‘What are thinking?’ she asked him.
‘I was thinking of a dream I had once,’ he said. ‘At least, I think now it must have been a dream, though it seemed very real at the time. It was the night my father died.’
‘Tell me about it,’ she said quietly.
So he told her about the cave on the lonely hillside and the cold lady and the oath he’d sworn.
‘Do you remember the words of that oath?’ she said.
‘Strangely, I do,’ he said. ‘Every word. It was never to speak of her or that night, not to mother, nor brother, nor sister, nor sweetheart, nor…’
‘Nor wedded wife, nor child,’ she said, ‘nor friend, nor foe, nor to any living creature that walks or crawls on land or swims in the sea or flies in the sky. You broke your promise,’ she said sadly.
Suddenly, the room was deathly cold.
‘Such a pretty boy you were then,’ she said. ‘So young, that I took pity on you.’
She turned away, opened the window and stepped out into the garden.
He cried out, ‘Take me with you! Don’t leave me here alone!’ but by the time he reached the window, there was nothing to see but the snow softly falling.
The Brownie under the Bridge
Scotland
Ever since he was a wee, small boy, Torquil had been afraid of the brownie that lived under the bridge. It began with his father, Torquil sitting up beside him every Wednesday, driving their pony cart to market. As they came to the bridge, his father would whip up the pony till she was going so fast it was a wonder she didn’t go flying up into the sky, cart and all.
When Torquil asked him why, his father told him it was because of the brownie living there. ‘If that brownie ever lays hands you,’ he said, ‘why then, you’re finished. You’ll never see your home or your kinfolk again.’
When he grew up and took over the farm, Torquil did as his father had done, going at top speed over the bridge, because the chances were that the brownie was still there. Brownies live a long time, so he’d been told, maybe two or three hundred years.
In time he married his childhood sweetheart, Jeannie, a sensible sort of a girl who didn’t try to change his mind, since Torquil’s fear of the brownie cut short their weekly trip to market by a good ten minutes.
Soon, she found she was expecting a baby. The weeks and months went by, until one evening she said to Torquil, ‘I think the baby’s coming. You must go and fetch the doctor.’
‘What, now?’ said Torquil, thinking of driving the trap over the brownie’s bridge in the dark.
‘Yes, now.’
‘Can it not wait till morning?’
‘This baby will be born long before morning. Off you go now and fetch the doctor.’
‘Would it not be better if I stayed with you?’
‘What do you know about delivering babies?’
‘I don’t like to leave you alone.’
‘I won’t be alone for long. The sooner you go, the sooner you’ll be back.’
‘What if I don’t come back? What if the brownie…?’
‘If you don’t bother the brownie, it won’t bother you. Please, Torquil, I’m begging you…’
At that moment, a knock came at the door.
Outside, stood a little old tinker woman. She was wrinkled and bent and smelt of fish and mouldering leaves, but Jeannie welcomed her in as if she’d been an angel sent from heaven.
The old woman had barely begun to speak, ‘I wonder, could you spare me a bite to eat and if I could sleep in the stable…’, when, ‘Come in! Come in!’ says Jeannie. ‘There’s a pot of stew on the stove and bread made fresh this morning. And a proper bed, too, for you to rest your weary bones this night, if you’ll just keep me company while this man of mine goes for the doctor.’
‘I’d be happy to,’ the old woman beamed. ‘Off you go now, lad – spit-spot!’
With the two women standing against him now, Torquil knew he’d no choice but to go, so he took the road at such a lick that he barely noticed the brownie’s bridge till he was safely over it and knocking on the door of the doctor’s house.
It wasn’t till the doctor was fetching his little black bag that Torquil realised the pickle he was in. He’d got to drive the doctor back to the farm. Then, after the baby was born, he’d have to bring the doctor home again, and then drive back to the farm again, alone. Four times in one night he’d be driving over the brownie’s bridge.
‘No, no!’ he whispered. ‘I cannot do it!’
The doctor was very understanding when he explained. ‘No problem,’ he said. ‘I’ll saddle up my own pony and ride behind you. Then there’ll be no need for you to bring me home.’
But saddling up the doctor’s pony took that little bit more time. And that pony could no more break into a gallop than fly to the moon.
By the time Torquil arrived back at the farm with the doctor riding behind him, he found Jeannie sitting up in bed with her newborn baby in her arms.
‘Well, well,’ said the doctor. ‘It looks like you didn’t need me after all.’
‘Where’s she gone?’ said Torquil. ‘The little old tinker woman who promised to stay till I came home again.’
‘You mean the brownie woman?’ Jeannie said smiling.
‘The what? The who?’
Jeannie laughed. ‘Poor Torquil! All these years you’ve been afraid of the brownie under the bridge and never stopped to wonder what it might look like! That one was the sweetest creature – and she’s delivered more babies than you ever will, doctor, in a lifetime. No offence.’
‘None taken,’ the doctor said, smiling. ‘Though if I were to live another couple of hundred years…’
The next day, Torquil took a basket of eggs and left them by the bridge on his way to market by way of a thank you. When he came back the basket was empty. Often after that he and his children after him − and his grandchildren and great-grandchildren too − would leave a little something now and then for the brownie, right up until the day they died, though none of them ever saw the brownie woman again.
Though brownies do live an awful long time. So it’s quite possible she’s living there still.
A Room Full of Spirits
Korea
There was once a boy who loved nothing more than to listen to stories. His father had an old servant who was a wonderful storyteller. Every night, he told the boy a new bedtime story. Every night, the stories whispered to him in his dreams.
The boy was also very selfish. ‘These stories are mine,’ he told the old servant. ‘I don’t want any of them to go beyond this room.’
That made the old man very sad. Like all storytellers, he wanted to share the tales he had to tell with anyone who would listen.
But he was a servant. He had to do as the boy said. And, since all storytellers are, in a way, magicians, able to conjure whole worlds out of thin air, it wasn’t a hard thing to do, to bind those stories so they never left the boy’s room.
Time went by, the boy grew up and became too old for stories, but still those stories haunted his dreams.
Until the day came when he was to be married. The whole household gathered in the courtyard, forming up for the procession to the bride’s house, where the wedding would take place.
All except the old storyteller. He was too old for all that junketing – the noise and bustle! Why couldn’t people be married quietly any more, the way they used to do in the old days? He’d just creep in at the back when the ceremony began.
Meanwhile, he wandered round the empty house, enjoying the silence, until, passing the boy’s room, he heard a whispering inside, of many voices. He eased open the door and stepped inside. The room seemed to be empty, but his head was suddenly filled with memories of stories he’d told long ago and almost forgotten. And with voices calling to him.
‘Old man! Old man, we know you can hear us.’
‘Please let us out. We want to go to the wedding too.’
‘Have you forgotten us? You
trapped us here. You are the only one with power to set us free.’
The old man smiled. ‘Forgotten you?’ he said. ‘Of course not! How could I forget a single one of you? You are my children. But the young master commanded me…’
‘Never mind what he said!’
‘He’s going away.’
‘He doesn’t need us any more.’
‘Please, please, please! Set us free.’
The old man said. ‘Go free, then, my children. Wander over the wide world, wherever you will.’ It was like a weight lifting off his shoulders.
Oh, but then the whispering voices started again, buzzing round his head like a swarm of angry bees.
‘We’re free!’
‘Free!’
‘Free at last!’
‘Now to get our revenge on that selfish boy!’
‘We’ll teach him to keep us prisoner all these years!’
‘I’m the story of the enchanted well. He’s bound to be thirsty on such a hot day. If I position myself right beside the road, one sip of my water and he’ll fall into a sleep from which…’
‘What if he doesn’t drink? Remember me? The story of the poisoned strawberries. One bite and he’ll be turned into…’
‘And if that doesn’t work,’ hissed another voice, ‘I’ll be lurking under the mat set down for him when he steps off his horse in the form of a poisonous snake.’
‘Stop!’ cried the old man. ‘Stop! Come back!’
The story spirits were off and away down the road in pursuit of the young master, who wasn’t a bad boy at heart.
What should he do? What could he do? The wedding procession was well under way. Even if he could make it stop long enough to listen, warn them of the dangers, would anyone believe him?
Still, he had to try. His legs were aching and his heart was pounding by the time he caught up with the procession but he was not a minute too soon.
A servant was offering up a cup of water from a roadside well for the young man to drink. The old man dashed it to one side, seized the reins of the young man’s horse and limped off again along the road.
Everyone was too surprised to do anything but follow.
The young man was still thirsty. When he spotted a field of strawberries, he called out to the old man to stop.
‘Stop! Stop! A handful of sweet strawberries would quench my thirst even better than water.’
The old man didn’t stop. For all the notice he took, he might as well have been struck stone deaf since breakfast time.
So they arrived safely at the bride’s house, where a ceremonial carpet had been laid down for the bridegroom to step onto.
Imagine everyone’s surprise when the old man let go of the horse some distance away, rushed over to the carpet and whisked it up … to reveal a snake rearing its poisonous head!
Luckily there were enough well-armed men around to make short work of the snake.
‘You saved my life, old man,’ the young man said. ‘But how did you know the snake was there?’
So then the old man, having got his breath back, got his chance to explain about the snake, the well and the strawberries, and who could say what other dangers which might be lurking in the days to come.
‘I was wrong, wasn’t I?’ the young man said, ‘to try to keep these stories all to myself.’
The old man bowed his head. ‘Stories are meant for sharing,’ he said. ‘We storytellers only borrow them for a while. The stories I told you when you were little, tell them to your children and your children’s children. And they’ll be content.’
Lari Don’s enthralling collection of folk tales about heroines from all around the world. These girls use their cleverness, courage or kindness to win the day, beating wicked witches, seven-headed dragons, shapeshifting demons and greedy giants.
A stunning collection of folk tales and legends from all over Europe. Magical to farcical, tender to terrifying, this selection of often unusual and little known stories from each state of the European Union is a joy to read.
Lari Don’s magical collection of folk tales about winter from all around the world. Find out how spiders invented tinsel, what happened when the spring girl beat the hag of winter, why eagle feathers made snow, and how a hero with hairy trousers used ice to kill a dragon.
From the girl whose stepmother turns her into a dragon to the werewolf’s bride, and from the god who becomes a fish to the girl who won’t kiss a frog, this fabulous collection is full of shape shifters from all corners of the world. Be careful; no one is quite who they seem!
This electronic edition published in 2015 by Bloomsbury Publishing Plc
Published 2015 by
A & C Black, an imprint of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc
50 Bedford Square, London, WC1B 3DP
www.bloomsbury.com
Bloomsbury is a registered trademark of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc
Copyright © 2015 A&C Black
Text copyright © 2015 Maggie Pearson
Illustrations copyright © 2015 Francesca Greenwood
The right of Maggie Pearson and Francesca Greenwood to be identified as the author and illustrator of this work respectively has been asserted by them in accordance with the Copyrights, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
ISBN 978-1-4729-1368-5
ePub ISBN 978-1-4729-1370-8
A CIP catalogue for this book is available from the British Library.
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