The Luniferous Gazette #63: The Return of Rose Red

Beauty after Blight and Bane

 My red roses came back! 

This may not seem like headline fodder except that I live in a far northern U.S. state and made the audacious mistake of planting seven rosebushes in my front yard. Even though they are technically zoned for my area, they struggle with the icy cold in winter and fungal blight and bugs in the summer. I’ve already had to replace one casualty of the clime!

I’m no master gardener, but I do my best to mulch, prune, water, and provide fresh garden soil and Miracle-Gro pellets. Oh, and wrap a six foot chicken wire fence around my roses every winter to protect them from ravenous bunny attacks. 

*Don’t trust the cute little fluffer! These beasties are merciless munchers . . . .

My husband resigns himself to helping me drive metal stakes into the ground each fall only to pull them out again in the spring. Neither of us knew how hard it would be to keep seven prickmedainty rosebushes alive. I should’ve gone for something low-maintenance like a rock garden, or extra hardy like an evergreen bush. Alas, hindsight is only useful for time travelers.

But my roses bloom for me, they always blossom in unkempt loveliness . . . until last summer, when my red rosebush refused to bud even once. I was mystified as this had never happened to me before. The bush’s leaves all seemed glossy and healthy, so what on earth should I have done differently?

Life keeps the answers pocketed ever so deep sometimes. This year, June rolled around and the usual profusion of pink, yellow, amber and cream roses greeted me with their live bouquets. Again, my red rose declined to bud—

But I didn’t give up! I watered, pruned, and provided fresh soil and Miracle-Gro pellets, just as in years before. And in August, at last, my Rose Red darling returned . . . .

She’s not what she once was—the winter was harsh, and I had to prune a large section back that withered and splintered over the cold months. 

But now my Rose Red once again offers her beauty to the sky in a scarlet swirl of petals, and I am grateful for her bold crimson.

I did do one thing differently this year . . . I learned the power of preventative action! I doused my seven roses in a fungal spray early in May before the first spot of blight had a chance to root in the green. I repeat the spray every few weeks. And whenever I find a few sneaky specks among my roses, I pick the diseased leaves relentlessly and rake the spoiled detritus out.

For just one speck of rot can run rampant and blight everything, and a tiny spore become a grand bane as it spreads unchecked among your garden, leaving you feeling cursed by the surety of doom because you missed the early warning signs—

Behold the sorry state of most of my rose garden by September 2025! 

Though my faults as a gardener are many, I will never let my roses suffer again because I did not guard their spring. 

Since we are on the subject of roses, I thought I’d share a poem— 

 Sub Rosa: Tokens of Secrecy

Do you know the secret
of five leaves?

I’ll share it with you free
as sun’s slant—

How to coax new rose
from a stem

Whose gaudy crown has already
bloomed and withered.

Let your scissors slide
over thorn

To the first petiole bearing
five leaflets

Gently shear just above it.

None of these coronets will
ever be yours

Bribes for the Grecian God
of Silence,

But not even Harpocrates can
claim confidences that lie

Under the rose—

Deepest mysteries seethe at the root
of every quick and end thing,

Yet too often our pupils seek only
easy blaze of flagrant whorls,

Forgetting humble germination.

Sometimes I count the fine
serration of rose leaves,

Each the shadow of an eye
against my palm,

Wondering if they can tell me
if my efflorescing ink

Will ever petal a single page,
seed bud linear diadem—

But some secrets will
never unfurl

Unless I dare to spell them out
from cane to corolla.

*As the last Wednesday in August, it’s time to add to my monthly Artweaver herd. Behold my wee Dandystallion, cousin to the dandelion: 

Source:

“Sub Rosa: Tokens of Secrecy.” (April 2014). Fresh Ink, 45, 28.

 ~*~  

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The Luniferous Gazette #62: Essential Cutlery of My Life

These Are a Few of My Favorite Spoons

I waxed poetic about the impact of a single blue glass plate on my life a few issues back, so I thought I would continue with the tableware theme and talk about the essential cutlery of my life. Specifically, spoons.

If you have better things to do with your time than waste precious Earth seconds on my core flatware memories, that’s fair.

Everyone else? I utilized my free will to take a fancy photo op of said spoons. Behold the Princess Spoon!

From my earliest childhood memory, I always reserved one favorite teaspoon just for my breakfast Cheerios. It was curiously light, more the silver suggestion of a spoon than the actual thing. The nearly paper-thin metal was emblazoned with delicate floral vines and a single cursive “P,” probably for our family’s last name. (*Or "Princess," obviously!)

All the other spoons in the drawer were boring in comparison to this fairy flatware! I’m pretty certain that my parents received the spoon as part of an advertisement for a silverware set in the 80’s or 90’s. The back is stamped “Stainless Steel Japan SAMPLE.”

When I went to college, of course I packed my favorite spoon. Dorm Cheerios are so much more scrumptious with a Princess Spoon, after all. Maybe it wasn’t a fairy wand that could grant me wishes or straight A grades, but each crunch somehow tasted more glamorous with my petite fancy “P” spoon!

I must make a dark confession, though. My Princess Spoon was part of a pair—

But one day, I accidentally dropped the ill-fated twin down the disposal and nicked the slender metal in multiple places!

 

I could never bring myself to get rid of the Marred Princess Spoon as it was still perfectly functional, but I still feel a smidge of guilt for my errant toss every time I pull it out of the silverware drawer.

Curiously, the twin spoons are stamped from different countries of origin, with the Marred Princess labeled “SAMPLE” and “Customcraft® Stainless Steel Korea.”

When I was thirty-three, I left my American birth religion (the one with the Golden Plates) and became enamored by the temptations of French press coffee. My Princess Spoon was suddenly elevated from cereal scooping to prime stirrer of my morning coffee. Oh, what a scandalous shift to caffeinated cutlery duties!

A fresh dawn broke over my breakfast scene as a new favorite spoon was elevated from my Costco Waterford wedding silverware set. Behold the perfect heft and artful scalloped ridges of the Mermaid Spoon— 

There’s only one spoon of its kind in my collection, so I dare not make any clumsy mistakes with the greedy grinder maw in the sink! I reserve the Mermaid Spoon for my oatmeal as I swear it tastes less bland because of the scalloped edges. Somehow, these ridges enhance the flavor (*just like the snap of a Ruffles potato chip is ever so much more satisfying between the teeth than a flat chip!).

Now, let’s move on to the Pretty Useless Spoons category:

 

The Garden Spoon serves as the center piece of a random alcove in my kitchen. A tiny nail was already embedded in the wall when we moved in, but it took me several years to figure out what truly belonged there. 

And is this spoon not a floral masterpiece worthy of such placement? I ask nothing of it but to gleam in its appointed corner. I smile at its silver shine frequently and dust it (um, occasionally). 

I thrifted this Bookish Angels Spoon in honor of my grammie Nancy Anne, an original Tag Sale Queen and lover of all things angel. The back is stamped “Reutter Porzellan Germany.” There’s just something fun about finding tiny winged porzellan persons flitting on your spoon!

 

I plucked this Dainty Daffydowndilly Spoon from a cup of tacky tourist spoons for under two bucks. 

Adorned with a single stately daffodil bloom, I believe it is a sterling silver Holland Souvenir Spoon. Maybe someday I’ll thrift an entire bouquet! For now, I am quite content with this solitaire blossom.

For the penultimate spotlight, may I present the Posh Sirens Pair—

These mother of pearl utensils are extra special to me because my sister B bought fine caviar sets from Whole Foods in honor of my visit one year. I’d never tried such a delicacy before and was enthralled that each set came with an individual fancy spoon for serving out the caviar will all due pomp.

B spoiled me with a home-cooked steak dinner with fresh black garlic from the local garlic festival, and garnished it with sauteed parsnips and fresh caviar. Then she gifted me these lustrous spoons as souvenirs of the poshest feast of my life!

I won’t grant you a glimpse of the elegant antique filigree of the last spoon I treasure most dearly, but I will leave you with a poem about the Heirloom Spoon (N.F. Silver Co 1877)—

 Tsp! A Spoonful
of Ash with Star

After Mama died suddenly,
my father placed her ashes
in a red plastic pot
from Marshall’s.

Scandalized, my sisters and I
painted three clay pots so
we could divide her
cherished dust
among us.

But when it came time
to divvy up her cinders,
we couldn’t just use an
ordinary measuring cup!

My youngest sister chose an 
1877 silver spoon, heritage
from the matrilineal side of
our family, and carefully
bestowed our mother’s
remains in thirds.

My portion sits on my desk
even now, dust upon dust,
sad leftovers of a life unraveled
by too much pain distilled
with beauty, cut short
without a goodbye.

I inherited the regal spoon that
split her embers into thirds, but
there will be no daughter from
my womb on which I may
bequeath this scratched
floral scepter that has
nourished life and
divided death over
the centuries.

I used to drop tears
like ancient silver
that my genetics,
and the woven
history of

So many women before me,
will come undone with
the oblivion of
my own
death.

Yet, I suppose it’s a monumental
waste of pride to lament a lack
of progeny when the mass
oceanic demise of
phytoplankton

Will probably extinguish
humanity and most
breath on Earth in
a few hundred
years anyway—

They say

Most humans are forgotten after
only three generations,
so does it really
matter

if

I am utterly erased from
memory a century
sooner than later?
Nope, I guess
not . . .

I shall spend my last days
elusive as Enya!
Let me vanish
like a slow echo,
or a long chime—

I will dance in gossamer voids
and perish in jewel tones
as all my ink fades from
the pages of time

glittering

like a comet tail of light,
here then gone on
the wings of
a wish

and ethereal annihilation.

Ash with star, star made ash—tsp!
Our genes are all the same
in the end:

None of us ever anything more
extravagant than a borrowed
teaspoon of stardust.

<>*<> 

Is there any favorite culinary item in your own daily life? Perhaps a dented water bottle or chipped mug that’s been through many years of adventures with you? I’d love to hear your own stories in the comments! 

 ~*~  

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The Luniferous Gazette #61: Night Roses are Better than Day Blossoms

 Shape in the Dark

 

Once upon a summer evening, I wandered into my rose garden and discovered that each blossom bore a different kind of sensory beauty in the dark—

Night Roses

Night roses are better

than day blossoms—

unable to dazzle with

petal frill and flush,

sunlit senses must trade

eye light for the silk-soft

brush of shape in the dark,

perfume stirred sweet

by evening shadows,

and the quiet flutter

of flower bodies in time

with the twinkle

of starlight. 

 A snatch of pink shade and moonless clouds . . . 

 Source:

“Night Roses.” (October 2024). Northern Narratives. 58.

 ~*~  

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The Luniferous Gazette #59: Empty the Sky

 Under the Brazen Hours

Ever since she released her hit single in June 2012, I’ve listened to Lana Del Rey sing “I got that summertime, summertime sadness / Su-su-summertime, summertime sadness” over and over again. 

I’m not even sure why her melody haunts me so deeply. Maybe it’s because there are seasons of life that brim with light, but also hidden sorrows? And there are luminous smiles that mask wounds wider than a crescent moon. No human is immune even under the most brazen hours. 

So if the rippling heat of July and the blaze of existence sometimes carry an oppressive melancholy or heavy memory, it’s okay—just stop pretending a storm isn’t raging within. Stand wild in the aching heart of it! 

There is no escape from yourself. Let the weight shed from your soul like the frozen scales of a melody.

EMPTY THE SKY 

These are not my tears. 
They won't melt, 
just fall in a flurry 
at my feet. 

Cut ice, bitter cold. 
They won't melt. 

I've tried to empty the sky, 
but these gems curate 
my pain in crystal 
that won't melt. 

I wish to wash 
the shatter 
and shards 
away—

Cry just one 
unserrated 
sliver of 
sun.

On a slightly warmer note, here is the newest addition to my Artweaver herd! An incandescent horse to match July's simmering summer.  

~*~  

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The Luniferous Gazette #58: Joanne and the Blue Plate

Learning to Love Blue Again 

My relationship with the color blue is complicated. Cobalt blue, in particular, I sometimes find smothering because I grew up tangled in that tone, and carry many heavy memories rolled inside its luxurious hue.

As my father loved the darker shades of blue, our household naturally became ever more saturated in those colors over the course of my childhood. Blue couch, rugs, navy blue sheets, glass vases, candlestick holders, Saratoga Springs sparkling water bottles, blue glass plates and even cobalt-blue handled silverware! If it could be found in cobalt blue, it was . . . .

Blue, thick and clinging as evening shadows—I simply could not appreciate it anymore! I was over the dazzle and dimmed out of my mind. I wanted to banish that dark gleaming tint from every corner of my life.

Until one day, a good family friend came over and made a scrumptious dinner, and then helped me to wash the dishes afterwards. Joanne was first friends with my mother, and even after her passing still came over at times to cook our family her signature feast of steak with Adobo spice, refried beans, and fresh avocado slices with lemon juice and salt.

And she forever changed my eyes with her wonderstruck admission:

Out of Azure

Relinquish the sponge, 
I urge her.

No need to imperil fingers 
to pruning, not since 
Josephine Cochran 
showcased her 
mechanical dishwasher 
at the 1893 
Columbian Exposition.

But Joanne beams shyly, 
whispering,
"I've never washed 
a blue plate before."

Something inside me startles 
and cracks at her admission,
eyes filtering sudden cerulean
inexplicable cobalt glories

As the scratched disc of glass
cradled in her worn palms shifts 
into a jeweled shard of midnight—
a showcase of sapphirine skies.

Joanne freed the caged blue spectrum in my heart with her wondering eyes, and I will forever be grateful for that!

I don’t own a cobalt blue plate today, but I scoured my home for a blue bounty for this picture: a giant gem paperweight and stone apple from my father, a delicate flower pin that belonged to my grandmother Nancy Anne, and a gleaming fiber optic marble and shining stones that make me smile. 

Is there a color closely entwined with your own life? 

 ~*~  

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The Luniferous Gazette #57: A Very Faerie Beach Getaway!

Contact Fey Liason Naidene Merryweather via Silver Basin  

So I went to the beach and took way too many pictures, so I thought I’d have a little fun . . . 

Dear Faerie Folk,

Wingtips feeling droopy from the heat? Book a breezy beach getaway with our company, Very Faerie & Merryweather! With over two centuries of experience catering to the Fey, we know all the best spots for flower bungalows and toasting mallow cheeseweed.

Take a sky ferry straight to this sandy paradise via our private Red-Winged Blackbird, Beach Bob.

 

A complimentary beach-flora parasol is included with all reservations, freshly plucked:

Model: Sunbeams-Alot  

 

Urchin Model: Scry Your Own Smiley Face 

 

With only a minor gem or spell recipe deposit, enjoy beach-adjacent activities like cattail sailing!

 

Trick unwary humans to wander down charming beach paths until their flipflops snap . . . 

When you tire of mortal frivolities, take a nap in the salt-kissed petals of our beach rose bungalows. 

 Bungalow 1: Pirate-Me-Pink 

 Bungalow 2: The Sunrise Sirenade 

 Bungalow 3: The Pearlinda

And if you’re concerned about scavenging mole crabs, let your wee bobbin-brains rest easy on vacation. Every one of our beach rose bungalows comes with a 100% organic security system! 

For the ultimate luxurious experience, book the Petallic Penthouse! (Seasonal availability varies by blossom yield)

When you feel a ravening coming on, enjoy salty marine-sprayed pine nuts:

Then slake your thirst on ripe juniper berries!

Or a tart green rosehip if you’re brave enough . . .

Top off your getaway with a dewdrop bath in a fuchsia fantasy tub grown exclusively by our proprietary Rosa rugosa spells. Gently sway in these premium petals to the energetic lullaby of sea breezes and happily sunburned mortals!

Contact Fey Liason Naidene Merryweather via silver basin. *And no, we do not accept changelings as alternate payment! 

*A final note: I’ve decided to dabble in short form creative exercises on Threads and Bluesky (@cynestiamoon) once or twice a week. Expect random haiku and 6-1 word thrift tales! I’ll also post them on Substack notes. 

~*~  

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The Luniferous Gazette #56: Coolant for the Rocket Trip

The Dehumidification of Hyperscale Humanity

As hyperscale data centers slake their thirst 
on the already dwindling water
of the Ogallala Aquifer, I can’t 
help wondering if this
is the final price of 
being human—

Losing our reservoirs, whole lakes 
and subterranean seas just to keep
knowledge banks c o o l instead 
of relying on squishy, faulty, 
water-logged brains!

Human brains are roughly 75% water,
our bodies requiring about 3 liters
a day to sustain existence, but
data centers will melt without
millions of daily gallons 
to calculate crisply—

Oh, why did our ancestors ever 
leave the ocean’s embrace?
Even our bones remember
where true power lies,  
wicking 31% liquid.

Now, artificial heat islands bake the land
to run our future heavens for us,
evaporating water and wonder.
No need to wonder about
anything, anymore . . .
AI told you so—

And one day, when our planet shrivels 
under the dust of pixelated dreams 
and memes, maybe we can build 
new hyperscale data centers 
on Ganymedes!

The solar system’s wettest world holds 
30 times Earth’s water, after all . . .
So please don’t cry, my dear! 
Your tears are already reserved 
coolant for the rocket trip.

 

*An AI hyperscale factory is in the process of being built in a town neighboring mine . . . what about yours? 

 ~*~  

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The Luniferous Gazette #55: Dragon Crumbs* The Little Smoleroid

The Little Smoleroid

A star fell over the Faerie Vale, but this was hardly a noteworthy event. Wishing embers regularly rained down over the magical landscape in a respectable haze of clockwork sparkles. 

The small silver lump left behind in the crater once this super-sonic, shimmer-strike settled down? Now, that was surprising—

The lump quivered and danced as it sorted itself out, sprouting a plum-sized head, bitsy hands no bigger than thimbles, and two tiny legs hardly taller than a sugar spoon. Shaking meteor dust from the metallic folds of her gown, this mechanical doll straightened to all nine inches of height. 

"Curious! Have I always been this short?" she wondered. A label peeled off her chest and fluttered to the ground in front of her, but the singed scrap yielded only further questions.

“Smoleroid functions deactivated pending payment—for display only."

The doll did not feel deactivated. On the contrary, all her systems felt quite invigorated after her tumble through the sky. But no matter how she rolled the interrogative over in her mind, she could not pin down her purpose as a so-called "smoleroid." In fact, she couldn’t recall one scant second of her life before she woke up in the simmer pot of this crater . . . . 

"How intriguing, I’m actually quite mysterious!" the Little Smoleroid exclaimed. 

Her ruby cabochon eyes flashed as she surveyed the tall forest rimming the crater’s edge. Morning mists glistened like wandering veils through pine needles and leaf shadows, beckoning her like a million beacon lights. "Perhaps an analysis of my surroundings will reveal further clues to my identity,” she decided.  

Her knee joints whirred as she bent low and leapt from the crater's heart, vaulting a hundred feet into the air in one fluid dart. The silver doll careened through lacebark pines, golden larches, and quivering aspens before aiming for a large rock in the center of a meadow. 

However, her petite heels skidded across the scaly green boulder that she’d mistaken for a soft, mossy landing point.

"Ow! Watch where you're fly—er, falling," the boulder chided, unfolding a long emerald neck, razor talons, and scowling rows of fangs. 

“Sorry, Lizard,” the Little Smoleroid replied. “Can you tell me: <who I—”

“L-lizard?” the beast stuttered, puffing his chest out as he interrupted her important quest of self-discovery. “Can’t you tell? I’m a dragon!” 

His snout fell as his bright orange eyes scrunched tight as squished suns. “Oh, who am I fooling—even a new hatched wyrm can breathe fire, but I haven’t been able to light a twig since all my brimstones went cold.” 

The silver doll shielded her gaze as a waterfall of lukewarm tears rained over her and bathed the meadow.

“Once, I was ‘Clawton the Frenzied Formidaflame!’” the dragon exclaimed. “‘High Simmer of Scorch, Evenly-Toasted Scone Master’—all right, that last one was purely aspirational.” He sniffled. “Now, you might as well call me . . . LIZZY!”

“Okay, Lizzy,” the Little Smoleroid replied dutifully. How puzzling—her reply brought on a fresh maelstrom of tears. “What’s a brimstone, and why is it so bothersome?” she asked.

“Essential fiber,” Clawton replied, “the bane of my existence!” He gave a longsuffering sigh that blasted off the fourth leaf from every lucky clover in the meadow. “My kind must devour volcanic stones to spark our natural flame, but I overnapped—er, hibernated by half a century and mine caught a chill. Now, all my brimstones are rumbling like useless ice chips in my belly.” 

Two keen beams of light fanned out from the Little Smoleroid’s ruby eyes, scanning the dragon’s midsection. “Hmm—eat me!” she said. “I’m confident I can alleviate your stomachache.”

Clawton squinted at her doubtfully. “A measly mouthful like YOU? If you say so . . .” Quick as a flash, the dragon gulped the Little Smoleroid down in a single bite.

The silver doll slid down the beast's gullet straight into a gizzard tumbling with chilled stones. Opening both palms, a swell of laser heat spilled from her dainty fingers and irradiated the brimstones with the most incendiary of scintillas. 

“Primary combustion restored,” she announced, pleased at this new discovery of her power functions.

The dragon gave a mighty hiccup that tossed the Little Smoleroid straight out of his fangs in a pillar of blue-tinged flames. She landed in a bed of charred daisies, swiftly pocketing a shard of brimstone as an insatiable urge to sample her surroundings overcame her. 

“Wonderful morsel, you’ve saved me from the wretched ignominy of lizardhood!” Clawton proclaimed, ribbons of fire dancing from his nostrils. “You have my eternal thanks, Marvelous Minikin, Supreme Baker of the Brimstones, Lady . . . ?”

“Just ‘Smoleroid,’ thank you,” the silver doll replied as she dusted ashes from her gown for the second time that day. “Do you mind telling me what that is, more precisely: <who am I?>” 

She mimicked the dragon’s prodigious sigh, and her compressed airwave shook all the bells on a lone bluebell blossom. “I lost my full designation,” she confessed. “I was hoping to recover my complete data set in this forest, but so far all I’ve encountered is a NOT-A-Lizard.” 

“How perplexing!” Clawton clacked his fangs together in deep rumination. “I hoard all manner of rare treasures from primeval marbles to fine porcelain dinnerware, but I must confess that I’ve never seen a ‘data set’ lying about.” 

He raised a single talon. “Try the unicorn in Marionberry Gulch—that wild beast has galloped across every nook and cranny of the Faerie Vale! But beware, itty-bitling . . . Alfalfie might obliterate you before you can get a word in edgewise.”

The Little Smoleroid clenched her tiny fists in determination. “Oh, I’m quite tough for my compact size and not the least bit crushable,” she assured him. “I can even survive a dragon gulp!” 

“Quite right,” Clawton said with the utmost admiration for his diminutive comrade. 

The morning mists dissipated and unveiled a cornflower-clear sky as the Little Smoleroid followed the dragon’s meandering description of the lay of the land. Yet she didn’t locate the gulch that glistened with live black gems until high noon. 

“Hullo? Unicorn Unit?” the silver doll called, her voice echoing off stone walls brimming over with luscious marionberries. “Clawton sent me! Can you please tell me <who I—

> > >

The clarion clatter of hooves drowned out the crucial end of her interrogative as a golden unicorn splattered in violet berry juice cantered towards her. 

“What a peculiar rock sprite, I’ve never seen your form before!” Alfalfie exclaimed. “Are you grown with moon silver or star quartz?” he asked, but his dulcet tone sharpened as he tossed his glinting spire. “No matter, I challenge YOU to a duel.”

“Challenge accepted,” the Little Smoleroid replied, mildly surprised by her own eagerness for spontaneous violent engagement. 

Was this combat instinct an automatic function just like her laser palms? As the unicorn lowered its deadly spire, tiny hover thrusters embedded in the silver doll’s heels lifted her three feet off the ground. Neat. Ah, she was learning so much about herself already . . . .

Alfalfie charged her so swiftly that it seemed like his form fractured into a glittering mirage. Still not fast enough to catch her! 

The Little Smoleroid flitted from the lethal edge of his spire like a firefly. Together, the silver doll and golden unicorn wove a dangerous dance among the marionberry bushes. Ripe gems exploded in the air as sparking hoof and laser bursts shook the gulch with their tangled silhouettes. 

“What a glorious tussle! I’ve never met such a formidable challenger,” Alfalfie panted in glee an hour and an age later. 

“Me neither,” the Little Smoleroid admitted, for the unicorn was her first recorded foe. Correction: what was the other word? F-f-fr—her fingers pocketed a glittering fragment of unicorn horn as the itch to sample overcame her again. 

“We must do this again!” Alfalfie said as he shook marionberry juice from his mane. “Promise, wee warrior of the rock sprites?” 

“Contract acknowledged,” the silver doll replied, grateful for the chance to trade tactics with a creature whose fierceness so easily inspired her own. She flicked a battle streak of marionberry from her cheek. “But I’m not a rock sprite, I’m a Smoleroid . . . ever heard of me or my kind?” 

Her core chamber sputtered with a melancholy flicker as Alfalfie replied, “Never!” Yet an ember of hope ignited as the unicorn continued, “But you might ask the willow dryad by the Leftling Stream. Dendrita gathers the songs of every creature in her roots and leaves. Tree folk are quite knowledgeable, you know.”

“Maybe her wisdom will finally explain the minor anomaly of my existence . . . .” the Little Smoleroid whispered hopefully.  

The silver doll flitted from the gulch at max hover-thruster output as she followed the unicorn’s directions towards the Leftling Stream. A lazy sun haze hung over the Faerie Vale as she encountered the willow dryad in the dead heat of afternoon. 

The tree woman bathed her long green fronds in the rippling waters, her bare feet rooting in the muddy bank with impressively knotted toes. 

“Salutations, fair Salix matsudana,” the silver doll said. “I’m a ‘Smoleroid,’ but I don’t even know what those three fancy syllables mean. Can you perchance tell me: <who AM I?>” Her head fell as she stared at the sterling face mirrored in the water’s currents like a stranger, worlds away. “I must know my primary function!” 

Every fiber cable, mercurial coolant, and diamante lens inside the Little Smoleroid froze as Dendrita let her deep-pooled gaze fall full upon her. 

“Othersky seed, you are entirely your own wish, and no one else’s!” the willow dryad said. “Did nobody ever tell you that?” Her leaves rustled with a chortle. “Make of it what you wish—see the trick?” 

“Of c-co—” the Little Smoleroid’s voice processor skipped as she was caught in the willow dryad’s twisty logic trap. “Elucidate me, please! I MUST know the trick,” she pleaded. 

Dentrita’s fronds swayed as she shook her head in a slow breeze. “A nut that hides in the dirt cannot understand a sapling’s song. Sometimes, we must live with our own heavy mysteries for a while before earning the answer meant only for us.” 

“But I dislike variables,” the silver doll confessed. “Especially when it’s <me>.”  

Dendrita raised her face to the sun and gave a splinter-lined smile. “Variance is just the mystic knot between wind, earth, water, fire—oh, and heart. And we do not mock the root for its winding journey.” 

“So . . . I should defer my destiny for another day, right?” The Little Smoleroid asked. Her sigh was too small to budge a single leaf this time. “Affirmative.” 

The silver doll wiled away the brightest span of the afternoon by the Leftling Stream. Sorting the finest pebbles with Dendrita and decorating the shoreline seemed a highly acceptable way to utilize her skill set, after all. 

The Little Smoleroid took particular care to add her own laser flare to each specimen, etching her chosen stones with geometric gibberish . . . coordinates, maybe? 

Immaterial! This garble of ghost codes had NO hold over her anymore. She would forge a new command path for herself—

“I suppose ‘function’ does include ‘fun’ in its first syllable,” the Little Smoleroid mused.  

“Ah. You’ve mastered the trick,” Dendrita said with a resinous twinkle in her eyes. She blinked, and a liquid drop of gold slipped from her eye and hardened into an amber tear. “Here—a keepsake to celebrate this moment.”

"Thank you! I’ll treasure this precious sample forever,” the Little Smoleroid said, pocketing her third snatch of wonder since falling from the sky at dawn. 

Yet as daylight dimmed into the soft pink and lavender shimmer of the gloaming tide, her happily framed horizon blew apart as the sky above the Faerie Vale ripped wide open. 

A familiar silhouette tore through this starless void. It shared her own form, but—magnified to colossal proportions! A thirteen-foot silver robot with oversized blaster arms and blazing dual rocket boots hovered in the sky.

“Display Model 003, I tracked your last position to this rift. Why haven’t you reported back to headquarters yet?” the mega-doll demanded in a booming bass voice. 

The Little Smoleroid felt every gear and bolt in her body twist and tighten: enemy. Enemy! ENEMY. Yet she could not deny the summons despite the siren warning coursing through her frame. Her heel thrusters responded to the command as she flitted skyward to meet her behemoth twin. 

“Who are you to label me with such a strange name?” the silver doll retorted. “I don’t even know your designation!” 

“Are your logic circuits scrambled, tin crumpet?” the robot retorted. “I am Gargantroid Unit 1234, and YOU are just a miniature mimicrant of my majesty!” 

Her crimson eyes flashed a blinding wave of scanner beams over the Little Smoleroid. “Ah, I intuit the fault: your internal portal jumper was damaged after being misdelivered to this pocket dimension . . .” Her eyes narrowed to glowing slits. “And maybe a few other critical systems, too—” 

“I’m not misdelivered! I’m exactly where I wish to be,” the Little Smoleroid objected. “The Faerie Vale is an ideal realm for brimstone baking, unicorn sparring, and pebble etching—”

“Error,” the Gargantroid scoffed, tapping the Little Smoleroid’s head with a blaster butt so firmly that her skull plating clanged like a bell as dizzy neon codes danced in her eyes. “Do not allow this undeveloped dump to corrupt your core directive. The human king of Ashburbia is impatiently waiting for you to demonstrate your battle functions at court. Correction: my battle functions.” The robot’s snicker rattled like a box of loose wingnuts. “YOU are just a shiny demo dolly sent to prospective buyers—a gimmick to advertise the might-for-hire of the Gargantroides Free Battalion!” 

The Little Smoleroid clasped her small hands together as she wished she could shrink back into the crater that brought her to this land. “So . . . I’m just a toy soldier?” she asked.   

The Gargantroid nodded. “Your logic circuits have rebooted: excellent. Now, let’s turn this uncharted diversion to our advantage with a live broadcast of your combat capabilities. Level this dimension, Display Model 003!” the larger robot ordered. “Even your tiny laser stick fingers should be adequately armed to blaze this revolting pastoral zone to the ground in thirty seconds flat.” 

The Little Smoleroid said nothing as she composed her internal rebellion: 

•    Clawton, 
•    Alfalfie, 
•    Dendrita—

Their lives, and so many more in the Faerie Vale depended on her carefully calibrated response! She raised both palms and blasted the Gargantroid at point blank range.  

“Apologies, Unit 1234,” the Little Smoleroid said as her laser beams pinged off her counterpart’s chest plating in a pitiful spray of sparks. “I must neutralize you.” 

The silver doll mustered every ounce of courage as she straightened to her full nine inches of height. “No Gargantroid may ever log the coordinates to this pocket dimension, ever again! It’s my new headquarters, you must understand . . . . ”

“You, calculate you can defeat ME?” the Gargantroid scoffed. “Pint-sized scrap, I won’t leave a single unformatted particle behind!” Double suns burned ominously in her blaster barrels as Unit 1234 leveled both weapons at her tiny target. 

The Little Smoleroid evaded the first searing volley with only a singed antenna, but velocity alone would not help her to escape the robot’s wrath. Nor would her puny arsenal save her from superior annihilation by her monstrous twin; the Gargantroid had everything that she did at her disposal, in grander proportions! Except—

Three teensy-weensy things . . . brimstone shard, spire sliver, and amber tear!

“Can’t you intuit?” the Little Smoleroid shouted over her shoulder. “A core directive with destruction at its heart will one day leave us with NO future function.” Her fingers scrambled to reconfigure her three precious samples as Unit 1234 bore down on her with relentless, fiery scorn.  

“The Gargantroides Free Battalion obeys the ancient wish of our makers. And from their millennial dust, we raze the universe in their eternal honor!” Unit 1234 retorted as she fired a dozen missiles at her mini-me.  

“Break your brackets! Are you truly ‘free’ if you can’t even make a wish for yourself?” the Little Smoleroid asked in a final bid to save her counterpart even as missiles harried her heels. 

Unit 1234 contorted midair, combining both arms into one massive cannon that would sear a blast zone with a mile-wide radius. “I AM—” 

The Little Smoleroid flew straight towards the eye of her own annihilation and tossed her makeshift death marvel into the barrel: One dragon brimstone, excessively explosive, melded to one unicorn spire sliver, highly refractive, speared to one amber dryad tear, extremely flammable . . . .

Unit 1234’s cannon imploded, her mangled torso and smoking limbs raining over the Faerie Vale in burning heaps. The impact of the robot’s main body cratered a hill with a simmering pond of melted metal. 

The Little Smoleroid hovered over this bubbling inferno as she scanned the wreckage for any remaining traces of her enemy, troubled—why hadn’t the sky tear stitched itself back together yet?

“Defective model deleted—” The skeletal frame of the Gargantroid sliced warped claws into the air, hooking the Little Smoleroid and dragging her down into the molten pond with her.  

“Oops! Unhand me—” The silver doll blasted free of the hissing ooze with a final laser palm burst that severed the barbed cage of the robot’s claws. She calculated an escape trajectory, but her overheated heel thrusters could only pop her onto the side of the crater. “I’m sizzled,” she said with a forlorn sigh. 

The Little Smoleroid resigned herself to fatal malfunction as she quietly processed the void sealing shut in the sky, and the first pinpricks of starlight twinkling over the Faerie Vale. 

However, she did not anticipate an audience for her demise. Her three most favorite acquaintances gathered close as her body dribbled metallic rivulets into the crater.

“Pardon me, I’m melting,” the Little Smoleroid said. “It was a pleasure to m-muh-meet—”

She sputtered the end of her goodbye as Dendrita snapped a vine from her hair and poured golden sap over the doll’s body. 

“I’ll refine your limbs with living amber,” the dryad promised. 

“And I shall weave you a new chainmail suit with a brimstone buckle,” Clawton vowed, molting a sudden razor storm of dragon scales.

“Oh! I’m giving you knives for new fingers,” Alfalfie exclaimed, shaving slivers off his unicorn horn that glinted clean-cut as rays of moonlight. “You’re going to love them.”

“I’m so glad I was misdelivered,” the many-glimmered doll said. 

Arrayed in the gifts of true friendship, the Little Smoleroid functioned happily ever after. 

*This story was inspired by my little sister M, who told me about Pandora dolls . . . miniature dolls traveling around Europe from the 14th to 19th centuries that showcased the latest fashions!

 ~*~  

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