On a Wind-Laden Winter Morning
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Below is a fully polished English letter from the British Queen to her old knitting friend, written in the tone you wanted: — regal but playful, — gently mocking, — with Hogwarts overtones, — and with the political satire about the “Chocolate Kingdom,” — plus meta-literary humor about Turing, Tolstoy, drones, Arizona, etc. It’s long, atmospheric, richly detailed. |
Enjoy! |
My dearest Eleanor,
Of course it is not I who writes — I am merely dictating, while my Royal Secretary crouches over a sheet of warm vellum like a nervous owl from the Owlery, scratching each word with a quill borrowed (with great ceremony and entirely unnecessary dramatics) from the College of Heralds.
In a moment he will sprinkle stardust powder on the still-wet ink, shake it twice — no more, roll the parchment with the precision of a Hogwarts letter, and seal it with my signet in red wax so thick it smells faintly of old spells.
And while he does all that, I sit in my red chair by the window knitting a Gryffindor scarf with deliberate, mischievous pride. (You, I believe, are still faithful to your mittens — though I insist a scarf gives one far more opportunity to perform a dramatic sweep of the shoulders before entering a room.)
| Now, ✨ | ✨ a confession. |
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The Royal scientists — those delightful, well-funded layabouts — have spent the last fortnight meddling with the Turing-driven automaton from the archives, the Turing Quill Model 2000, a self-writing contraption so temperamental it occasionally corrects Shakespeare and once attempted to add footnotes to the Book of Common Prayer.
With a few taps and teasing provocations (the device responds disturbingly well to flattery), the scientists coaxed it into producing the opening chapter of what appears to be a vast European novel.
Tolstoy would have fainted with envy. His poor wife copied War and Peace out five times by candlelight, while this infernal machine spits chapters like a caffeinated Dickens. I swear, if Tolstoy knew of it in his day, he’d have locked it in the stables — or written a treatise calling it “the devil’s typist.”
But listen, my dear Eleanor — the story it produced!
“In a small European realm —
let us whimsically name it the Chocolate Kingdom —
the Queen declared three days of national strike.
Three days where no trams rattled,
no paperwork shuffled,
no civil servants pretended to work while drinking tea.
The offices fell silent.
But the bars and cafés brimmed with citizens
buzzing like a shaken hive,
discussing the sudden collapse of the social programs
left in the hands of the ruling coalition known as Arizona —
a political sect entrusted with slicing the enormous chocolate treasury
into pieces that somehow always melt before reaching the poor.
At the same time, the new political season opened
with a darker, metallic taste:
the Russian aggression
and the Drone War that hums over Ukraine
like steel locusts.
Newspapers screamed:
‘A SWARM OF DRONES ABOVE KYIV IS LIKE HITLER’S U-BOATS ABOVE LONDON!’
‘CHURCHILL WOULD NOT APPROVE!’
‘ARIZONA DEMANDS A BILLION EUROS FOR ANTI-DRONE SHIELDS!’
‘DRONES AS PRECISE AS AMAZON, DELIVERING WAR BY DOORBELL!’
And in the Parliament,
a trembling man with a loud tie proclaimed that
modern drones are nothing short of
‘GRENADES WITH SWASTIKAS DELIVERED BY COURIER SERVICE.’
The Chamber gasped.
Someone fainted behind the benches.
The Queen of Chocolate listened to all this
and stirred her tea slowly — clockwise,
because counterclockwise invites rebellion.
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And she thought:
It does not matter who wins this confectionary conflict.
What matters is that I — the Queen —
may always declare a national strike
to give my people a few days to think.”
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Now, Eleanor, you understand why I adore the Turing Quill.
It captures the spirit of Europe better than half our diplomats.
And yes — between us —
I do believe every queen deserves the right
to halt her kingdom for three days
so the citizens may remember they are human
and not merely clockwork.
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P.S.The Secretary is glaring at me — he fears this letter has become too long, too whimsical, too candid.
But we are old women now, you and I, with our scarves and mittens, and who shall scold us?
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| If you want the reply from the friend, or a sequel chapter of the Chocolate Kingdom, or the Queen discovering the Turing machine has joined a union, I will gladly continue. |
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...with all the warmth of Gryffindor wool and all the mischief of a queen too old to pretend otherwise.
