Today was the 38th of Pyriel; the four moons were all full moons as well. Today was also Ana’s fourth birthday. Her father gave her a hair ornament which he made himself and her mother gave her a doll made from clay. Ana was extremely happy about her gift and immediately when her parents gave them to her she hugged them and ran off to her room to play with her new doll.
Ana had one straw doll and now one clay doll. When her parents gave her the straw doll the previous year they found out what power the gods gifted her. She could make the doll move to her commands and she would usually talk to the doll in her room instead of her imaginary friend.
Later that day Ana went out with her mother and father. They went to the chief’s house for a small party for Ana. Ana was not expecting the party and she was completely surprised when they arrived at the chief’s house, even the Lord of this land came to celebrate Ana’s birthday.
“Happy birthday Ana, you might not remember me but I am your father’s best friend.” The old plump man smiled at Ana.
She stared at him and nodded, her father then pulled the old plump man with him away from Ana. She sat on a chair in the corner of the room and played with her doll.
She was talking to her doll when her mother came to talk to her, “Ana you should enjoy this party a bit more, the Lord even brought his own daughter for you to play with.”
“Ana don’t want to.”
“But this party was arranged just for you, it wouldn’t be fun if the birthday girl didn’t enjoy her own party.”
“Ana don’t want make people sad. Ana play with girl.” Ana’s speech was still a bit broken when she spoke to others but it was now better than before.
“Good girl, I’ll give you some sweets when the party is over.” Her mother took her hand; they walked towards the old plump man.
“Yay, Ana like sweet.” Ana was happy that she could get some sweets from just playing with another girl.
When they stopped in front of the old plump man Ana saw the girl who was going to be her playmate. The girl was dressed in a sparkly white and silver dress, everything this girl wore screamed ‘expensive’.
The girl came up to Ana and introduced herself, “I am the Lord’s daughter, Sapphire Dyeborne. What might your name be?”
“Ana is Ana.”
“Well then Ana let’s be friends.” Ana nodded to Sapphire who took her hand and lead her to the play room inside the chief’s house. The two played with dolls the whole time and Sapphire was quite surprised to see Ana’s clay doll move. Sapphire did not know Ana had a power to control dolls.
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The following morning Ana woke up to her usual roof and bed. She thought she must have fallen asleep while playing with Sapphire as she could not remember how she got back home. But there was one problem, her clay doll was missing. She quickly ran towards her parents’ room only to find it empty as the sun was already quite high they must have already gone to work. Ana tried to open the front door but she was too small to reach the handle. She ran back to her room.
She appeared with straw doll in hand; she went back to the front door and instructed her doll to open the door. It did as instructed but with some difficulty, it was much smaller than Ana but it used its light weight to climb up the door. When it reached the handle it and Ana both realised something, the doll was too light to open the door.
This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.
“Big brother, how get out?” Ana asked her doll as it climbed back down the door.
The doll waved its arms and ran to the kitchen and pointed at a window. Ana followed and opened the window. The doll climbed through the opened window and landed on the ground outside, it waved its arms signalling her to follow.
“I don’t know, scary.” Ana was scared, she had never tried going through a window as she never had too.
The doll drew a picture of the clay doll in the dirt and waved its arms at Ana.
Ana looked at the picture, “Okay, I go.” She climbed out slowly and minimized the fall by first hanging on the edge before dropping down.
She picked up the straw doll and ran to the river near the town where her mother would be. She arrived and looked around but her mother was nowhere to be found. The doll climbed out of her arms and drew a picture of a person with a hammer and a table near him in the loose dirt.
“Daddy…” The doll nodded at Ana and she picked it up again.
She hurried back home as she only knew the way to her father’s work from her house. The door to her house was slightly open when she returned. Curiosity struck the little girl; she opened the door and walked through the house to find her mother investigating the window that was open in the kitchen. She walked up to her mother and pulled on her dress.
“Ana where have you been?” Her mother had hugged her, “I was so worried when I couldn’t find you.”
Ana looked at her mother’s crying face, she knew she did something bad but now was not the time.
“Mommy, new dolly lost.”
Her mother stood back up and patted her head, “Then let’s go back to the chief’s house, you probably forgot it at his house after the party last night.
Ana nodded to her mother and took her hand. They walked out of the house towards the chief’s house.
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~Somewhere else entirely~
A girl threw a doll made from clay at the wall, breaking one of its legs, “Why doesn’t it move, it moved at the party last night. I even infused some magic into it.”
The maid that stood watch over the girl picked up the doll, “Little mistress why don’t we have the court magician take a look at it, maybe it needs something else to function.”
The girl puffed her cheeks in displeasure, “Fine…”
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Ana and her mother were standing in front of the chief’s house, they searched everywhere where Ana was but they have not found the doll. They even asked the maids and none of them seem to know where it is.
“Ana do you want a new one?” Her mother asked as she gave up on the search.
“No… Dolly present…” Ana felt heartbroken from losing her birthday present.
“How about we tell daddy to make you one out of metal, like your hair pin?” Her mother pointed at the hair ornament in Ana’s hair.
Ana took off the ornament to inspect it; she showed it to her straw doll and asked, “Metal?” The doll nodded slightly. She looked back at her mother, “Dolly of metal?”
“Yes, dolly of metal.” Her mother petted her with a smile. Ana nodded and held her mother’s hand. They made their way to her father’s workshop to place an order for a metal doll.