Orla’s Hidden Silver Pin — Beside the black canal, Orla pressed a silver pin into the mud and measured the night by its tiny shine. Read the full story →
Beside the black canal, Orla pressed a silver pin into the mud and measured the night by its tiny shine. She wanted to guide the moon-moths to the toll willow before the fog swallowed the bank, but the reeds kept hissing, “Too thin, too small,” and the water smelled of cold pennies.
The pin had been her mother’s last bright thing, no longer than a thorn, and Orla meant to raise it high. Then she heard a scrape-scrape under the dock: a beetle boat, snagged on a root, with three shivering passengers and no one awake to see. Orla slid the pin free. “Hold still,” she whispered. She picked at the knot until the root let go, and the boat bobbed away without a thank-you, only the soft plink of oars in mist.
By dawn, Orla had nothing shiny left for the moths. So she stood straight, lifted every bloom like a little lantern, and spread her leaves long and narrow to point the path. The moths found the toll willow anyway. Ever since, gladiolus flowers climb in bright towers and carry sword leaves at their feet, marking roads for travelers who may never know why. If you trace those sharp leaves, can you spot where Orla’s silver pin used to shine?
