Clip of Holly getting answer in The Cloud leads to abuse (8)
I believe the answer is:
mistreat
'abuse' is the definition.
('mistreat' can be a synonym of 'abuse')
'clip of holly getting answer in the cloud' is the wordplay.
'clip of holly' becomes 't' (I can't explain this - if you can you should believe this answer much more).
'getting' becomes 're' (I've seen this in other clues).
'answer' becomes 'a' (abbreviation eg in Q and A).
'in the' means one lot of letters goes inside another.
'cloud' becomes 'mist' (mist is a kind of cloud).
't'+'re'+'a'='trea'
'trea' going into 'mist' is 'MISTREAT'.
'leads to' is the link.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for mistreat that I've seen before include "Behave badly towards" , "Abuse" , "Deal unfairly with" , "Handle badly" , "Ill-use" .)