Every child in Mrs. somone’s orphanage knew the rules:  

1. No jumping on beds after dark.  
2. No stealing sweets from the kitchen.  
3. And never, ever leave your toys out at night.  

But eight-year-old Veera was too heartbroken to care. After the matron scolded her for crying over her broken clay horse—"It's just dirt and paint, child"—she left its pieces on the windowsill and hid under her blanket.  

At midnight, the sobbing stopped.  

Because the toys began to sing.  

 The Mending Song  

First came the wooden elephant with the missing leg, dragging itself across the floor with a sound like wind through hollow trees. Then the ragdoll with one button eye, stitching herself a new pupil from moonlight. The tin soldiers marched in formation, their bayonets lifting Veera’s shattered horse onto a battlefield of scattered crayons.  

And the toys worked.  

- The elephant’s trunk glued ceramic shards with honey stolen from the chapel candles  
- The doll’s hair—unspooled yarn—wove a mane stronger than horsehair  
- The soldiers melted their own medals to fill the cracks with liquid silver  

 The Price  

By dawn, the clay horse stood whole on Veera’s pillow, its legs flecked with metallic scars. But the toy shelf looked different:  

- The elephant’s remaining leg had splintered.  
- The doll’s other eye had gone dark.  
- Three soldiers lay motionless, their chests hollow where medals used to be.  

Mrs. somone would say it was just child’s imagination.  

But Veera knew better.  

That evening, she left her bread crusts by the toy shelf—"For the heroes"—and whispered the only rule that mattered:  

"Love lasts longer than porcelain."