The castle living room was dead quiet, save perhaps for the faint sound of baited breath. Finally, there was a rumble like a miniature earthquake, followed by the unmistakable sight of a very large man squeezing through a very small fireplace. It brought to mind the uncanny image of a tube of toothpaste.

The man set down his massive sack, brushed some soot off his red suit, and then skimmed his surroundings. The instant his eyes caught a tray of milk and krumkake, he licked his lips and barreled forward-

"Hi there!"

-only to be stopped by a pair of red pigtails popping into view.

"Whoa-ho-ho!" Santa nearly tripped over his own stubby gelatin legs, but he managed to catch himself before he could fall on his mountain of a rear end. This was fortunate because if he had, the poor snowman standing behind him would've been crushed flat.

"There he is again!" Olaf pointed a twig-arm at the intruder as he waddled over to Anna's side. "See, I told you I wasn't dreaming! Is it normal for old fat guys to break into our castle?" He leaned in, then said in an undertone, "Want me to call the guards?"

Anna giggled. "It's okay, Olaf. Something tells me we can trust him..."

"Okay..." Olaf turned back to Santa, his coal-eyes narrowing. "You'd just better not take any of those priceless jewels we keep hidden behind the painting of the-"

"Olaf!" Anna gave him a nudge.

"What?"

"Little Princess Anna?" For once, Santa was the one skeptical of someone's existence. "You can see me?" He adjusted his spectacles. "I thought you stopped believing years ago."

"Yeah, well..." Anna nodded to the snowman. "...Olaf here swears up and down he saw you last year, and, c'mon, if talking snowmen exist, it's not that big a logical leap."

"True, true." Santa chuckled to himself, then reached into his sack. "Well, you've certainly grown since the last time I saw you. Truth be told, I don't get to see too many beautiful young ladies in this line of work. Err, don't tell Mrs. Claus I said that..." He returned from the sack with a present in hand, which he gently placed in her hands. "Merry Christmas, Anna."

"You, too, big guy." Anna gratefully accepted the package. But just as Santa was starting to turn away, she suddenly said, "Santa, wait!"

He turned back around – an action that took the better part of a minute considering how much there was to turn. "Yes?" He caught sight of Anna's face. "Is something the matter?"

"To be honest, I..." Anna bowed her head. "...I only stayed up to see you because something was bugging me." She took a breath, then said, "If you're supposed to be this saint who gives presents to all the little kids in the world, well, I mean, I don't know how your magic works, exactly, but if you can travel the world in one night and make reindeer fly and eat a billion cookies without throwing up, you must have really good control of your powers, right?"

Santa nodded.

"So then once Elsa got locked away, why didn't you wake her up on Christmas Eve and tell her the key to controlling her magic was just love?" Anna's brow creased. "Wouldn't that have been a way better present than some plain old toys?"

For a moment, the castle was silent again. Then Santa gave a sad smile. "I wanted to do exactly that, Your Highness, but I'm afraid I couldn't. That was the year she stopped believing in me."

Anna's face fell. "Oh. Sorry. I, uh, didn't mean to accuse you..."

"It's quite alright." And with that, Santa returned to that krumkake. "Tell your sister I'm glad everything worked out in the end."

Santa ate, drank, filled the stockings, laid the presents under the tree, and all that jazz, but it seemed to pass by as a blur to Anna. She wasn't sure if it was because Santa's Christmas magic was warping the fabric of spacetime or because she was feeling kinda down now. Either way, Santa finished his work, then he hugged both Anna and Olaf goodbye, and Olaf called out, "Bye! Thanks for not stealing anything!" right as Santa vanished back up the chimney.

Anna set to work unwrapping her present, but she did so halfheartedly. "Man, I wasn't expecting a visit with Santa Claus to leave me so... depress- Ooh, are these those shoes I wanted?"

The sunlight of Christmas morning poured through the wide-open palace windows, lighting the particularly skeptical face of the queen.

"I'm telling you, he was real!" said Anna.

"Uh huh." Elsa folded her arms. "And how much eggnog did you and Olaf have last night, again?"

"Uh... I don't see what that has to do with anything." As Anna spoke, both she and Olaf stealthily hid the empty bottle and glasses behind their backs.