offered up a patch of land just beyond the peppermint grove. “South-facing. It’ll catch the most winter sun,” she declared. Kathy Clockwright brought a wheelbarrow filled with salvaged hardware. “Use what you can. Shoe Elves waste nothing.”
By the end of the week, the foundation was dug, the footers laid, and the first floor joists were taking shape. Elves of every stripe arrived in shifts—some to swing hammers, others to cut lumber, and a few just to bring cocoa and cheer. It became clear this wasn’t just a house project. It was a Village effort, a gift to the Kringle family from the community they helped shape.
And at the heart of it all stood Nico, sleeves rolled up, sawdust in his hair, sketchbook never far from reach.
The house rose faster than anyone expected.
Snow fell softly as the roof trusses went up, and elves worked through short winter days with cheerful determination. A team of Fairies flitted in one afternoon, adding delicate frost patterns to the windows and blessing the threshold with a pinch of blue dust “for harmony.” Crumbelle Frosting sent over cinnamon buns still warm from her bakery, while Penny Tootle carved the banister rails with vines and stars.
Nico, ever watchful, adjusted the pitch of the entryway just slightly to better channel runoff from spring thaws. He tweaked the framing around the windows to allow for deeper sills—“Good for Clara’s books someday,” he explained. No detail escaped him, and no shortcut was tolerated. The house may have been a gift, but it was also his craft.
By mid-March, the walls were painted in warm tones of cranberry and cream. Icicle-shaped sconces glimmered on either side of the fireplace, and handwoven curtains had been stitched by half the True Elves on Candy Cane Lane. The front door bore a brass holly-leaf handle and a carving above it: Kringle Hearth, Est. 1965.
On a clear morning, with sunlight melting snowdrifts into glittering streams, the house was declared finished.
The Village gathered for the dedication. Mayor Winters gave a short, heartfelt speech, ending with: “This house isn’t just lumber and love—it’s a mark of our faith in the Kringle family, and the promise of many warm winters to come.”
Then came the quiet moment.
Chris and Merry Lou Kringle stood at the threshold with Clara in their arms, Nico beside them. Chris turned the handle first, stepping into the wide, pine-scented air of their new home. Merry Lou followed, pressing her cheek against Nico’s shoulder as she passed. “It’s perfect,” she whispered.
Inside, sunlight spilled across the polished floors, casting warm golden hues across the hearthstones. The house smelled of pine, cinnamon, and fresh dreams.
Nico lingered for a moment before entering, hand resting on the doorframe he’d sanded himself. He didn’t need applause. The creak of the hinges, the soft giggle from Clara’s new nursery, and the look on his parents’ faces told him everything.
He had built more than a house. He had built a future.
As evening settled over Kringle Hearth, Nico found himself awake long after the others had gone to bed. He sat in the window alcove of his new room, sketchbook in his lap, firelight dancing on the pages.
His hand moved almost without thought—circles, axles, belts. A new design was forming, something with gears that could adjust sleigh altitude in real time. But beneath that, deeper still, was another idea. Not a house this time, and not a toy.
A place.
A secret place. A workshop of his own.
He looked out across the dark Village, where lamplight glowed like stars on snow-covered roofs, and his eyes settled on the old barn behind the Toyshop. Empty. Forgotten. But full of potential.
Nico smiled.
There was still work to be done.