Ash and the Missing Glowstone

I promised Bea a glowstone, and then I arrived with an empty pouch.

“I’m sorry,” I said, looking inside it again. “It was right here when I left home.”

Bea, a tiny moon-mouse with whiskers like pale threads, peered up at me from the doorway of her nook. Her home sat beneath a curved shelf of rock on a little moonlet beside my comet’s path. The moonlet was no bigger than a hill, but it had ridges, dips, and winding trails enough to confuse even a young comet.

“That’s all right, Ash,” Bea said. “But my nook gets very dark when I come home from gathering seeds.”

I looked at the pouch tied around my middle. It was made of blue cloth, and I had carried the glowstone in it all the way from the far side of the moonlet. The stone was round and honey-colored. It wasn’t large, but it made a cozy pool of light wherever it rested.

“I’ll find it,” I said. “I remember the way I came.”

Bea tucked her paws into her little vest. “I’ll help. I know every crack near my nook.”

We started along my route. My tail swished behind me, leaving a curved trail of dust in the low gravity. Bea hopped beside me, sometimes stopping to inspect a pebble with her nose.

The path wound between gray rocks and patches of pale moss. At the first bend, I found a golden pebble. I held it up. It looked almost exactly like the glowstone, except it stayed dull in my palm.

“Not this one,” Bea said. “The real one can light your whiskers.”

We set the pebble back where it was. Farther along, another round stone caught my eye. Then another. Each one looked promising until we picked it up.

I began to wonder how many look-alikes the moonlet could hide. Ahead, the path curled around a ridge, and beyond it lay the steepest part of my winding route.

“Let’s look carefully,” Bea said. “The stone can’t have gone far.”

I nodded and followed her around the bend, hoping the next clue would be waiting there.

We searched beside the ridge, then beneath a ledge, and then around a cluster of rocks shaped like sleepy sheep. I found two more golden pebbles. Bea found a round seed shell and held it up proudly until we both saw the tiny hole in its side.

“Not our stone,” she said, putting it down.

I checked my pouch again. Its empty mouth flopped open. As I turned, my tail brushed the moonlet’s ridge. Something snagged with a little rasp.

I stopped. “Bea, look at my pouch.”

One corner of the cloth had caught on a sharp bit of stone. The tie had slipped loose. I remembered sweeping my tail over this ridge on the way by. The pouch must have opened right here, and the glowstone had rolled down the sloping ground.

Bea pointed to a narrow groove in the dirt. “There are tiny sparkles in it!”

I leaned close. The little marks led away from the ridge, past a fork in the path, and ended beside a flat rock. At its edge, a thin golden line showed in the dark space underneath.

“There you are,” I whispered.

I pushed the flat rock with my nose. It barely moved. Bea pressed both paws against one side. I set my shoulder to the other and nudged again. The rock slid a little, just enough to make room for the glowstone.

Bea reached under and rolled it into my waiting hands. Warm light spread across her whiskers and the rough ground around us.

“We found it!” she said.

I was glad, but I also felt a bit sheepish. “I should have checked my pouch when the ridge tugged at my tail.”

“You noticed it now,” Bea said. “That’s what matters.”

I pulled the pouch tie snug and made a soft knot, then tugged it twice to be sure it held. Bea walked beside me as I carried the glowstone back along the familiar trail. When we reached her nook, we set the stone beside the entrance, where its warm light made a little pool on the ground.

Bea stepped into the pool of light and turned around once, her small paws making quiet taps on the stone. Then she came back to the entrance and sat beside the glowstone.

“It’s just right,” she said. “Now I can see the way to my bed.”

The nook was not much bigger than a burrow beneath a garden rock. Bea had a blanket woven from dry moss, a cup for seeds, and a smooth pebble she used as a stool. The glowstone made each thing easy to see without making the little room too bright.

I sat near the entrance, careful not to block the light. From there, I could see the long curve of my tail resting across the moonlet’s dusty ground. Far beyond the ridge, my comet’s path carried on through space. It would be waiting for me when I was ready to go home.

“Will you tell me about your trip?” Bea asked.

So I told her about the quiet stretch of space I had crossed, the bumps in my path, and the pebble that had looked like a tiny dumpling. Bea giggled at that, then told me how she had saved the last of her seeds for breakfast.

We talked in low voices. Now and then, Bea glanced at the light beside her door, as if making sure it was still there. Each time, she smiled.

At last she yawned and pulled her moss blanket close. “I think my nook is ready for bedtime.”

“I think so, too,” I said.

Bea settled in, with the glowstone beside the entrance and the warm circle of light reaching just far enough to touch her blanket. I sat quietly until her eyes closed. The moonlet was still, and the narrow trail home lay clear behind me.

Before I left, I checked the knot on my pouch once more. Then I turned toward my comet’s path, carrying the memory of Bea’s bright little doorway with me.