Categories: all aviation Building a Biplane bicycle gadgets misc motorcycle theater
I'm building up a new campaign world for a D&D game I'll be running soon, and I have finally produced some work from that effort which I can share without spoiling anything.
The initial adventure location is in a Slavic-inspired region of this world, and I needed a folktale for one of the situations I was setting up. As is usual in these cases, I just started writing to see what would come out -- all I knew was the title, and one of the pivotal moments in the story. It's always fun to see what my feverish little brain comes up with in these cases.
Thus, I present you the quickie first-draft story of the Witch in the Woods, written roughly in the style of traditional folktales:
Once, long ago, there was a young girl named Maria Antipova, who had an infant brother, Leonid. Their parents had died, and they were living as best they could in their parents' cottage in the woods. Maria would gather firewood during the day, and sell or trade it to local villagers in exchange for food. It was a hard life, but they were surviving, and the local villagers gave them a good rate for the firewood, for they felt sorry for the pair.
One day, a withered old woman dressed in fine traveller's clothes came to their door, and begged for some food as a weary traveller. Maria invited her in, and gave the old woman what she could. It was meager, just porridge and a very small mug of warm milk, and she apologized for the poor fare. The old woman demanded more, having become very imperious once she had stepped over the threshold. Maria gave her more milk, but the old woman was not satisfied. Leonid started crying, for Maria had taken food away from him to give to the old woman. She became angry at the baby's cries, and said, "Silence that whelp, or I will sell him to the fairies!" Maria tried, but Leonid was so hungry, and he would not stop crying.
The old woman could not be pleased. Finally she demanded, "Give me a bed to sleep in, for I am tired, and give me wax to plug my ears against that child's screeching!" Maria gave her her own bed, and a piece of wax she was used to chewing when the hunger was great. The old woman went to sleep in Maria's bed, and Maria stayed with Leonid, consoling him to no avail. Eventually she fell asleep holding the baby, perched atop the little milking stool. The fire died down to embers, and the night passed.
In the morning, Maria awoke to find that the old woman was gone, and so was Leonid. Frantic, she searched through the cottage but to no avail: Leonid was nowhere to be found. She ran out of the cottage to the path, and called out for Leonid, but there was no answer from the woods. Just then, a woodcutter was passing with his axe, and he heard Maria's calls. "Who do you call for, girl?" he asked. She recognized him as one of the villagers would would trade milk or butter for wood. "My brother is gone! An old woman was here, and when I woke up this morning, Leonid was gone, and so was she!"
The woodcutter said, "I saw an old woman riding a butter churn through the air this morning! She was holding something in her hands." Maria thought this must be the old woman who had spent the night, and asked, "Was she wearing fine clothing?" The woodcutter said she was, then said, "She is Taraga, the Witch in the Woods. I'm afraid your brother is gone, never to be seen again." Maria asked him where the Witch lived, and he said she lived over the mountains in a wood far away. "You had best not go to her, for the way is dangerous and she will eat your brother before you can reach her."
Maria was undeterred, and gathered her few things into a cloth and cast it across her shoulder. She tucked her father's meat cleaver into the waistband of her dress. Before she could set out, there was a knock on the door, and a kindly villager woman stood without. She said, "Maria Antipova, my husband tells me you are going to Taraga, the Witch in the Woods. Take this shawl, and it will keep you warm. And take this apple, so that you do not hunger. My husband sends you his stoutest boots, so that your feet can travel without tiring." Maria accepted the gifts gratefully, and set out.
The way was hard, the path rocky. Soon she was climbing up a mountain, and clouds gathered into a storm. "Maria Antipova!" said a voice from the clouds, "Go no further, or I will sweep you from this mountain!" The storm rained down on her, and Maria put up her new shawl, and stayed completely dry, for it was a magic shawl. The mountain grew ever steeper, but Maria continued on, baring her teeth into the storm. "I am not afraid of you, Taraga!" she called into the sky. The clouds thundered in response.
Soon the mountain was past, and Maria was slogging through a swamp. She tucked up her skirts and pressed on over the boggy ground, the boots keeping her feet dry, for they were magic boots. Soon the swamp had passed, and she was climbing over great boulders, but she felt she was getting closer. As night closed in, she made a small fire between two boulders and ate her apple until she was no longer hungry, but the apple was still whole, for it was a magic apple. The fire died down to embers, and Maria tried to sleep, but the ground was hard.
She heard a snarl near to hand, and rose again, crying out, "Who is there?" A wolf's face appeared out of the gloom, and said in the old woman's voice, "Maria Antipova! Go no further or I will eat you up, as surely as I will eat up your tiny brother!" Maria stood and held out her father's meat cleaver. She said, "I am not afraid of you, Taraga, and I will rescue my brother whether you like it or not!" She swiped at the wolf's face, and it ran away.
The next morning, she made her way past the boulders, and came upon Taraga's hut. It was surrounded by a fence surmounted with children's skulls. "So, you have found me, Maria Antipova," said Taraga. "Soon I will add your brother's skull, and maybe even your own, to my fence." Struck with an idea, Maria said, "Let me in, for I am weary with travelling!" The old woman let her in to the hut, where Maria saw Leonid lying in a baking pan in front of the oven, which was heating up. "Give me food, for I am hungry!" said Maria Antipova. Taraga grimaced and hissed, but gave Maria what food she could find: a cabbage and an onion. Leonid woke up and started crying at the loud voices in the hut. "Silence that child, or I shall steal him and sell him to the fairies myself," said Maria Antipova, and the old woman was forced to comfort Leonid. "Give me a bed, for I am weary with travelling," said Maria Antipova, and the old woman was forced to give up her bed to Maria. "Now leave me to sleep," said Maria Antipova, and when the old woman turned around to leave Maria to sleep, she cut her in two with the cleaver.
Gathering up her brother, Maria gave him the apple to eat and fixed the shawl about him so that he would stay dry. Together, they left Taraga's hut, and walked back to their own cottage in the woods, where they lived to a ripe old age and were happy with each other.
Posted at 21:31 permanent link category: /rpg
Categories: all aviation Building a Biplane bicycle gadgets misc motorcycle theater