by Laura Bernardeschi Nelson
In the heart of the Kingdom of Rats, where the air carried the dry scent of old paper and decisions postponed until they no longer mattered, there lived a Vixen. She did not belong there. Her steps were too light, her gaze too clear for corridors built on half-truths and careful omissions. And yet, each day she crossed that maze of rooms, as if some small, stubborn part of her had been left behind within its walls.
Among the most active creatures of the Kingdom were the Paper Weasel, the Stuffed Boar, the Mud Hippopotamus, and the Mantis.
The Mantis was a thin, unsettling figure, all angles and stillness, her long limbs folded with needle-like precision and her hands always joined, as though she lived in a state of quiet prayer. But she did not pray for peace. She prayed, gently and persistently, for things to unfold in the worst possible way. “I only hope everything will be settled… in the right way,” she would murmur from time to time, and there was something in that word—right—that never failed to leave a bitter aftertaste.
The Weasel, by contrast, did not concern herself with outcomes so much as appearances. She built nothing. She arranged. Words passed through her and emerged softer, safer, stripped of their sharper edges. Meanings were reduced, stories bent delicately out of shape until they could no longer cause discomfort. It was, in its way, a form of craftsmanship.
The Boar was the Vixen’s opposite in every respect: heavy where she was light, blunt where she was precise, and, above all, entirely convinced of himself. He was not old, though he moved as if burdened by an invisible weight of his own making. He laughed often—too often—with a loud, ungainly laugh that arrived well before whatever might have justified it. “Ha! That’s a good one!” he would declare, while the Rats exchanged uncertain glances. His speech wandered; his accent seemed to shift halfway through a sentence. “You get it? Eh? I mean… you get it.” No one did. He remained certain that they did.
In this, he was supported by the Mud Hippopotamus. The two were not friends in any meaningful sense, but they performed the role convincingly enough. The Hippopotamus would nod slowly at the Boar’s words, offering the occasional, solemn “Yes… very sensible,” even when there was nothing there to be understood. Between them, they maintained a presence that was less authoritative than it was simply difficult to ignore, and that was often enough.
Around them, the Rats kept their silence. And the Pug ran.
He was small, perpetually breathless, his short legs moving faster than seemed practical as he hurried from one creature to another, eager to be of use. “I’m coming! I’m coming right away!” he would pant, rarely pausing long enough to discover what, exactly, he was meant to do. Nothing in the Kingdom had been made with him in mind, and yet he carried himself with the fragile conviction of someone essential. He smiled at everyone, agreed with everyone, and arrived, without fail, a moment too late.
It was the Weasel who, one day, chose to disturb the delicate balance of things. She did so without announcement and without trace, shifting small, invisible weights, adjusting distances so subtly that no one could point to the moment anything had changed. By the time it was done, the Boar found himself entrusted with a new role—one of those roles that appear important chiefly because no one feels entitled to question them.
The Mantis observed in silence, her head inclining by the smallest degree. “This is how it must be,” she said softly.
The intention, though never stated outright, was simple: to create enough confusion to unsettle the Vixen.
But the Vixen did not unsettle easily.
On the day when her absence would have mattered most, she was elsewhere. Far from the noise, far from the careful rearrangements, she moved in quieter spaces, as though she had sensed the shape of the trap before it had fully formed. The Kingdom, left to itself, felt at once cluttered and hollow, thick with neglect and yet strangely empty.
The Boar laughed anyway. “Excellent participation!” he announced, addressing no one in particular. The sound lingered briefly, then fell flat. No one joined him.
Silence, when it could not be reshaped, proved irritating.
So the Weasel and the Boar agreed—implicitly, of course—to move their efforts beyond the Kingdom’s walls. They knew that, elsewhere, the Vixen occupied herself with smaller, quieter things: gathering fragments of stillness and offering them, without ceremony, to those who needed them.
“We should take part,” said the Boar, with sudden enthusiasm.
“I will pray that it succeeds,” the Mantis added, her voice smooth with quiet assurance.
“Yes! I can help—I can run—” the Pug began, already in motion, the rest of his thought trailing behind him.
They proceeded, with confidence and very little care.
The traces they left were unmistakable—so obvious, in fact, that they bordered on parody. When the Vixen encountered them, she did not react as expected. She did not object, did not confront, did not attempt to correct. She laughed, briefly and without bitterness, and then she chose something far more decisive: she offered no response at all. She left everything exactly as it was—visible, intact, and entirely sufficient.
The effect, when it came, was immediate.
The Weasel vanished, as though the space she occupied had simply closed over itself. The Mantis remained, though her stillness deepened to the point of strain; for a fleeting moment, her carefully joined hands trembled. “I was… praying for the best,” she said, though no one seemed inclined to hear it.
The Boar persisted, but diminished, as if some inner mechanism had quietly failed. The Hippopotamus withdrew into the mud without comment. The Pug continued to run, though now without direction, his urgency unmoored from any purpose.
Through all of this, the Vixen did nothing.
Then, almost as an afterthought, she made a single, subtle change: she altered her reflection within the Kingdom. Where her face had once appeared, there was now only a soft, diffused light—without outline, without form, impossible to fix in place. It was not a gesture of defiance.
It was an absence.
The Kingdom of Rats continued, as such places do, in slow, uneven motion, sustained by small gestures and larger illusions. But the Vixen was no longer part of it—not truly, not even when she passed through its rooms.
And this, more than any confrontation, more than any accusation, proved impossible to bear.
🦊 La Volpe e il Banchetto delle Ombre
Nel cuore del Regno dei Ratti, dove l’aria sapeva di carta vecchia e decisioni rimandate all’infinito, viveva una Volpe. Non era fatta per quel luogo: il suo passo era leggero, il suo sguardo troppo limpido per corridoi costruiti su mezze verità. Eppure, ogni giorno attraversava quel dedalo di stanze, come se una parte di lei fosse rimasta intrappolata lì dentro.
Tra le creature più attive del Regno c’erano la Donnola di Carta, il Cinghiale di Pezza, l’Ippopotamo del Fango e la Mantide. La Mantide era una presenza sottile e inquietante, con lunghe zampe piegate come aghi e le mani sempre congiunte, come se fosse immersa in una preghiera continua. Ma non pregava per la pace. Pregava per il peggio, con una calma quasi dolce che rendeva le sue parole ancora più disturbanti. «Io spero solo che tutto venga sistemato… nel modo giusto», sussurrava ogni tanto, e quel “giusto” aveva sempre un sapore amaro.
La Donnola, invece, non costruiva nulla: sistemava. Spostava parole, riduceva significati, piegava le storie finché non diventavano innocue. Il Cinghiale era l’opposto della Volpe in ogni cosa. Ottuso, pesante, convinto. Non era vecchio, ma si muoveva come se lo fosse, appesantito da se stesso. Rideva spesso, troppo spesso, con una risata larga e sguaiata che arrivava sempre prima della battuta. «Ah! Questa è buona!» sbuffava, mentre i Ratti si guardavano tra loro senza capire. Il suo modo di parlare era confuso, con un accento che sembrava cambiare a metà frase. «Capito? Eh? Insomma… avete capito.» Nessuno aveva capito, ma lui era convinto di essere brillante.
Condivideva questa illusione con l’Ippopotamo del Fango. Non erano amici, non davvero, ma fingevano di esserlo. Si sostenevano a vicenda per mantenere una presenza ingombrante sopra i Ratti più piccoli e impauriti. L’Ippopotamo annuiva lentamente a ogni parola del Cinghiale. «Sì… sì… molto sensato», mormorava, anche quando non c’era nulla da capire.
Intorno a loro, i Ratti tacevano. E il Carlino correva. Piccolo, con le zampette corte e il respiro affannato, si muoveva da uno all’altro cercando di rendersi utile. «Arrivo! Arrivo subito!» ansimava, senza sapere bene a cosa stesse arrivando. Niente era fatto per lui, eppure si convinceva di essere indispensabile. Sorrideva a tutti, seguiva tutti, e arrivava sempre un attimo dopo.
Un giorno, la Donnola decise di rimescolare gli equilibri del Regno. Senza lasciare traccia, spostò pesi invisibili e ridefinì silenziosamente le distanze tra le creature, finché il Cinghiale si ritrovò investito di un compito nuovo, uno di quelli che sembrano grandi solo perché nessuno osa farne domande. La Mantide osservava immobile, le mani congiunte, e inclinò appena il capo. «Così deve essere», sussurrò.
Il piano era creare abbastanza confusione da far vacillare la Volpe. Ma la Volpe non si spavento’. Quel giorno restò altrove, lontana dal rumore, come se avesse percepito la trappola prima ancora che prendesse forma. Il regno rimase pieno di ragnatele e completamente vuoto. Il Cinghiale rise lo stesso. «Ottima partecipazione!» disse, guardando il nulla. Nessuno rise.
Irritati da quel silenzio, la Donnola e il Cinghiale decisero di spostare il gioco fuori. Sapevano che la Volpe, lontano dal Regno, si dedicava a qualcosa di leggero: raccoglieva piccoli frammenti di quiete e li condivideva con chi ne aveva bisogno. «Facciamo finta di voler partecipare», disse il Cinghiale. «Io pregherò che funzioni», aggiunse la Mantide con un sorriso appena accennato. Il Carlino saltò subito. «Sì! Posso aiutare! Posso correre!» Non finì la frase.
E così fecero. Male. Le tracce che lasciarono erano così evidenti da sembrare una caricatura. Quando la Volpe le vide, non si arrabbiò. Rise. Poi fece qualcosa di più forte: non rispose. Lasciò tutto lì, visibile, sufficiente.
Nel Regno, il cambiamento fu immediato. La Donnola scomparve. La Mantide rimase immobile più a lungo del solito; per un istante, le sue mani tremarono. «Io… io pregavo per il meglio…» sussurrò, ma nessuno la ascoltò. Il Cinghiale rimase, ma più piccolo, come se qualcosa si fosse spento dentro di lui. L’Ippopotamo si ritirò nel fango, in silenzio. Il Carlino continuò a correre, ma senza direzione.
La Volpe osservò tutto questo senza intervenire. Poi fece un gesto semplice. Cambiò il proprio riflesso nel Regno. Al posto del suo volto apparve una luce sfumata, senza contorni, impossibile da afferrare. Non era una provocazione. Era una sottrazione.
Il Regno dei Ratti continuò a muoversi lentamente, tra piccoli gesti e grandi illusioni. Ma la Volpe non ne faceva più parte, nemmeno quando era presente. E questo, più di ogni parola, fu ciò che nessuno riuscì davvero a sopportare.
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