Stillness Under the Sporelight
The Girl Who Didn't Blink It is said—by unreliable drunks and slightly more reliable dryads—that if you wander too far into the gloom-glow of the Bristlebac...
Read articleThe story archive
Whimsical
Fifteen illustrated stories appear on each archive page, newest first.
The story archive
Whimsical
331 published tales
Wizard of the Four Realms
Embers of the Pact In the lands before clocks, before kings, before carpets that flew or taxes that didn't, there lived a wizard known only as Calvax. Not a ...
Read article
Madame Mugwort’s Morning Ritual
The Brew Before the Boom Madame Mugwort did not tolerate interruptions before her first cup. Not from the crows, not from the spirits in the attic, and espe...
Read article
Cranky Wings & Cabernet Things
The Root of All Sass The forest hadn’t always been this irritating. Once upon a century or three ago, it was a quiet, dewy glade where deer pranced, squirre...
Read article
The Howling Hat of Hooten Hollow
The Hat That Bit Back By the time Glumbella Fernwhistle turned ninety-seven-and-a-half, she’d stopped pretending her hat wasn’t alive. It gurgled when she ya...
Read article
The Woodland Wisecracker
The Bark Behind the Giggle Deep in the rustling bowels of Elderbark Woods—where the ferns gossip louder than the crows and the mushrooms have cliques—there ...
Read article
The Turquoise Troublemaker
Crimes of Leaf and Laughter There was a place, nestled deep in the forest’s golden curls, where the laws of logic melted faster than a caramel gnome in a hot...
Read article
Winged Wonder in Thought
The Thinking Tree and the Moron with a GoPro Deep in the uncharted underbrush of Not-Quite-Wales-but-Might-As-Well-Be, where GPS signals go to die and the mu...
Read article
Florals and Folklore
The Bloomfather Spring had officially sprung in the hamlet of Mossbottom, and the pollen was drunk on its own power. Birds were tweeting unsolicited advice,...
Read article
The Ember-Eyed Wanderer
Of Hoodies and Horns The forest of Merribark was not on any map, mostly because the cartographers who found it never made it out again—distracted by the into...
Read article
Hope in Hooded Silence
Hooded, Not Humbled The fairy in question had a name, of course. But like all good woodland mysteries, she preferred it whispered. Call her "Hope" and she'll...
Read article
Soaked in Sunshine and Mischief
It was the kind of rain that made the world smell alive — damp earth, crushed leaves, and that heady perfume of mushrooms fermenting secrets into the soil. ...
Read article
Equinox in Feathers
Once upon a cusp between seasons, deep in a forest that couldn’t quite decide if it was sweating or freezing, there lived a peacock named Percival Featherst...
Read article
The Petal's Little Protector
It was a night so muggy you could drink the air. Somewhere between midnight and whatever hour is reserved for bad decisions, the garden vibrated with the kin...
Read article
Fae of the Laughing Leaves
A Cautionary Tale of Bad Decisions and Worse Ideas The Acorn Incident Deep in the Greenwood — where even the moss rolls its eyes at tourists — lived a fairy ...
Read article