Silent Fred beamed at her and then produced a plastic container full of pale pink, squishy marshmallows. He popped one into each mug.

Finally, he lifted his top hat again, gave another little bow and walked back around to the front of the sleigh. He waved his big white feather high in the air and brought it down softly on the backs of the ShobGobbles. The sleigh slid gently through the snow with a jingle of bells.

‘Oh!’ Sean’s head fell back against the seat. His eyes were glazed and dreamy.

‘What’s the matter?’ asked Nicola.

Sean said, ‘I just had some hot chocolate. Taste it. It’s . . . it’s just . . . taste it!’

Nicola took a sip. It was like nothing she’d ever tasted in her life. It was as if all the hot chocolates she’d ever had before had only been pretending to be hot chocolate. This was so much richer and creamier, but it was more than that – it was an entirely different sensation of drinking. Nicola imagined her tastebuds throwing streamers in the air and dancing in the streets.

She looked around and saw similar expressions of dazed bliss on everyone’s faces – even Greta’s.

Shimlara smacked her lips. ‘If you think this is good, wait till you taste your first bar of ShobbleChoc!’

Soft flakes of snow began to fall. Nicola cradled her mug of hot chocolate in her hands, snug and warm under the white rug. She looked around at a strange world awash with the colours of the rainbows and thought about her great-grandmother. Grammy said she had some memories from the year 1930 that were as clear as yesterday. Nicola thought: I’ll remember this when I’m one hundred years old.

8

‘Here come some people!’ said Tyler.

They’d been travelling in the sleigh for about twenty minutes without seeing a single thing other than large, flat, snow-covered fields.

Now, in the distance, they could see a crowd of people walking towards them. As the people saw the sleigh ahead they obligingly stepped off the track to let them pass. Nicola could hear their excited shouts as they watched the sleigh approach.

The first thing Nicola noticed about the people of Shobble was that they were extremely dirty.

Some of them were splattered with a pink gooey substance that clung to their clothes and faces. They were wearing hard hats and carrying tools. Others were drenched in a shiny, dark brown liquid, so only the whites of their eyes and their teeth were visible.

‘They must be the marshmallow miners and chocolate drillers on their way home from work,’ said Shimlara.