Storytelling for Week 11: The Questing Beast

The Questing Beast

“Awaken, king, and behold the symbol of your destruction.”

Arthur groaned as his eyes endeavored to open, the shrieking cries of the dying and the tearing claws of beasts still fresh in his mind. Lifting his head from the cold bark of the tree he reclined against, he ran a sweaty hand across his face and looked up.

A pair of serpentine eyes as large as Arthur’s head hovered close before him. Jerking back, the king instinctively reached for the sword laying at his side, but found himself unable to bring it to bear. Looking down, Arthur saw that the creature in front of him had pinned the blade to the ground with the large hoof that extended from one of the beast’s lion-like forelegs.

“You have no need to fear me, Arthur Pendragon,” the beast said, his scaly mouth revealing glistening fangs as he spoke the words in an icy tone. “I have not come here to bring harm to you.”

Arthur stared at the beast for a moment, his hand seeming to move of its own accord as it released its grip on the sword hilt.

A low chuckle rumbled from the throat of the beast as it slid away from the king, its lithe leopard’s frame gracefully strutting toward the nearby spring. One eye still focused on Arthur, the beast dipped its reptilian head down toward the spring and began to lap up the water with a large forked tongue.

Arthur slowly got to his feet, his eyes studying the beast, the likes of which he had never seen before. “What is your name, creature?”

“I am many things,” the beast replied, lifting its head from the water. “Vengeance. Lust. And chaos. Things with which you are quite familiar.”

“I know these things, but have endeavored not to be entrapped in them,” Arthur said.

The beast swung its head to fully face Arthur once again. “Yet you are a man. Flawed. Full of vices that you have no hope to suppress. Prone to creating Chimeras like myself—cursed beasts who are fated only to bring destruction.”

“I do not understand what you mean,” Arthur said, confused.

“Not yet, but some day you will,” the beast said. “For now, I will tell you a story.”

The creature settled down onto the ground by the spring, its long neck nestling next to one of its muscular haunches. “There was once a princess who was the most beautiful in all the world. Knights from all over the land sought her hand, and many a lance was tilted for even the honor of being granted an audience with the fair maiden. Yet this princess refused to marry all the suitors no matter how worthy they might be. Her heart, you see, was set on one man--her own brother. Eldagan was his name, and he was a famed knight in these lands in decades past. In her lust for Sir Eldagan, the princess formed a contract with a demon, agreeing to spend one night with the fell creature in exchange for making her brother return the feelings she had for him.”

Arthur shivered at the thought of a person going to such lengths for the sake of fulfilling such a corrupt lust.

“In the end the treacherous demon betrayed the princess and orchestrated events to where Sir Eldagan became accused of raping his sister. One of the finest knights of his era met his demise not on the battlefield in glorious combat, but at the hand of his own father, who set his dogs upon his unjustly accused son.”

The beast lifted his head from the ground and fixed Arthur with a stare that was filled with a deep melancholy.

“I am that princess’s cursed offspring, a living testament to the evils man is capable of,” the beast said in a regretful tone. “It was I who slew my mother and the rest of her unfortunate family.”

Arthur shook his and looked away from the tragic creature’s mournful gaze. “I did not wish to know any of this. Why must you tell me these things?”

“A wise king must know of folly if he is expected to not fall victim to it himself,” the creature said. “You have already sinned, Arthur, and your sin will bear fruit that will bring about your destruction in good time, as it did with my poor mother. I give you this warning, and urge you to be a righteous king who will not repeat the mistakes of the past. The chaos that will engulf your kingdom is inevitable, but if you rule with a wise and virtuous hand, then many years of prosperousness still await your kingdom and your people.”

Arthur nodded. “I would rule no other way than that, creature, regardless of what you advise.”

The beast rose up to his feet and bobbed his head in a nod. “Remember me, king. Remember my story. For one day you will know it to be yours.”

Author’s Note: This story is based on “The Questing Beast” in the King Arthur unit. I read up on what the Questing Beast was all about on Wikipedia and decided to write a story that detailed the Questing Beast’s creation and how it can be seen as being symbolic of Arthur’s sin of sleeping with his half-sister Morgause and birthing Mordred, who becomes the agent of his own destruction. I wanted to portray the Questing Beast as being an intelligent and somewhat tragic creature who desires to pass on what it has learned through its own creation to Arthur.

Picture of Arthur and the Questing Beast (Un-textbook)

Bibliography Information:

Book: King Arthur: Tales of the Round Table

Author: Andrew Lang

Year Published: 1902

Web Source: Un-textbook

Storytelling for Week 10: How Jake Lost a Race to Rock and Cicadas

How Jake Lost a Race to Rock and Cicadas

Jake had to walk uphill to his high school every weekday and he hated everything about it. Every day the sun beat down on him and had him sweating halfway up the climb. His book-laden backpack hung heavy on his shoulders and pressed his sweaty T-shirt against his clammy backside. The worn soles of his tennis shoes evinced the toll the daily trek had taken on his feet, which were always sore every time he reached the hilltop.

Then there were the cicadas. Every day the cicadas sang their morning song, and Jake’s teeth ground together in annoyance with every monotonous note.

One day after school Jake was standing at the hilltop preparing to descend when he saw a cicada sitting upon a boulder. Jake raised his foot high in preparation to stomp it, but the cicada flew off before  Jake could kill it.

“Stupid cicadas,” Jake muttered as he made to head downhill.

“The cicadas don’t like you either, jerk,” a voice said, the low, gravelly tone coming from the direction of the boulder.

Jake glared at the boulder. “Who asked your opinion, stupid Rock!?

“Nobody ever asks us rocks’ opinion, but that doesn’t mean we don’t have things worth saying, youngster," Rock said.

“Sure, sure,” Jake said snidely, stooping down to poke at Rock.

“I’ve been on this hilltop for decades,” Rock said. “I have seen more in my long life than you will ever see, and know more stories than you will likely ever know.”

“Yeah, so what?” Jake said, poking Rock again.

“So . . .” Rock began, a hint of impatience now tinging his voice, “the sum of a person’s wisdom can be determined by the number of stories he knows, for what are stories but microcosms of experience that teach us about the nature of life and the good and bad ways it can be lived?”

“I don’t know what you just said, but it sounds stupid, Rock” Jake said.

Rock sighed heavily. “Then why don’t we create a story of our own?”

Jake stared at Rock, arching a brow. “How?”

“A race, my angsty friend,” Rock said.

“A race? With who?”

“With me of course. Whoever reaches the bottom of the hill first wins.

Jake laughed. “Are you forgetting that you’re a rock, Rock?”

“We rocks can be quite speedy in the right context.”

Jake stood up and crossed his arms. “You just want me to get all sweaty running downhill, don’t you?”

“There’s no stopping this story now that I’ve decided to start it,” Rock said. “Whether you choose to run or walk, I’m going to win this race.”

Jake shook his head incredulously and began to jog downhill. He did not want to look silly by sprinting down the hill, but there was something in Rock’s tone that made him feel that it might be smarter to jog.

When Jake was halfway down the hill he looked back up the incline and saw that Rock had still not moved. Gritting his teeth in anger for being fooled by the boulder, Jake decided to walk the rest of the way down the hill.

Jake had not even taken three steps when he felt a rumble beneath his feet. Looking uphill again, he saw that Rock was rolling down at incredible speed. Yelping in surprise, Jake began to dash downhill, worn soles slapping hard against the grass as he sought to reach the bottom before the boulder could catch up.

The rumble grew louder until Jake could hear it over his own ragged gasps and the thunderous beats of his heart. He willed his feet to go faster, but there was no outpacing the rolling Rock. Rock surged in front of Jake and hurtled toward the foot of the hill.

When Jake reached the bottom, Rock was still rolling for a long time before finally settling several feet away. Panting Jake trudged over to where Rock now sat.

“H—how did you?” Jake said, breathless.

“It only takes a little bit of a push to get a rock sitting on the edge of a hill rolling,” Rock said.

“But . . . but—”

“But nobody was there to push me?” Rock interrupted. “What about those much hated cicadas of yours? You may deem them your enemies, but having been on this hill a long time, they have become my longtime friends and companions. Rather than growing to hate their song, I have come to appreciate the beauty of its nuances, and through it their people as a whole. It was them who gave me the push I needed to secure victory.”

Jake shook his head. “You're lying.”

“Believe what you will, young one,” Rock said, “but whether you acknowledge it or not, this is the day a man lost a footrace to a rock and cicadas. My sitting here at the foot of the hill will be a testament to this story long after you are gone.”

Jake went away and tried to forget the events of that particular day, but every day he went up and down the hill to school he couldn’t help but look at Rock and remember that race that he had lost. So too could he not listen to the cicada song and feel the same way he used to about it. Although the sound still grated on his nerves, he began to feel an odd appreciation for it. Perhaps this was the wisdom Rock spoke of, a wisdom gained through being part of a story.

Author's Note: This is based on the story in the British North American unit entitled "Wolverene and Rock." In the original Wolverene teases a rock about the fact that he cannot move, but the Rock states that he is capable of rolling. The mischievous Wolverene starts to race downhill and Rock rolls after him and eventually catches up and shmooshes him. Woverene calls for help to his brother Thunder and Lightning and Rock ends up blasted into a million pieces while the wolverine gets his fur coat torn to pieces. In my version I kept the central idea of a character racing Rock downhill, but gave it a modern context and replaced Wolverene with a rambunctious teenager named Jake. The cicada thing was a random idea that came about since I thought the setting of the story should be a hot spring day, which for whatever reason made me think of cicadas. The story ended up being quite different from the source material, and I thought it was fun to explore some different themes from the original.

A rolling stone gathers no moss . . .  and is pretty handy in a downhill race besides (Wikipedia, picture taken by Kate Ter Haar, 2010)

Bibliography Information

Book: Myths and Legends of British North America

Author: Katharine Berry Judson

Year Published: 1917

Web Source: Un-textbook

Storytelling for Week 9: The Seal-Boy

The Seal-Boy

The seal-boy we called him.

We first saw him just off the coast of the land we were heading towards. Clad in the mottled skin of a seal, he plunged into the water and did not rise up for a long time. Fearing the boy had drowned, we paddled to the place where he fell, but as soon as we got there, the boy suddenly emerged from the water in front of my kayak.

An impish grin lit up the boy’s smooth face, and his dark eyes danced with pleasure at the bit of mischief he had played on us.

“He’s over here!” I called from my position at the rear of the kayak fleet. Looking at the young rogue’s face, I couldn’t help but chuckle, and for the moment I forgot the unpleasant task that awaited our group when we came ashore.

Suddenly the boy dove back beneath the water. The rest of the kayaks paddled around the area with amused looks on their faces as they again sought the boy out. The little one emerged out of the water several times amidst the kayaks, naughtily shaking our crafts just hard enough to cause some to grow angry with the troublemaker.

Later the boy emerged much further away from our fleet. He waved at us cheerfully.

We gave the boy chase. Further and further the seal-boy swam, his little head dunking beneath the water and emerging a long distance away from his last location. The irregular cadence of paddling oars and shouts followed him as we made to catch up with the boy, but he ever kept his distance as he brought us out to open sea.

The boy finally stopped next to an iceberg that had run aground. The boy leaped clear of the water and clambered up the gleaming white surface of the iceberg, reaching the top with astonishing ease.

The seal-boy stood atop the iceberg and leaned against a large piece of loose ice that lay precariously close to the edge. We paddled over to the iceberg and looked up, gazing upon the seal-boy’s jeering face.

“We cannot climb it as he did, but if we were to carve steps into the side, we could reach him,” one of the kayaks suggested.

We thought this a sound idea, and several of the kayaks took out knives and picks and began to chip at the base of the iceberg. The workers labored steadily under the seal-boy’s stoic scrutiny until they managed to carve out steps leading directly to the iceberg’s peak.

Kayaks began to climb the iceberg, their sealskin moccasins treading cautiously upon the slick steps. The ascending kayaks still clutched their tools firmly in their hands, but I knew they would be put into an entirely different use once they reached the seal-boy.

The seal-boy casually strode away from the climbers and disappeared behind the large piece of ice he had been leaning against. Suddenly the chunk slid closer to the edge, its trajectory angling towards the kayaks’ climbing path. It took only that little shove to cause the piece of ice to slide down off the top of the iceberg and tumble down its side. The kayaks screamed in terror and dismay, but there was nothing they could as the ice struck them one after another and sent them hurtling into the icy waters below.

Angry shouts tore from the throats of the other kayaks. Before any of them could react, the seal-boy leaped from the top of the iceberg. The boy dove toward the water headfirst, hands outstretched before him to break through the water first before the rest of his body plunged beneath.

A long tense moment passed as we waited for the boy to emerge again. Instead, we heard a terrified scream as one of the kayak’s vessel was overturned. My breathing quickened and my head panned every which way as I watched another kayak have his paddle stripped from him before his own boat was forcibly cap-sized. Other kayaks were taken by surprise from behind as the seal-boy lunged from the water, seized them, and then dragged them beneath.

The dreadful reality of what would happen to me if I did not run finally sunk in as I saw limp forms begin to rise to the surface of the water. My body seemed to move of itself as I sought to turn my vessel around and paddle as far away from the iceberg as I could.

I was making steady progress when the horrifying sound of splashing water came from behind me and I felt a forceful tug on one end of my paddle. Frightened and certain of my death, the paddle slipped from my limp, shaky hands. A whimper rose up from my throat as I desperately began to paddle my kayak with my hands. I shivered as my palms pushed through the freezing water, but my shaking was not because of the cold. I knew my time had come.

I looked at the stick that lay beside me in my boat: my only weapon. Against the likes of this merciless boy who swam so easily in the water I knew such a weapon would prove inadequate.

To my surprise, one end of my paddle suddenly reappeared and came to rest in my lap. I looked to my right and found that the seal-boy was holding the paddle out to me.

“You I will not kill,” the boy said. “I will allow you to go home, but you must tell your people never to come here seeking to kill us. If they do not heed this warning, then I will kill them all, and not let a single one return.”

I looked upon the deadly serious face of the youth as I wordlessly took back my paddle. I knew that I would do as he said, and that I would never return to this place again, for I had no wish to run across the seal-boy ever again. 

Author's Note: This is based on Âtârssuaq from the Eskimo Folk Tales unit. In the original story, we learn about the birth and maturity of the son of Âtârssuaq, who from a very young age is trained by his father to be an extremely skilled swimmer. Âtârssuaq is eventually killed by his enemies, and the son finds himself tasked with having to defend his people from an invasion of northerners coming down in a fleet of kayaks. Using his skilled swimming abilities, he lures his enemies out to open sea and to an iceberg, then begins to kill them through various means. In the end he only spares one helpless kayak, and sends him home with a warning. So pretty much this story follows the second half of the original plot line to the letter, but it is is written from the perspective of the lone survivor. I wanted to create a slight feeling of terror for this so-called seal boy and show his brutality from the viewpoint of someone who nearly found himself being dragged to a watery grave at the youth's hand. This story is a little on the rushed side, so I hope you still enjoyed it for what it is.

Inuit family (Un-textbook)

Bibliography Information

Title: Eskimo Folk-Tales

Author: Knud Rasmussen

Year Published: 1921

Source: Un-textbook

Storytelling for Week 6: Yamato and the Demon Boar

Yamato and the Demon Boar

“Tell us of the hunt, Makoto! Tell us of how Lord Yamato slew the demon boar!”

Makoto impassively stared at the stars that blanketed the evening sky, then slowly shifted in his place furthest from the fire as he studied the youthful faces that stared at him expectantly. They all had heard the reports of what happened, but a mere catalog of events was not what these men sought. They wanted a story, told in the way only a gifted storyteller like Makoto could tell it.

Makoto ran a large hand across his slightly wrinkled face. He stared at his hand for a long moment as if in a trance, noting how the fingers were still thick and strong from decades of pulling the string of his hunting bow. He mapped the veins that bulged from the back of his hand and waited a moment longer before speaking. A good storyteller knew that there was value in being patient in the telling. A story was built not merely upon the relaying of the narrative itself, but upon the spaces before and in between the narrative, upon the tense breaks and pauses that cultivate anticipation in the listeners.

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The demon boar was the most formidable creature we had ever hunted. It was larger than any bear, and more cunning than a fox. Its tusks were the color of bleached bone and as long as a man’s forearm. A shaggy brown coat of fur covered the bulging muscles of the boar’s body and its fiercesome snout. Most terrifying of all were the beast’s eyes, which glowed like hot coals inside its cavernous eye sockets. Those eyes promised death to all who would dare hunt it.

Yamato rode boldly at the head of the hunting band, clad in a gleaming set of steel armor, each gold-lacquered piece tied together by crimson ribbons of the finest silk. His knocked bow (the bow was in fact not Yamato’s, for our lord had accidentally left behind his own bow and been forced to borrow another’s, but this detail Makoto saw fit to leave out) was held firmly in one hand, while his other hand casually cradled the reins controlling his handsome hunting horse. Thrust through the sash at his waist was the Sacred Grass-cutting Sword Kusanagi, its long, curved blade resting in an ornate bamboo scabbard.

When we spotted the boar, Lord Yamato immediately loosed the hounds upon the beast. Although the dogs made a valiant effort to harass the creature, the boar trampled and tusked the pitiful bays in mere moments. Our lord then ordered us to unleash a volley upon the demonic beast. Although the boar’s formidable appearance and ferocity frightened us, we obediently loosed shafts upon the dread creature. To our terrified surprise, the arrows bounced off the boar as if its fur coat was as strong as metal.

It was then that the creature charged us, smoldering eyes alight with rage. Although we turned to flee, the boar’s powerful legs outpaced those of our horses, and the demon rapidly caught up and brutally tore through our ranks. Men fell from their horses with horrified cries and were trampled by the boar’s stomping hooves. Hunters and horses alike were impaled by the beast’s tusks. A scant few, myself included, managed to survive the boar’s onslaught and take cover within the trees.

The courageous Lord Yamato alone stayed out in the open, his bow discarded in favor of his long lance.

(In fact Yamato too hid in the woods, Makoto knew, but the old hunter remained silent on this point).

Yamato boldly charged the boar, but his lance failed to pierce his foe’s hide and our brave lord’s steed was run through by a gore-stained tusk.

(In truth Yamato already lost his horse in the chaos that ensued before. He stood his ground behind a copse of trees a bowshot away from where I hid, Kusanagi tightly gripped in his hands).

Lord Yamato rapidly disentangled himself from the flailing hooves of his dying horse and drew the Sacred Sword from its scabbard. Fearless in the face of his demonic foe, Yamato watched the boar stamp one of its hooves against the ground in preparation for a charge.

(Makoto could still remember how Yamato and the boar had played their waiting game, Kusanagi staying behind the tree line and the demon patiently waiting for the lord to come out into the open).

The boar charged Lord Yamato, who leaped high into the air the moment before the creature was upon him. Our glorious lord landed atop the beast and plunged Kusanagi deep into its backside. Pulling free his blade, he leaped clear of the wounded beast and watched it collapse into a heap of violent death throes, the demon’s squeals of pain echoing loudly in the air.

(It was more difficult than Makoto thought to not tell of his part in the slaying of the boar. He had resisted the urge to admit that he had fired an arrow at the boar’s backside and briefly drew the attention of the creature away from Yamato and to the old hunter. It had been in that moment of distraction that Yamato had broken from the trees and fell upon the boar with Kusanagi, killing the beast with a single blow).

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Makoto saw the delighted faces of the young men who looked at him as he finished his story and was content with his narrative. It did not matter that the story he had told was a lie. These men did not need truth. Thinking that Yamato had slain the boar by his strength alone, these youths would grow in their love of Lord Yamato, and they would follow him all the more fiercely. That was all that was important. As for Makoto, he would content himself in knowing that he had played a small part in one of his lord’s legends, even if no one else would ever know of it.

Author's Note: This story is based on "The Labors of Yamato: The Demon Boar" in the Japanese mythology unit. In the original story, Yamato kills this demonic boar all by himself by cutting off his tail and then driving him off a cliff. In this version I changed the manner in which Yamato kills the boar. However, the main departure that I take from the source material comes in how I've changed the story form in order to explore some different themes. I made this a frame story told from the perspective of a made-up character who accompanied Yamato on the boar hunt. Makoto is an aging hunter who is known as a skilled storyteller, but he struggles with the desire to take his share of the glory by telling of his secret part in the slaying of the boar. Deciding that, as a storyteller, it is his duty to tell the story that will help solidify the loyalty of Yamato's future generation of vassals, Makoto tells a version of the story that gives his lord all the credit. Whether or not his decision was a good one I leave up to the readers.

A bit how I imagine what a Japanese hunting party might look like.
(Image Information: Painting of Emperor Jimmu with an expeditionary party by Ginko Adachi (1890)

Bibliography Information

Title: Romance of Old Japan, Part I: Mythology

Author: E.W. Champney and F. Champney

Year Published: 1917

Source: Un-textbook

Storytelling for Week 5: What Makes the Thunder and Lightning

What Makes the Thunder and Lightning

U Pyrthat cradled his great drum in with the gentleness of a mother holding a child, the thick fingers of his four arms blurring as they struck the instrument’s tightly stretched animal skin. Although his hands seemed to strike the drum only lightly, the sound that came out was deep and resonant. The booms of the drum added an energizing baseline that supported the cheerful trills of flutes and bombastic crash of cymbals. The thunder giant sat in the center of the clearing that he had chosen as the location for the great festival he had organized, his large form intimidating and yet majestic in the light of the full moon. Around him were animals of every kind, every creature from the snail to the squirrel to the tiger. They had all come to U Pythat’s party to eat, talk, and dance.

The dancers were many, and all of them whirled and flipped with vigor and grace to the steady beat of the drums and the metallic clash of cymbals. The dancers all carried weapons of some kind, lending a distinctly martial flavor to their dances. Moonlight flashed across blurring iron as the dancers’ weapons were spun and thrown into the air like batons before being caught again by deft paws. The spectacle of cavorting beasts was one that any man would surely be astounded to witness, although no men were there at the party, fur U Pyrthat had intended this festival to be one reserved for the animals alone.

Although all of the dancers were skilled, none could compare to the lynx U Kui when it came to elegance and fluidity of movement. Neither could any of their weapons compare to the jeweled sword that he had brought with him. The curved blade glowed with a constant and dazzling illumination, as if having captured the light of the moon itself and trapped it inside the steel. As U Kui twirled it rhythmically  around his lithe frame, the sword seemed to leave a trail of faint light in the wake of its movements that hung in the air momentarily before slowly fading away. The effect was such that it seemed liked the lynx was painting the very air around him in streaks of transient silver light.

All of the animals at the party were mesmerized by U Kui’s skill and the beauty of his sword. U Pyrthat’s amber eyes gazed upon the lynx’s sword with abject envy. When there was a brief pause in the music, the thunder giant walked over to the resting U Kui and pointed to the lynx’s sword.

“U Kui, let me borrow that sword for a while,” U Pythat said. “I wish to dance with it as well.”

U Kui’s sharp eyes narrowed as they gazed up at the giant, his pointed ears folding down slightly. “This is my sword, U Pythat. I will not allow another to dance with it.”

Other animals overheard the lynx’s rude refusal and glared at him in anger.

“Do not be so selfish, U Kui!” one of the animals remonstrated.

“U Pythat is our host!” another animal said. “Were it not for him, you would not have been able to come here and dance!”

U Kui found himself wilting beneath the scowls of his fellow animals and their words of chastisement. With a low grumble, the lynx reluctantly gave his sword to U Pythat. The giant eagerly accepted the blade and walked back to the center of the clearing.

When the music started back up, U Kui, still sore over being forced to lend his sword out, did not dance. Instead he watched as U Pythat took up his drum again in one pair of hands while holding the lynx’s sword in a third hand. When the music started up again, the thunder giant managed the impressive task of simultaneously striking his drum, twirling U Kui’s blade, and dancing. Now it was the thunder giant who had everyone’s attention. His powerful legs pounded against the ground in rhythm with his drumbeats, which now boomed so loudly that the ground itself began to shake.

U Kui watched anxiously as U Pythat pirouetted about with a grace that belied his great size. The thunder giant slashed the lynx’s sword every which way, leaving streaks of light all around his person. U Kui had to admit that U Pythat was even more adept than he himself was at dancing. The prideful lynx growled a barely audible complaint and wondered when the giant would stop dancing and give him back his sword.

Suddenly U Pythat leaped high into the air even as he continued to whirl U Kui’s sword and beat his own drum. U Kui shot back up to his paws and ran to the place where the giant had been dancing just before, an angry roar tearing from his throat. He could do nothing but watch helplessly as U Pythat disappeared into the purple clouds above. Although none of the animals could see the giant’s body any longer, they could still make out the bright streaks of light produced by U Kui’s sword flashing inside the clouds. They could also still hear the loud booms of the thunder giant’s great drum.

This is how thunder and lightning came into existence. This is also why U Kui never wanders far from his home, for it is there where he is building a large mound that he hopes will one day allow him to reach the sky, where he can reclaim the blade that was stolen from him.

Author's Note: This story is basically a slightly more detailed version of the tale "What Makes the Lightning" from the Khasi folktales unit. The story as I've told it pretty much goes the exact same way as the original story. I was kind of pressed for time this Wednesday, so I couldn't think of any clever way to retell it. I basically just focused on telling the story in a way that focused on filling in some of the descriptive details that the original tale didn't give. 

U Kui looking kind of mad. Who can blame him? (Wikipedia Commons)
Photo taken by Tony Hisgett (2013)

Bibliography Information

Title: Folk-tales of the Khasis

Author: K.U. Rafy

Year Published: 1920

Source: Un-textbook

Storytelling for Week 4: The Old Man and the Demi

The Old Man and the Demi

"Say, Demi!"

"Yes, Master?"

"I'm hungry."

"Want me to get some food?"

The old man smiled slyly, turning his head away from the large, muscular demon, hiding the grin on his face. "Why, yes, that would be excellent.”

The hulking demi got slowly to his feet and trundled off into the woods. The old man watched him go, the fingers of one hand dipping into the warm waters of the deep river that he sat next to.  Basking in the light of the sun shining down in the cloudless sky, the old man took a deep, satisfied breath and waited.

The demi came back with a large stag cradled in his sinewy arms. He laid the flaccid creature before the old man.

The old man yawned.  “Can’t you bring back something bigger than that? This stag would not even do for a snack!”

The demi frowned, but obediently went back into the woods.

The old man scrambled to his feet and seized the animal by his long horns. With a grunt of exertion, he dragged the beast to the river and shoved it into the roiling, white-capped waters. The creature was quickly carried away by the fast-moving stream, and the old man sat down contentedly as he waited for the demi to return.

The demon came back a few minutes later, this time dragging the carcasses of three young does.

The old man yawned again. “You disappoint me, demi. Surely you know that I require more than just three does to satisfy my lunchtime hunger? Bring me some bigger beasts!”

The demi sulked and reluctantly retreated back into the wood’s dark recesses, but this time an impressively cunning thought entered into his characteristically un-cunning mind. Rather than immediately hunting for more animals, the demi kept to the shadows at the outer perimeter of the forest and watched his master for a short time.

The demi gasped as he saw the old man hurriedly grab the three does the demon had brought to him and throw them into the river.

Anger rose up in the demi, but caution kept him from charging straight toward the old man and trying to kill him right then and there. Even though the old man had cruelly wasted the gifts that the demi had worked so hard to get for him, he was still a powerful foe who could turn boulders to dust and squeeze the water from rocks, as he had demonstrated upon their first meeting. It would not do to attack him directly.

The demi thought long and hard on what to do, and finally another clever thought found its way into his head. The demon smiled happily and eagerly stomped off back into the depths of the wood.

The old man had grown very bored and impatient since his servant was taking so long to bring the elder his ostensible sustenance. Finally, the demi appeared, this time dragging the limp forms of a pair of jackals and a pair of wolves.

“These will fill you?” the demi asked, a slightly enigmatic smile playing across his wide face.

The old man sighed. “Better, but still not enough. Bring me yet more!”

The demon sighed in turn and made a show of skulking back towards the woods. When he had once again disappeared from sight into the dark shadows cast by the thick trees of the forest, the demi once again turned around to observe the old man’s actions.

The old man started to do what he had done previously. He unceremoniously grabbed all four canines by their tails and began to drag them toward the river. However, as soon as he yanked on the animals’ tails, the wolves and jackals thrashed to life, lips curling back to reveal razor sharp teeth. Low, dangerous growls rose up from their throats.

The demi smiled as he watched the old man gasp in surprise, his hands losing their grip on the animals’ tails as he staggered back. The demon had but knocked out the wolves and jackals, and it was the old man’s rude yank on their tails that had awakened them.

The canines lithely rolled to their feet and made to surround the old man, their paws padding slowly, silently across the grass as they closed in with their prey.

Crying out in fear, the old man threw himself into the river behind him. The old man, however, could not swim. It had been thanks to the demi that the old man had crossed that same river weeks before, and without the aid of the demon’s power, he could only flounder helplessly as the river’s strong current swept him away, never to return.

Author's Notes: This story is based on "The Cunning Old Man and the Demi" from the Georgian Folktales unit. The original story has the old man using his wits to convince a demi (a demon) that he is a powerful being, and thus acquires the supernatural being as a servant. The demi eventually catches on when a jackal and a wolf tell him that the old man has been throwing the carcasses the demon has been giving him into the river (an act which also provided the canines some nice, free food). The demi gathers together a posse of wolves and jackals and makes to confront the old man, Unfortunately for the demi, the old man sees the pack and says to the demon, "Dost thou not owe me more than ten wolves and jackals?" Sensing betrayal, the wolves and jackals attack and kill the demi. Deciding that this is too cruel a fate for a relatively innocent creature, I re-wrote the story with the demi coming out on top. I use a lot of the same story elements, but made it to where the demi, who still foolishly believes in the old man's great power, unexpectedly uses his wits to get revenge on the trickster. 

Rioni River, Georgia (Wikipedia Commons)

Bibliography Information:
Title: Georgian Folktales
Author: Marjory Wardrop
Year published: 1894
Web source: Un-textbook

Storytelling for Week 3: Gallery of Accusers

Gallery of Accusers

I studied the woman’s face by the faint light of the sunbeams that leaked through the crevices around the tombstone above. She was beautiful in the fashion of her people. Eyes soft and grey like smoky quartz, skin like burnished bronze. Her straight black hair was a carpet of glossy black beneath her. Recognition dawned over me, and the image of this woman walking beside her husband with a bright smile on her face briefly flitted across my mind. Pushing the memory away, I watched as the woman’s eyes met mine. I saw panic in her face, then confusion, then, as her eyes traveled to the bone that I held overhead in one hand, fear darkened her expression like clouds passing over the sun.

My lips pressed firmly together in concentration, I tightened my grasp on the smooth femur bone and swung down mutely. A single blow to the skull was enough to kill her instantly. I closed the woman’s eyes with a frail, shaky hand, my gaze lingering only briefly on her sightless grey irises.

I took the seven loaves of bread and single pitcher of water that surrounded the woman’s limp frame and crept away silently, finding my way back to the corner of the cavern that I favored by nature of the fact that it placed me far away from the stacks of dry bones and rotting bodies that littered the mass grave. I eagerly bit into one of the loaves in my arms and placed the rest atop a tattered shirt that I had taken off a man some time ago—I couldn’t be sure how long ago, for I had long since given up counting the passing of days.

The loaf I ate from was slightly burnt, and each chunk I gnawed off was tasteless and gritty as sand, but I kept eating until I had finished off half the roll. Next I drank from the pitcher, the hot water so sweet and refreshing that it took a considerable effort to stop myself from drinking too much.

I set aside the food and drink and settled into my corner, my turbaned head resting against the cool stone at my back. An image of the comely face of the woman who I had killed flashed in my mind, and my teeth gritted together as I sought to will the picture away. Six other faces joined the woman’s. I remembered every face clearly. The eyes of the men and women I had killed bore into me, every gaze burning with accusation.

My breaths grew short, and I struck my head against the stone behind me, hoping the slight jolt of physical pain would help to dispel the gallery of condemning faces. The gallery remained.  

You were going to die anyway, I insisted to the faces. I saved you from a long, painful death by hunger and thirst.

The seven pairs of eyes continued to stare at me in silent reproach.

Every death I meted out was so that I could prolong my own life, I admitted to the faces. Should I be faulted for just wanting to live a few weeks more?

The gallery of my accusers remained unsympathetic to my justifications.

Desperate, I rocked my head forward in preparation to strike my head against the rock behind me once again.

Something heavy ran across my leg. The faces disappeared as I flinched in surprise and looked down. My eyes, which had long since grown used to the darkness of the cavern, spotted the shadowy form of some manner of sizeable animal. The creature stood still for a brief moment, and then darted away from me. Crying out, I scrambled to my feet and pursued the animal. If the beast had found a way into the cavern, then it was possible that it might lead me to the place that had allowed it to enter in the first place.

My effort was rewarded as I followed the creature toward what appeared to be a sizeable cranny in the cavern’s wall. The animal passed into the crack, and I was not long in following it, my slender form squeezing eagerly into the tight passage.

#

The white sun blazed brightly, its rays stinging my eyes so painfully that I could not admire the first blue sky I had seen in what felt like a lifetime. Keeping my gaze lowered, I watched as my ghostly pale feet shuffled into the sand of the shoreline that stretched out before me. Scorching pain shot up my feet the moment they touched the sand, and I leapt back with a yelp, sending a spray of the fine white powder into the air.

Lifting my eyes slightly and squinting, I stared out at the seemingly endless expanse of sea that lay beyond the shore. Suddenly the gallery of faces appeared before me again. Their faces continued to stare daggers at me, but there was something in their eyes that seemed to be slightly amused.

I smiled at my accusers, and an inexplicable laugh worked its way from my lungs to my mouth. I found myself laughing incessantly, the sound seeming mad to my ears.

You’re dead for nothing, I realized. Salvation lay in a little crack in the wall the entire time. My salvation. Your salvation. And yet I killed you. Killed you for nothing.

I laughed for a long time, long and hard. I laughed when I saw the distant white sail come into view atop the seascape. I laughed as I waved my arms to get the vessel’s attention. I laughed and wondered how long I would live having to look upon the faces of the people who I killed for nothing. I laughed and hoped that one day the faces would learn to laugh with me.


Author's Note: Sindbad's fourth journey is, in my opinion, among his darkest. In the story, Sindbad's ends up taking a wife in a society where one is expected to be buried alive alongside one's spouse should that spouse die. As you might expect, Sindbad's wife dies and Sindbad ends up being put in the same mass grave where all the unlucky spouses are placed. What transpires next is pretty shocking. Once Sindbad's provisions are used up, he starts killing the other living spouses that are lowered into the chamber after him. He ends up finding an escape route in a manner similar to how I describe in my story, but not after having apparently murdered several people in order to pilfer their provisions. What made me want to write this scene is that it deals with a pretty morally questionable deed in a shockingly light way. I read the scene honestly thinking that there's no way Sindbad can't be feeling at least some guilt for offing people so casually, especially given that I don't believe the merchant has killed a single person prior to this tale. As a result, I decided to write this scene in a way that adds a little more psychological weight to the narrative. The result is a story that is a bit darker than the original. Although Sindbad looks like he's going crazy in my version, I don't think such an occurrence is a big stretch given the fact that he has been living in near total darkness on a very spare diet for at least several weeks' worth of time, and given that his only social contact during this period comes in the form of clubbing other human beings. I know I'd certainly get a little off kilter under such circumstances.

Sindbad being lowered into what he thinks will be his permanent grave (Un-textbook)

Bibliography Information:

Title: The Arabian Nights’ Entertainments

Author: Andrew Lang

Year published: 1898

Web Source: Un-textbook

Storytelling for Week 2: Saint Felix and the Spider

Saint Felix and the Spider

During the reign of the Roman Emperor Decius, a decree was made that all imperial subjects must make heathen sacrifices to the glory of the emperor, or else face risk torture and execution. Many Christians refused to follow Decius’s decree, and among these was the pious Bishop Felix.

Aware of Felix’s disobedience to their emperor, the soldiers of Nola sought to bring death to the good priest. The soldiers assaulted his home, but found him absent from his abode. From then on the Roman soldiers patrolled the roads day and night in hopes of catching Felix and slaying him. In their thirst for the rebellious priest’s blood, they accosted travelers constantly, interrogating them and asking if they had seen the bishop on the road.

One day the soldiers came across a beautiful maiden, clad in simple but elegant robes of purple. The soldiers couldn't help but stop and admire the woman, with her wavy raven locks and alabaster skin. One of the soldiers managed to close his gaping mouth long enough to approach the woman and speak to her.

“Maiden,” the soldier said. “Have you perchance seen the Bishop Felix on this road? Answer true, or—“ The soldier cut off his words, not able to bring himself to threaten so beautiful a woman.

The maiden gazed at the questioning soldier with dark, sleepy eyes. “I have not seen the bishop.”

“Very well,” the soldier said, his resolve to further press the question withering beneath the maiden’s lovely, heavy-lidded gaze. “Our apologies for disturbing your business.”

The woman offered the soldiers a kind smile before gliding past them and continuing down the road with measured, graceful strides.

#

Several hours later, Felix took off his long wig, grateful to relieve his head of its burden of black tresses. He thanked God not for the first time for his naturally feminine face and for there not being anything in church doctrine concerning the matter of disguising oneself as a woman.

The bishop sat in a clearing that he had spotted just off the trail he had been following, his sweat-matted back leaning against a humongous tree as wide as a castle turret. He was brushing dust from his tired limbs when he heard a high-pitched voice off to his right.

“Hail, Felix of Nola!” the cheerful voice greeted.

Felix looked to his right, but saw no one. By chance, his eyes flicked downward, and he spotted a palm-sized spider staring up at him with four liquid eyes. Startled, the bishop scrambled away from the arachnid.

“It’s okay, I don’t bite! Well I do, but I won’t bite you! Kay?”

Felix gasped in amazement, noting how the words really did seem to come from the spider, the syllables emitting from its tiny body with each rhythmic movement of its mandibles.

“It’s a miracle!” Felix exclaimed.

“Thanks, but I prefer to be called Peter,” the spider said.

“Are you a messenger from God, sent to tell me of what I must do to survive Decius’s persecution?” Felix asked.

“I dunno about all that,” Peter said, “but I was sent here for a reason. Here it comes right now!”

The ominous sound of clanking metal and shouts echoed forth from behind Felix.

Whirling around, Felix caught sight of a soldier on the nearby road. He trembled at the glimmer of the soldier’s sword as he pointed it in the bishop’s direction while shouting an alarmed cry.

“C’mon, follow me!” Peter said.

Desperate, Peter followed after the arachnid as it scuttled around to the opposite side of the tree trunk he had been resting against. There lay a large hole that went deep into the tree.

“Get in there!” Peter ordered.

“But surely the soldiers will look there,” Felix said.

“Trust the God-sent talking, prophetic spider and get in!” Peter insisted.

Felix reluctantly got into the hole, fleeing as deep as he could inside its shadow-swathed recesses.

Peter’s tiny form perched on the edge of the hole. “Time for me to get to work!”

Suddenly the spider jumped from the bottom lip of the hole’s entrance to its top edge, and a silken thread now bridged the gap the arachnid had leaped. Peter didn't stop there. He burst into a flurry of motion, leaping about the hole’s entrance like a tiny acrobat, all the while forming a tapestry of web that grew ever more intricate by the second. The sound of clinking metal and barking cries growing louder was lost on Felix’s ears as he found himself entranced by the spider’s work, marveling at the way Peter darted around with supernatural speed while simultaneously creating a work of art that no human could ever hope to replicate.

And then the spider was finished, his web complete, beautiful in how the sunlight played against its silver filaments. Through the holes in the web, Felix saw a squad of soldiers come into view and froze, suddenly reminded of the danger he was in. One of the soldiers looked in the direction of the hole the bishop hid in, and Felix held his breath in fear.

“Nobody is hiding in there,” another soldier said to the one who was looking in Felix’s direction. “Look at that web. If he got in the tree hole, the web would have been broken. No spider could have spun such a fine, strong web in so short a time after someone climbed into the hole.”

The soldiers agreed and moved on, and Felix breathed a sigh of a relief.

Peter sat in the middle of his beautiful web, his many eyes seeming to look contentedly at Felix.

Decius’s reign of terror over Christians eventually ended, and Felix, after a time of hiding, survived to help people and serve the Lord for many years after, and he never forgot the spider that God had sent to preserve his life during his time of great need.

Author’s Note: I based this story on “The Ballad of Saint Felix” in the “Saints and Animals” stories of the Biblical Unit. Since Felix is a bit of a trickster in the ballad, I retained this same theme for my story, only gave it a whimsical spin by making the bishop disguise himself as a woman rather than as an ordinary pilgrim. Continuing with this idea of a light-hearted spin on the story, I gave the spider that spins the web that hides Felix from his hunters the ability to talk, so as to add a little bit of humorous interaction into the narrative. I’m happy that I was able to include a lot of descriptive details in this story. This more descriptive approach did make me go over the word count at first, but a little bit of editing allowed me to retain some of the imagery while still keeping the narrative brief.

Saint Felix attacked and hidden by a spider's web. These guys aren't wearing very Roman-like clothing, but medieval artists were rarely sticklers for historical detail.  (Wikipedia Commons)

Bibliography

Book: The Book of Saints and Friendly Beasts

Author: Abbie Farwell Brown

Year published: 1900

Web Source: Mythology and Folklore Un-Textbook

Storytelling for Week 1: How Codger Saved the World and Got a New House

There was a crazy hermit who lived in a mine shaft. This Codger—Codger was his name—was a solipsist, and fairly well convinced that, were he to die, the world would surely end. Troll the Ogre, who was on holiday, was not so convinced. One day, he came to the mine shaft to pay Codger a visit.

“Hey, Codger, “ Troll said. ““You say that if you die, the world ends, right?”

“Why, yes,” Codger replied. “Since the world exists only as a projection of my mind, of course it would end if my mind ceased to function as a result of death!”

“I didn’t get everything you just said, but that’s a yes, right?”

“Indeed.”

“Huh?”

“Yes, I meant yes!” Codger said, slightly exasperated.  “Indeed means yes. Understand?”

“Oh, Ok. Well I think you’re wrong,  and I’m gonna prove it!”

“And how might you go about doing that?”

“We’ll play a game,” Troll said, smiling evilly.

“Something tells me I won’t like this game,” Codger said, frowning.

“You go out to the firing range and stand among the targets, and I’m gonna shoot at you. If I hit you and you die and the world doesn’t end, then I win.”

“If I’m following your logic here, then that means if you hit me and you’re wrong, then I die, you die, and the world ends, correct?”

Troll scratched his scaly head with one of his black, gnarled nails. “Hadn’t thought about that.”

“I don’t like the idea of this game one bit,” Codger complained. “How exactly do I win?”

Troll rubbed his chin thoughtfully . “How ‘bout this? I’ll only shoot three times. If you dodge all three times, you win.”

Codger considered the Ogre’s proposition. Troll was not the brightest behemoth in the world—not even in the top ten by Codger’s estimate—but he was a crack shot.   “What do I get if I win? I mean the world’s continued existence rides on this game. My reward for saving the world must be suitably appealing.”

“Hmmm… How about I give you my vacation home if you win?”

Codger’s eyes lit up. Codger’s current home was not particularly to his liking, being that the landlord was a pain and the cost of utilities far too high for a mere mine shaft, but it was the best place he could find. Troll’s vacation home, on the other hand, was the nicest in the land.

“You’d really give it to me?” the hermit asked. “For free?”

Troll shrugged. “Why not. Not like I’ll actually lose the game.”

Not able to pass up the chance to live in luxury, even if it meant putting the world in peril, Codger nodded eagerly. “We have a deal. Shall we begin the game tomorrow at high noon? There’s no better time than then, yes?”

#

That evening, Codger had his weekly game of cards with his best friends Ron, Jack, and Caesar. There he told the trio of the game he was going to play with Troll the next day.

“Doesn’t sound like the odds are in your favor,” Jack the Axeman said.

 “That’s why I need your help,” Codger said.

“Sure, sure,” Ron, a loveable mammal of the ursine persuasion, said. “I can roar really loud and scare him so that he’ll miss.”

“Right,” Jack said.

“Your roar, huh?” Caesar the wicker man said, sounding doubtful.

“You’ve been working on that, right?” Codger asked.

“Sure, sure,” the bear said with a toothy grin that made Codger mildly nervous despite himself. “Wanna hear?”

“I’ll take your word for it,” Codger said.

“I can run at him with my axe,” Jack offered.

“Sounds like a good way of getting shot,” Codger said, looking at Caesar. “What about you?”

“Set myself on fire?” Caesar suggested.

“I’ll put you out afterwards,” Jack offered.

Codger shook his head. “That won’t do. Think of something else by tomorrow, okay? I’d hate to have to rely only on Ron’s roar.”

#

Troll sighted down the barrel of his large rifle toward Codger, who stood in the distance amidst the field of paper targets.

“Wonder why he’s not moving,” Troll said. “Oh well.”

The ogre was about to pull the trigger on his rifle when the strangest sound he had ever heard echoed forth. The best way he could think to describe it was a cross between a wolf’s howl and a goat’s bleat. Troll paused as he listened to the strange nose. After a moment, he shrugged and once again focused on his target.

The smell of smoke wafted to Troll’s large and very sensitive nose. Sniffing curiously, the ogre found his head turning to one side. In the distance he could see something burning brightly.

Troll frowned. “Lots of strange things happening today.”

A loud crack sounded from behind, causing Troll to slowly turn around. A tree fell directly toward the ogre, who scrambled to get out of the way, but his big, heavy feet were too slow. The trunk landed directly on top of Troll.

#

“Well, Jack’s good with an axe as usual,” Codger said, looking down at Troll as the ogre sought to lift the trunk from his squished body. Were Troll anything less than an ogre, he would likely be dead. “I don’t suppose this means that I win, does it?”

Troll looked around at Codger, Ron, Jack, and Caesar angrily. “No. You didn’t win! You tricked me!”

“Well I couldn’t exactly just let you shoot me when the world is at stake,” Codger said. “So what do you say you give me the house if we help get that tree off you? You won’t be able to lift it by yourself, and I don’t think anyone else is going to want to help you.”

Troll growled, but accepted the hermit's offer.

Codger smiled. “Another apocalypse averted.”

Authors Note: I based this story on Tom Gauld's Map of the Area Surrounding our Holiday Home. I used some of the map’s “motifs”—the crazy hermit, the mine shaft, the ogre, the wicker man, the bear, the axe man, and the shooting range—and decided to throw in a wacky idea like a solipsistic main character to create a random and weird story. I didn’t really like how I ended it all that much, but I’m still fairly happy with it, considering that flash fiction type writing isn’t something I’m experienced with.
 

(Image information: A burning wicker man from Wikipedia Commons)