Here are the rules:
FIVE LINES ONLY! No cheating.
If you write five lines, you may write an additional five lines later in the story, but only after other players have contributed.
We ask that you not be offensive. Sex and/or violence is allowed, but please don't get too graphic. (Remember, this is a public site!)
Posting ends midnight on Sunday, November 2nd. I'll conclude with the last five lines, and post the whole collective story on Tuesday, November 4th. Sound like fun? Join in!
Here's the prompt:
There was once a girl who was very obstinate and willful, and who never obeyed when her elders spoke to her. One day she said to her parents, "I have heard so much of the Old Witch that I will go and see her. People say she has many marvelous things in her house. I am very curious to see them."
Her parents, however, forbade her going, saying, "The Witch is a wicked old woman who performs many godless deeds. You are not to go near her lair."
The girl, however, would not turn back at her parents' command. She set off to find the Witch's house.
What will happen on the journey? Will she make it to the witch's house? If she does, what will she find there? It's all up to you. That is, it's all up to us!
Remember, ONLY FIVE LINES per entry. And please--READ PRIOR ENTRIES BEFORE ADDING YOUR OWN. You never know what plot twist you're missing out on if you don't!
On your mark. Get set. GO!
Posted by Karin Rita Gastreich
9 comments:
Just outside the village, as old and superstitious a place as had ever been, the disobedient child found a penny on the path.
"A sure sign I'm in the right, going to the Witch's house!" She picked it up, put it into her pocket, and barely took three more steps before a wind gusted up and turned her about. When she could see again, the path, the superstitious old village, and any wood she had ever known was gone. The girl cocked her defiant head, and in doing so spotted a small, tidy cottage just there, through a thin screen of evergreens.
Nearing the cottage, the girl noticed that it was nothing more than an abandoned façade of what appeared to be a once-prosperous trading post. Upon laying one foot upon its foundation stone, a tingling sensation charged through her extremities so forcefully that she thought it best to leave it behind and continue on her journey to the witch’s house.
With the house still out of sight, and despite the weakness in her legs, she determined to stay on course in order to arrive before nightfall. As she remembered what the townspeople had told her, she assured herself, “The pain of her reign is upon me, but I will not have to walk much longer.” Each step more painful and heavier than the last, she finally fell to her knees as if unable to proceed any further when she glanced up, awestruck, at what stood before her in the distance.
A carriage, regal and black, filled the path. Magnificent as it was, it was the four creatures that drew it that stole her breath away. They were horses, yes, but of a shade of misty grey that seemed to shimmer and shift as they pawed the ground, and each had a giant pair of wings folded on their backs. As she stared, a handsome young man leapt down from the driver's bench and opened the carriage door, revealing a lush, red silk-lined interior.
"Care for a ride, young miss? It will only cost you a penny."
What a marvelous carriage, what glorious steeds, what wondrous luck indeed to happen upon a stray penny.
She pressed it into the young man's hand, then accepted his help into the pure rose-scented bliss that waited within.
Without a word he closed door and a moment later the carriage rattled down the path, lulling her to a midnight rest.
In the back of her mind, so cozy and content, she was sure the witch was hardly a threat. All this was yet another sign she was in the right, going to the witch's house.
She slept on a bed of roses, rocked as in her cradle, her lullaby the horses' hooves, and as she slept, a song rippled through her dreams. A song sweet as spun candy, twisted as a sugar-cane, subtle as spice and cinnamon baked in a pie.
Her grandmother’s voice, sharp as a green apple, spoke through her dreams. ‘And where might you be going, young lady, with one no better than he should be?’
She snapped awake to find herself upon a cold bank of birken leaves. A wolf’s eyes stared down at her out of the young man’s face.
She froze before that amber regard. "And why, pray tell, do you seek the witch's house?" He crouched before her, sharp eared shadow falling on the ring of mushrooms that circled them both. He smiled as she scrambled back from him only to stop, trapped, at the ring, crouching slightly forward. "It's an answer I'll be having, if it's any farther you'll be going."
She trembled at the flash of sharp white teeth in his mouth, but lifted her chin defiantly. "All my life I have heard of the marvels to be found in the Witch's house, and now I wish to see them for myself."
"'Tis marvels you seek, is it?" the wolf-man said, with a grin that held the hint of a snarl. "Well indeed, young miss, the Witch's house holds marvels aplenty for those bold or foolish enough to seek it out. You've crossed her foundation-stone; you've ridden in her carriage; now kiss her faithful servant, and you shall be granted your heart's desire."
The girl was young and defiant, but she was no fool, whatever her mother thought. "A kiss is quite dear a fee, especially as this would be my first. But if a kiss is required it is a kiss you shall have, only after I've seen the witch and come back again to this carriage,gone through this wood and back home again."
"If home is truly your wish, my dear," said the wolf-in-boy's-clothing, "we are agreed."
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