There once was a little Narwhal called Nara who spent its days hanging out with seals at the ice floes of the Arctic Circle, not far from the North Pole. Nara loved to splash and play with his friends but there was one problem – Nara’s toothed tusk. It constantly got in the way. At first, Nara stood out for being the ‘unicorn’ of the North Pole. His seal friends marvelled at its strange beauty but the novelty soon wore off.

Everytime Nara played catch with the seals, his spiralled accoutrement would impale the ice, sending his pinniped friends head-first into the icy water below. Everytime he played football with them, he’d accidentally pierce the inflatable ball. Everytime he went with them to chomp on some cod at the ice floe, he had to wait until they had their turn before attempting to feed because of the sword that he bore on his head – lest his friends end up sliced in half on his dinner plate. He loved his friends but more often than not he found they were crossing swords because of the danger it posed.

‘I’d ask a shark to come and bite that tooth off your head if I were you,’ suggested Celia Seal.

‘If you didn’t have that ridiculous barb we would actually be able to play with you’, bemoaned her brother, Cecil Seal.

‘I don’t think you should play Hide and Seek anymore. That pole is a dead giveaway!’ remarked Selena the Harp Seal.

The older Nara got, the bigger the tusk grew and the less his friends included him in their games. Nara felt sad. There weren’t any other Narwhal families living near the North Pole. His mammy and daddy had travelled from very far away – the Baffin Bay-Davis Strait, in fact, and that meant that they were one-of-a-kind around these parts. All Nara wanted was to fit-in and feel part of the North Pole ice-floe community.

One morning, Nara spotted Santa Claus down by the North Pole jetty.

‘Hello Santa,’ Nara greeted, hoping to have a quiet word.

‘Ho Ho Ho Nara,’ replied the jolly man in red.

‘Santa if you could be so kind would you grant me one Christmas wish.’

‘Of course, my young Narwhal friend.’

‘I know that I’m a whale and should be proud to be a very unique one at that but Santa, what I’d really like best of all is to no longer be a whale but a seal.’

Santa frowned. ‘Why would you want to be that?’

Santa listened patiently as Nara explained all the trouble the toothed tusk caused him.

‘You are very special to me Nara, being the only young Narwhal in the North Pole,’ he said, winking at his sea-creature friend before plodding his way back through the snow to the toy factory.

Christmas morning came and it had been extremely cold all over the Arctic Circle. So cold in fact that everything froze – including a sheer glassy pane that covered the sea. Even the usual spots of broken ice where Nara and his family would pop up were icing over, thick and hard.

This wasn’t necessarily a problem for Nara and her parents as they could breathe underwater for long durations, replenishing their oxygen levels when cracks appeared in the ice, but it was a big threat to seals, who could only stay underwater for a half-hour at a time.

Nara hoped Celia, Cecil and Selena were safe and sound on an ice floe, enjoying the treats that Santa left out for them – Chocolate Shrimp Yummy!

But then just as Nara was feeling his head to check if there was still a horn jutting from it, her disappointment soon gave way to panic. In the corner of his eye, he spotted his friends, desperately trying to break the ice above their furry heads.

‘What happened?’ Nara shouts.

‘We dived in for a Christmas dip but we must have taken too long as it has frozen over,’ explained Celia.

‘We tried going to our other usual spots to catch some air but they too are completely covered,’ added Cecil.

‘What are we going to do?’ cried Selena.

Nara could see they were in the horns of a dilemma. ‘How long have you been down here?’

‘Too long Nara!’ replied Celia, panic rising in her voice.

‘We dove further than we usually do,’ Cecil explained.

‘We are never going to make it back home!’ whaled Selena.

 

Nara knew there was only one thing to be done. He would have to break the ice by crook or by hook. Nara, dived deep into the water, much to the dismay of his friends, but quickly returned, with great speed and hurtled towards the ice above their heads.

Crash!

Nara cracked the ice, but not enough to free his friends.

‘Hurry Nara!’

He knew his friends were under the water far longer than they ought to be. It was really important that he break the ice. He dived deep again, exhausting himself in the process, before taking a bigger stab at the frozen sheet above their heads. This time, his toothed tusk protruded through the frozen water, sending sunlight flooding in.

‘Hurrah!

The seals splashed with great excitement as they pulled themselves up onto the ice floe.

‘It’s a miracle!’

‘A festive miracle’

‘Nara you did it!  You and your wonderful spiralled sword.’

Santa and the reindeer, having just returned from their overnight adventure all over the world, ran to see what all the hubbub was about.

‘Nara saved our lives’

‘Nara’s giant tooth saved our lives!’

Santa winked at Nara. ‘Merry Christmas Nara,’ he greeted. ‘You are a very special member of the North Pole community and we love you just the way you are!’

The friends ate lots of festive halibut, threw snowballs and sang sea shanties to their hearts content. Nara realised that being different wasn’t so bad after all!

Chele Crawley