Princess Marigold and the Lost Crown
The rule about the crown was simple: on at breakfast, off at bedtime. Princess Marigold had kept this rule for so long that she no longer noticed the weight of it, seven gold flowers against her head, twelve hours of every day.
Which was, perhaps, why it was so disorienting to wake on a Tuesday morning and find it gone.
She searched the room with the methodical calm of someone who has strong feelings about things being where they belong. Under pillow — no. Window ledge — no. Wardrobe, both sides of the bed, behind the blue chair, on top of the bookshelf — nothing.
She looked out the window.
In the garden below, a fox was moving with the studied casualness of a creature who doesn't want to be observed moving.
Marigold went downstairs.
The trail was clear enough once she was looking: three-toed prints in the soft mud of the rose bed, heading through the gate in the yew hedge that she had always assumed was decorative. It opened, which was the first surprise. The second was what was on the other side.
A hollow in the grass she had never seen, though she had lived in the castle all her life. A rabbit warren. A circle of arranged objects: a brass button, a square of blue cloth, three pebbles of increasing roundness, a piece of coloured glass, and — on a stick at the centre of the arrangement, catching the morning light — her crown.
The fox was sitting to one side, watching her arrive.
"You took it," said Marigold.
"Borrowed," said the fox. "There's a difference."
"Is there?"
"Borrowing implies returning."
A rabbit appeared at the entrance to the burrow. Then another, and a third behind that one. They arranged themselves in a line and regarded her with the composure of a committee.
"We wanted to study it," said the first rabbit. "Crowns are interesting. You don't see them unattended."
"This one is gold with seven flowers," said the second.
"And it has a scratch," said the third, "on the left side, made by something with a sharp edge. Old scratch — three or four years at least."
"Apple tree," said Marigold. "I was twelve."
The rabbits seemed satisfied by this.
"Does it actually mean anything?" asked the first rabbit. "Or is it just decoration?"
Marigold looked at her crown. She had worn it every day for four years and had not, she realised, thought very carefully about this question.
"Both," she said finally. "It means I'm responsible for things. And it's also gold with seven flowers."
"Reasonable answer," said the fox.
She picked up the crown and put it on. The familiar weight settled.
She left her blue hair ribbon as an exchange — it seemed polite — and walked back through the gate.
The garden looked the same. The crown felt the same.
But she found herself, walking back to the castle, thinking about the question rather than the answer. Which seemed, perhaps, exactly right.