✨ The Nut Chronicles Part 2 ✨
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The Nut Chronicles, Part II: “The Nut That Roared”
It began, as many peculiar things do, with a nut.
Not just any nut, mind you — this one was rounder, shinier, and more suspiciously magnificent than anything Thimblegruff had ever seen in all his years of professional hoarding. He spotted it nestled among a pile of dried acorn caps behind a mossy stump, glittering faintly like it knew it was special.
"That one’s humming," said Pibbinook, squinting at it. "Things that hum don’t belong in nut piles."
"Things that hum belong to me," said Thimblegruff, who promptly stuffed it into his cheeks with a determined puff.
They returned to their den beneath the root of a twisted alder tree — a cavernous warren stuffed to the rafters with the world’s most impressive nut collection. Hazelnuts carved like dice. Chestnuts with smiley faces. Walnuts the size of turnips. But the newest acquisition… it had a presence.
That night, the forest rustled. Leaves twitched. Mushrooms glowed. And the nut began to rattle.
At precisely midnight, it popped itself out of the hoard, hovered a full inch above the dirt floor, and let out a noise that can only be described as an indignant gobble-whomp.
"Well, that’s new," said Pibbinook from under a pile of quilted leaves. "What’d you go and bring home a cursed nut for?"
"It wasn’t cursed when I found it," snapped Thimblegruff, who had developed an unfortunate eye twitch. "Probably."
As the nut began levitating higher, flickering with odd purple sparkles, a voice echoed through the den:
“I AM THE KEEPER OF THE GROVE, HOLDER OF THE ROOTED RHYME, GUARDIAN OF— wait. Are those gumdrops?”
The voice paused. The nut dropped with a thud. Silence.
"Quick," whispered Pibbinook. "Get the gumdrops."
The nut, apparently mollified by sweets and a polite mug of bark tea, introduced itself as Quendalith, a dormant spirit of the ancient grove who’d accidentally fallen asleep in a hollow nut casing for about 387 years. Upon awakening, it had gotten disoriented and landed in the middle of their hoard.
"Whoops," said Thimblegruff.
"Typical," sighed Pibbinook.
Thus began a new and deeply inconvenient chapter in their lives — one where their most prized treasure could now speak, glowed at night, and insisted on reciting lengthy forest poetry during meal times.
And this, dear reader, is where things start to spiral.
But more on that in Part 3: “Quendalith the Inconvenient.”
✨ Curious where this nutty tale began?
You can find Thimblegruff & Pibbinook, the silver-toned squirrel earrings that inspired it all, in their official listing here.
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