Anahera the Angel

Anahera the angel is made from 100% cotton yarn, unless requested otherwise. Other color palates available upon request. Please allow a month and a half of production time. Because Anahera is hand-made, expedited production time is not possible, although we don’t expect it to take a full six weeks.

20% of the proceeds of this, and all future Christmas patterns will go toward A21, to give a family the second-best Christmas gift possible; the return of a trafficked loved one.

Ordering Process

To skip the story and order your angel, email me at dressedlilies@gmail.com, and we’ll get all the details sorted out! 🙂

Dress, hair, and skin colors can be specified via special order if you want an item other than this one. Custom orders bump prices up, depending on materials and complexity of additional details. Sizes can be adjusted, as well; price stands to adjust depending on size.

(If you’re like me, you’re not here for the product but the pattern. Well, my dears, this pattern was one I came up with based off these pictures from Kamlin. Mainly because I didn’t know how much I’d actually be paying for the pattern. Inspiration credit fully goes to her, though! Have fun and happy making!)

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There are some things it’s fair to assume don’t move. The angel on top of your Christmas tree being among them. You definitely don’t expect it to fall off the top of your tree with a thud while you’re home alone. Watching a scary movie.

Aryeh attacking the Christmas tree was completely understandable, really.

Although his parents disagreed when they got home.

Whether fortunately or unfortunately, though, Aryeh was the only one who knew how to fix the angel. While he wasn’t grounded per se, he did have to fix the angel in such a way that it’d stay fixed, help his dad repair the tree and lights, sweep up the broken ornaments, and put the ones that hadn’t broken back onto the tree before he could play his video games or watch movies again. And he “certainly wasn’t allowed to watch that one anymore, young man. Clearly, it’s causing your adrenaline to surge in inadvisable ways.”

It was no use arguing that that’s precisely what scary movies were supposed to do, considering the evidence of its effectiveness was scattered across the living room floor. And the fact that a few presents had been impaled by the breaking ornaments or crushed by the falling tree wasn’t helping his case, either.

So he took the angel back to his room and fiddled around with it, gluing this and that, digging through his stash of wire and his sister’s stash of fabric to discover what might hold it together.

He finishes sometime after midnight and falls into bed, tired, but he’s that much closer to being free to play his video games tomorrow. That wasn’t so bad, he has to admit.

But then he wakes up to find the angel has completely disappeared and, in its place is an entirely different angel.

Aryeh’s stomach falls out from under him, and all he can do is stare at it.

Again, you should be able to expect some things not to move, but apparently, reality isn’t playing by its own rules these days, and the new, never-before-seen angel turns its blank face to look at him.

If reality’s going to break its own rules, it should only expect to have a shoe thrown at its face. The angel is knocked off Aryeh’s desk with an “mmpf,” as Aryeh mutters an exclamation that’d only serve to extend his not-quite-grounded-ness.

The angel makes a few more muffled noises that sound indignant as Aryeh creeps closer with an old hockey stick he’d been meaning to donate but never had. Just as he’s about to bring the stick down on the angel–and potentially commit an act that’d get him turned away from the pearly gates, although he’s not sure about that–something catches his eye.

Aryeh makes it a point to keep his desk as clean and empty as possible, and he’d made sure to clear it off after fixing the angel last night. This morning? He didn’t exactly know. But now, there’s an envelope in the middle of it. Aryeh keeps a wary eye on the angel–that looks like it was made of yarn, somehow–and sidesteps his way to his desk. He picks up the envelope as the angel shakes its head as though to clear it.

Aryeh is no expert in stationary, but he’s pretty sure the heavy, thick envelope- and the heavy, thick paper that comes out of it- is impressive. It doesn’t feel like normal paper, although he can’t explain how it’s different.

Dear Aryeh Agnew,

The angel you repaired yesterday is safe and sound and back on the top of your Christmas tree.

As you have no doubt noticed, this angel is not that angel. This angel desperately needs protection, as the safe house it was previously in has been compromised. As was demonstrated yesterday, you are very capable of attacking what you believe means you harm. It was also noticed that you came out an unscathed victor, something that cannot be said for your Christmas tree. It is, of course, highly irregular that we put a principal under the care of a caretaker when the caretaker is still unaware of our existence. Still, we believe this to be a safe exception.

Show the enclosed ID card to your sister and ask her to explain the state of things. If you agree to be the caretaker to this angel, write your agreement on the back of this paper by midnight on the day you received it, and place it under the restored Christmas tree. It will be picked up by one of our agents. If you refuse to be a caretaker in this matter, write your refusal on the back of this paper and do the same. The angel can and will fly back to us of her own accord, and it will be as though she was never here. Your sister will refuse all knowledge of the situation, so you might as well not try to get her to side with you.

If you harm the angel or otherwise try to reveal the truth about her living condition, we have ways to keep our secrets safe. Ways we would not advise you test.

We hope you have a pleasant day, Mr. Agnew,

[redacted] from the NSF board

Aryeh reads through the letter again. His sister? He picks up the lanyard with the laminated ID card hanging from it. There’s a logo on it: a circle with a lot of curlicues like a stylized medallion. Inside it were the letters NSF, with words around the inside of the circle working those letters out to mean No Sparrow Falls; Protecting the Commonly Stange, whatever that means.

Below the logo, it was stated that Aryeh Agnew was a temporary handler for Anahera the Angel in division undetermined. It also had an ID number.

Aryeh frowns and turns the card over, but there’s nothing on the back.

There’s a muffled noise similar to someone clearing their throat, and Aryeh turns to look at the angel. She’s sitting on the floor, blank face looking up at him. Her face has no expression, but Aryeh can imagine she’s annoyed. “Caretaker, huh? Ask my sister, huh? Yeah, this is exactly how I wanted this day to go.”

The angel crosses her arms as though annoyed.

Aryeh sighs and picks her up, putting her on his desk.

She shakes her head and points at the door with an arm.

Aryeh hesitates but then shrugs. If his sister is supposed to know what this is about, anyway…

“Alright, you can come with me.” He slides the lanyard over his arm and picks her up. It feels weird to have the angel move in his grip, resting its arms on his hands. “Aislin? I need to talk with you!”