The Toy Prince

The moment Marisol knew her Uncle Drosselmeyer had to be a genius was the day he surprised her family with a clockwork dog. Marisol wasn’t the only one overjoyed. Her brother Frix and older sister Lucinda could hardly contain their excitement at the idea of a handmade family pet.

Marisol remembered how she chased the artificial husky around the living room while her Mama, Papa, and Uncle watched. Papa was beyond furious, but no one seemed to care. The Hoffman children were used to their Papa saying no, and somehow getting their way with the help of Mama. This Yuletide would be no different.

“Bernadette,” Papa said, fixing his wife with one of his distinctive fun-killing glares. “Remember when we said ‘no pets’? That includes wind up mongrels that your brother conjured with his juju.”

It was natural for anyone who met Drosselmeyer to feel suspicious of his motives. He was a clock shaman by trade, choosing to parade his connection to the supernatural with the outline of a human skull painted over most of his face. He was also missing an eye, which he covered with an opaque goggle patch. His top hat and ankle-length waistcoat gave his already skinny frame the appearance of a twisted, gnarled tree.

Uncle Drosselmeyer merely smiled as he popped a chunk of coco bread between his lips. “Now, Malachi, do be mindful of what you say. You’ll hurt Gizmo’s feelings.”

Frix, who had overheard them, couldn’t help his outburst. “Gizmo? Is that his name, Uncle Drosselmeyer?”

Marisol, who already had her arms wrapped around the husky’s neck, squeezed as tightly as she could. “Oh, Uncle Drosselmeyer, it’s perfect! Papa, isn’t Gizmo just perfect?”

The artificial dog wagged his tail accordingly, showing off the sheen of his tongue, which matched the rest of his metallic coat. The only color that stood out was the lantern neon green of his eyes.

Papa ground his teeth and turned again to Mama. “Bernadette, I’m serious. We need to get that dog out of here before the children become too attached.”

Mama laughed. “Malachi, do you remember why we said no pets in the first place? It was for Lucinda’s health. We didn’t want to risk her having an allergic reaction. But it appears that Dross found the solution for that.”

“But Darling, don’t you agree that no means no?”

Everyone knew that Papa’s fun-slaughter had nothing to do with Lucinda’s health and all to do with his chronic wariness of Uncle Drosselmeyer’s enchanted inventions.

Marisol and her siblings turned their pleading gazes onto their Mama. She was their last hope. Lucinda carefully got to her feet – for the doctor had forbidden any abrupt movement during her recovery – and delicately danced towards the adults. She held her arms at low graceful angles and was so light and measured in her skip, as if she hadn’t spent six months on hiatus from what she loved most – ballet. Ever since she had been in poor health, she had to be barred from attending classes until she fully recovered.

Marisol and Frix held their breaths as Lucinda continued to prance. They knew that whenever Lucinda really wanted something, she danced for it.

Papa and Mama never stood a chance.

Lucinda balanced on her toes, her nightgown rippling around her knees. “Please, Papa.”

She bowed low, arching her wrist with that otherworldly swanlike grace that Marisol could never replicate in her own dancing, no matter how many hours she practiced. Still bent over in her bow, Lucinda tilted her cloudy gray eyes upward.

“Can we please keep Gizmo?”

Mama fought to hold back tears. “Oh, Luci.”

Uncle Drosselmeyer grinned knowingly behind his skull mask.

Papa blinked his own cool gray eyes and lost all willpower. “The mongrel can stay.”

Lucinda slowly lifted her torso to full height. “Thank you, Papa!”

Marisol and Frix went berserk. “Gizmo gets to stay! Gizmo gets to stay!”

Lucinda went to hug Papa, who was back to growling and scowling. “You didn’t let me finish. That thing can only stay until Yuletide is over. Then he’s going back home with your crazy uncle.”

The Hoffman children continued to rejoice, for they knew that no such thing would happen. Gizmo would be theirs forever.

Marisol would never forget that Yuletide. It would be the last one where Lucinda danced. Five Yuletides passed since then and Lucinda had grown steadily weaker. By the time Marisol was fifteen, Papa and Mama Hoffman were preparing this to be Lucinda’s last Yuletide.

“Tell us what you would like for this year,” Mama said as she bent over Lucinda’s bed-bound form. Though she was barely twenty, Lucinda possessed the energy and fragility of a geriatric monarch.

Papa was there too, holding Lucinda’s hand and trying to keep up a strong face. “That’s right, babygirl. We’ll get you anything you want this year. You just name it.”

Lucinda coughed and looked past Mama and Papa at Marisol and Frix. She winked at them before looking back up at Papa. “You’re not going to like it, Papa.”

The gray eyes that Papa shared with his eldest daughter softened as he caressed her damp forehead. “You don’t worry about me, sweetheart. Just tell us what you want for Yuletide.”

She sighed. “I want to spend Yuletide with Uncle Drosselmeyer this year.”

From where she stood, Marisol could see Papa’s back go rigid. There was laughter in Mama’s voice as she bent over and kissed Lucinda on the head. “Oh sweetie, that’s all? We’ll call your uncle right up.”

Marisol and Frix shot private celebratory glances. Frix, being still a child, had to be thinking about all of the toy soldiers Drosselmeyer was bound to bring with him. But Marisol was hopeful that her uncle would help her work on her juju.

It came as no surprise that Papa wasn’t thrilled when the Hoffman family had learned about a year ago that Marisol possessed the same clock-crafting skills as her uncle. Papa eventually grew accustomed to her conjuring life back into any broken appliances or whispering the glitches out of the more complicated household devices. It didn’t take long for Marisol’s clock-craft to become a part of the family dynamic just as Gizmo had after spending a few days following Papa around and fetching his slippers whenever he needed them.

Marisol had relied on her new clock-craft to take her mind off of Lucinda’s deteriorating health. When the eldest Hoffman child learned of Marisol’s new gift, she squealed in delight and requested little juju ballerinas to fill up her shelves.

“I’m no Uncle Drosselmeyer,” Marisol told her. The most she could make her ballerinas last was a few hours before they would eventually need to be wound up again. And the clockwork dolls were limited in the moves they could perform, the most complicated being a pirouette.

After Mama and Papa left Lucinda’s bedroom, Marisol approached her sister’s side and said, “With Uncle Drosselmeyer’s help, I’m going to build a proper ballerina for you. This one will be able to leap and do splits. I promise.”

Lucinda looked around her room at the dozens of prototypes. “I’m thankful for all of the toys you’ve made me. They’re all special in their own way.” She chuckled. “You’ve got a ballerina from every corner of the world. And they all have their own styles of dance and wardrobe. How could I possibly ask for more?”

Marisol knelt by the bed so that she was level with Lucinda’s shoulder. “I haven’t made one that looks like you yet. This one will. She’ll have your eyes and your pretty hair.”

Lucinda reached out and tugged one of Marisol’s fiercely curly spirals. “Don’t count your hair out, sis. It’s lovely too.”

If Lucinda took after Papa, then Marisol was a slightly fairer-skinned version of Mama. Their parents came from two separate islands. Papa’s side was all olive skin, aquiline noses, and pale eyes; Mama and Uncle Drosselmeyer’s skin was richer in tone, their features fuller and rounder, and their hair cast the illusion of appearing coarse, but was in fact wickedly soft at the touch.

Frix appeared to be an even blend of Bernadette and Malachi’s polar genetics. But Lucinda favored Papa in the eyes, skin, and hair. Marisol was the closest to Mama in skin tone and had hair that without assistance, refused to stretch past the nape of her neck.

Lucinda said, “Close your eyes. I have something for you.”

When Marisol was told to open them again, she found in her hand a basket stuffed with decorative paper. Curiously, she peeled the paper away. Underneath the wrapping was a bone-white surface with large hollow holes and sickle-shaped teeth.

“Ah! My apprentice skull! Thanks, Luci.” Marisol donned her head with the saber skull.

Lucinda added, “Now you’re a real clock shaman in training. Wait until Uncle Drosselmeyer sees.”

As if Lucinda had spoken the magic words, a loud crash erupted from downstairs. It was followed by Papa’s irate curses and Mama’s amused laughter. Soon Frix and Gizmo joined in, their combined barking making it impossible to tell who was who.

Marisol sighed and patted Lucinda’s hand. “I’ll be right back.”

The young shaman found her family making a ruckus over a fallen Yuletide tree in the living room. Half of its clockwork decorations that Marisol had built herself were strewn across the floor. Gizmo and Frix were making it even worse by marching around on top of them.

Papa whipped the air with the end of a broom, his face as red as a kidney bean.

“These damned bats,” he grunted, “haven’t shown up in months! But Drosselmeyer arrives and they’re suddenly hiding in our tree? Don’t try to convince me that it’s a coincidence.”

Uncle Drosselmeyer casually stepped into view with his arms crossed behind him. “Bats? I don’t see any bats here. Malachi, you really should sit down and have a drink.”

Marisol leaped the last few steps and bounded over the tick-tockery shambles.

“Uncle Drosselmeyer!”

“Oh!” The old man grunted when his niece plowed into his arms. “Has it really been five years? Look at how you’ve grown! I see that you’ve been embracing your knack for clock-craftsmanship.”

“Marisol, what the hell is that you got ’pon your head?”

Marisol shrank at the edge in Papa’s voice. She forgot to take off her shaman skull before coming downstairs! Using her uncle’s waistcoat as a shield, she peeped, “Don’t be mad, Papa. Lucinda made it for me.”

Papa growled under his breath and went back to sweeping for the so-called bats.

Uncle Drosselmeyer squeezed Marisol’s shoulders. “I can’t wait for us to get started, but first, take me to your sister. I have something for her.”

Marisol gladly led Uncle Drosselmeyer to Lucinda’s chambers. Frix and Gizmo followed them up the stairs. Lucinda’s eyes lit up when the five of them entered her room. She tried to sit up a little straighter for her uncle.

Frix shoved his way to the front and blurted, “Luci, if Uncle Drosselmeyer gives you a toy, will you let me try it out first? Pretty please!”

Marisol fought the urge to hurl her skull at her brother’s head. “Frix, get out of the way.”

Her brother stuck his tongue out at her. “On second thought, if Uncle Drosselmeyer gives you another one of those ballerinas like Marisol makes, you can keep it. Those are beyond lame.”

“Take that back, Frix!”

Marisol snatched her brother by the collar and wrestled him to the carpet. Some of Lucinda’s toy ballerinas came to her aid, leaping down from their shelves and pirouetting on Frix’s face. Gizmo, the clockwork dog, flounced around the two of them, chasing his tail obsessively when their rivalry grew too intense for him.

While they were occupied, Uncle Drosselmeyer pulled aside the lapel of his waistcoat and retrieved Lucinda’s present. Though her body was tired from all the excitement in the house, Lucinda forced her eyes to stay open.

“Uncle, how did you know to visit us? I only just asked Mama if she would invite you.”

The clock shaman winked his good eye. “I’ve been working on this toy for you, and when I added the finishing touch, I just got this hunch to come and see you. Here it is.”

He carefully placed the parcel between Lucinda’s weak arms.

“I wonder what it is.” Lucinda unwrapped a human-shaped figure. Her gray eyes gleamed.

“A Nutbreaker! Frix! Marisol! Get off the floor and come see!”

In a matter of seconds, all three of the Hoffman children were gathered around and mesmerized by the handmade Nutbreaker. Drosselmeyer had designed him so that he broke nuts on his own. They took turns placing hazelnuts inside him and watching him grind them between his pearly teeth.

It was a handsome Nutbreaker. His frame was wrapped in a combination of fastidiously tailored pieces and draped fabric with exotic print. His caramel skin was colored with round, rosy cheeks. Distinguished facial hair hugged his lower face and complemented the lush black corkscrew curls that snaked out of a regal golden turban. Lucinda’s Nutbreaker could have easily assumed the role of a dauntless matador or a foreign dignitary.

Unable to keep her eyes open or her head up, Lucinda slumped against her pillow in a labored, but blissful slumber.

Marisol sighed. She wanted to keep playing with the Nutbreaker, but it wouldn’t be fair to Lucinda. She reached for Frix, who was holding it.

“Nuh-uh! I didn’t finish my turn.” He darted away with the Nutbreaker.

Marisol looked to her uncle. “Uncle, can you tell Frix to give it back? He can’t play with Luci’s stuff when she’s resting.”

Drosselmeyer said nothing; he merely peered mildly at his niece and nephew.

Frix put even more distance between them and drew up something round and shiny.

“Hold on. This thing’s really good at breaking nuts. I want to see if he can make a dent in one of my toy cannonballs.”

Marisol shot forward. “Frix, no!”

But it was too late. Her stupid knucklehead brother popped the bullet between the handsome Nutbreaker’s teeth and watched him automatically chomp down.

Though the air shattered with the sound of something breaking, the cannonball remained unharmed. The lower half of Nutbreaker’s jaw, however, wound up falling to the floor.

“Frix . . .” Marisol bit at his name. “What have you done?”

The boy shrugged and dropped the toy on a random shelf before rushing out of the room. Marisol surged forward, scooping the Nutbreaker into her arms and cradling him as if he were a newborn.

“I’ll fix you,” she whispered. “I’ll make you handsome again. I’ll make you better.”

Marisol held the Nutbreaker close and turned a few times in place. She imagined herself in mint pastel stockings and a cotton candy tutu before elevating herself onto her toes. Even though she was nowhere near as graceful as her sister, she closed her eyes and danced with the ruined Nutbreaker. She danced with him because she knew Lucinda could not.

She danced, and danced, and danced . . . until she realized that something could have been done to prevent this.

Marisol opened her eyes and turned to face her Uncle Drosselmeyer.

“Uncle, why didn’t you stop Frix? He would have listened to you!”

Needles pricked the back of Marisol’s neck. She blinked.

“Uncle Drosselmeyer?”

But the clock shaman was gone.