“Seriously?” Nate shouted.

He sat straight up and set his cocoa mug on the coffee table in front of us. I stared in horror at Joy, who’d come to deliver the news. Around us in the lounge, elves stopped their foosball matches and paused their video games to look over.

Joy let out a huge sigh, the kind that hysterical people used to calm themselves down, and folded her arms tight across her chest.

“Whole internal sensor system’s busted,” she said. “Santa’s having to have parts flown in and he’s going to have to go into Frost’s territory to get them, and he’s not even sure the goblins will be able to enchant the pieces in time.”

I didn’t know anything about the mechanics of cars or airplanes, but the internal workings of Santa’s sleigh seemed more complicated than any vehicle that existed in the Humdrum world, and they were about to strand me in the North Pole for who knew how long.

My conundrum wasn’t why the elves were panicking all around me, though. Joy had uttered what seemed like showstopping words around here: “We might have to cancel Christmas.” It sounded like the plot of a trite holiday movie back in my world, but here, the people I’d gotten to know over the past weeks looked like they were about to punch walls or burst into tears.

“We’ve worked for ages on the robot monkeys!” someone wailed from across the room. Her friend patted her on the back but looked like she was going to be sick.

Even Felix, standing behind Joy, looked like he’d had better days.

“We’re not giving up hope yet,” he announced to the room. “The goblins are expediting the order and the sleigh crew is working around the clock trying to find another solution. We need to keep working hard and giving Santa our best.”

One elf responded with halfhearted “Yeah,” but it wasn’t enough to lift the weight from the room. Off in one corner, Lucy sat in an armchair with her legs drawn up under her. She held her head in her hands and seemed to be taking deep breaths. I could only imagine how she felt after putting together thousands upon thousands of outfits for Christmas morning.

Felix stuck his hands in his pockets and rocked back and forth on his heels. I’d spent the day with him, learning how to take care of the reindeer, and he’d been upbeat and chatty. Now, I got the impression he was just trying to hold it together for everyone else.

I stood up. “I’ll grab you guys some cocoa.”

Joy nodded gratefully and sank into the other sofa in front of the fireplace. She put her feet up on its coffee table, leaned back into the thick upholstery, and closed her eyes as if she could shut out the whole of reality.

Felix followed me to the cocoa table. It took up almost a whole wall and held three large silver dispensers—Milk, Dark, White—and silver-lidded glass jars full of marshmallows, crushed candy canes, and coconut. A dizzying array of syrup dispensers and spice shakers sat in front of the jars.

“Joy likes whipped cream and cinnamon,” Felix said, while he put together his own sugar coma of marshmallow and chocolate syrup.

I brought her drink back to the table, and she accepted it with a grateful sigh.

“I can’t believe this is happening,” she said.

Nate tapped his knuckles on the table in an antsy rhythm. “It’s not actually going to come to all that,” he said, sounding too confident for his confidence to be real. “Santa will sort it out. He always does.”

“Not when Jack’s in the picture.” Joy glanced at me. “The power went down again yesterday.”

“What does that have to do with anything?” Nate said.

No one answered. Even I knew it wasn’t a good sign.

“Why does Santa have to go to Jack’s territory?” I said.

“Santa’s the only one who can just walk through the dome,” Joy said. “Everyone else needs the sleigh, and… well.”

“The goblins don’t come this far north,” Felix said. “They’re going to create and enchant the parts we need, and then some faeries are going to actually deliver the stuff up here. It’s anyone’s guess what Frost will do to stop them getting here in one piece.”

He sipped his cocoa. The whipped cream left a white mustache on his upper lip.

“Frost wouldn’t dare attack them,” Nate said. “The Faerie Queen wouldn’t take kindly to it.”

“Like Frost cares what the Faerie Queen thinks,” Joy muttered. “He’s on too much of a power trip to listen to anything she has to say. I just hope they get through all right, and that Santa is able to meet them and get back safely.”

She clutched her mug. Everyone else went silent at her words.

Santa was everything around here, and the thought of him being in danger seemed to quiet even Nate.

I curled my legs up under me. “When’s the stuff supposed to get here?”

“Week before Christmas,” Felix said. “

Joy closed her eyes and let out a deep breath.

“That’s cutting it too close,” Nate said, shaking his head.

A meow sounded at our feet. I looked down to see Joy’s cat, Butterscotch, rubbing his head on the sofa. He and a few other pets had free reign of this wing of the live-in elves’ quarters. No one seemed to mind the cats and dogs wandering around, or the three rats that ran around the wing like they owned it. Joy patted her lap and Butterscotch jumped up, turned a circle, and then plopped down and started purring.

I reached over and scratched between his ears. He closed his eyes and blissed out.

“What if something happens and they can’t get the parts?” I said. “You really just cancel Christmas?”

“Not much else we can do,” Nate said.

I opened my mouth to say And what about me?, then closed it again. The stricken looks on the faces around me made it clear: This wasn’t about me. This was a crisis that affected all of us, and I wasn’t the most upset person in this room right now—not by a long shot.

Joy was red-faced and looked like she was about to burst into tears. I handed her a napkin, just in case.

It didn’t look good. I could tell from Felix’s forced smile and the way Nate’s knee kept jumping that they were doing their best to keep a lid on their emotions—and if this was what it looked like to keep a lid on things, I could only imagine what they were going through on the inside.

I was going to be stuck here, I realized. Maybe just for a few more weeks until the sleigh was really and truly fixed, but maybe for longer. If the sleigh wasn’t ready by Christmas, I wouldn’t be important enough to keep the mechanics working on it night and day. Who knew how long I’d be stuck here?

“I think I might take you up on that houseplant offer,” I said to Joy.

She’d offered me cuttings of one of her philodendrons. Since I’d killed every plant I’d ever tried to grow, including a cactus an old roommate had assured me was immortal, I’d declined. Now it sounded like I was going to be here for a while, though, and I needed something to keep my rooms from feeling like a themed hotel suite.

She sniffed and nodded.

I looked around the room. Every elf in the place seemed like they were on the verge of some kind of nervous collapse. The North Pole was under more pressure than I’d realized, and somehow, through a freak accident, I’d ended up in the middle of it.

“It’s going to be okay,” I said, with all the conviction of someone who had no idea what she was talking about. “We have nothing to worry about.”