One day in the forest, a doll found a butterfly upon the ground. Its wings were as blue as the sky, and twitched with life, but it could not fly.
How sad, the doll thought as it nudged the butterfly onto a porcelain finger. It lifted the butterfly up and carried the little insect as it stood beside its witch.
The doll’s witch looked up from where she knelt beside a patch of flowers, sickle poised to slice the stems of the herbs she sought. When she saw the tiny form resting upon her doll’s finger, she raised an eyebrow.
“What is that you have there? A dead bug?”
“It’s alive, miss,” the doll said, raising her hand so the butterfly caught a beam of sunlight through the dappled shadows.
“You’re not going to save it. Might as well leave it to the woods.”
Giving her witch a smile, the doll said, “This one wishes to try, miss, if you allow it.”
With a sigh, the witch shrugs and turns back to the herbs. “Very well, but only if it doesn’t get in the way of your duties. Now, bring the basket here.”
The doll stepped over with a bright, cheery grin, offering the wicker basket held in its other hand. With a snic-snic-snac the witch cut the moly buds from their stems and piled them in the basket along with the toadstools and amaranth and acanthus she had found. Her foraging complete, she stood and led the way back home.
As the witch prepared each precious find for preservation, the doll prepared their afternoon tea. Even as it whirled through the kitchen and the garden, brewing and setting the table and adjusting the awnings for shade, it kept the butterfly safe upon its perch. Its witch finished with her own tasks much sooner, and the tea was a bit late, but neither said anything about the matter.
As evening fell, the witch rose from her study to find that dinner was behind as well. Wordlessly she stepped in to help, though her doll lowered its eyes in shame at that. And again, neither spoke of it.
The sun has set and the moon lit the earth, and the butterfly remained on the doll’s finger. It had stopped twitching after dinner. Dishes lay soaking in the sink, when they should be clean and set in their cupboards. Finally, as they sat in the garden together, the witch turned to her doll.
“You can’t hold onto that thing forever, you know.”
“This one knows, miss. It just…” It stared helplessly at its witch.
“The butterfly is dead, little one.” Her words were blunt, but her tone gentle. “Your kindness cannot save it.”
“It has to keep trying miss.”
The witch paused, heart aching from the earnest determination of her doll. She stared up towards the moon. “You need to rest, and I am not tired yet. I’ll carry it for now, okay?”
Hesitantly, the doll handed over the butterfly, who stirred not at all, and returned to the house. With a heavy heart, the witch stood up from her chair and raised the blue-winged butterfly to the moonlight.
The next morning, the doll awoke and began to finish the tasks it neglected the night before, working extra quick to make sure they were done before its witch awakens. For her part, the witch rose late, emerging from the bedroom at half past ten for her morning tea.
As her doll served her, it asked, “What happened to the butterfly, miss?”
The witch hesitated a moment before she said, “It awoke and flew off in the moonlight.”
“This one is glad, miss,” the doll said. “It knew that it just needed a bit of time to heal.”
The rest of the day was a happy one for the doll, cooking and cleaning and having its hair brushed. It never realized that its witch did not look it in the eyes until the day’s end.