Dietrich reached into his scrip and pulled out the wooden doll and gave it to their little girl. He had polished it to remove the scorches, and had replaced the charred arms and legs with fresh sticks he had found. The hair, he had cut from his own head. But Maria dropped the doll in to the dirt and cried, "That isn't Anna!. That isn't Anna!" And she ran in side the rebuilt cottage, leaving Dietrich crouching in the dust.



Sighing, he replaced the doll into his scrip. It wasn't the doll, he thought. The doll was only a construction of sticks and rags. There was nothing precious about such things. He stood and picked up the wooden cage with the clucking chickens...



Something repaired, he thought as he returned to the parsonage, is never quite what it was before. Whatever parts were replaced, the memories could never be.



~ Michael Flynn, Eifelheim