Fairy Tales with Uncle Bubba
by Bubba Ray
The woman stood at one of the large windows of the Great
Hall. She looked over the surrounding lands with an uncertain expression
on her face. She had a small frame — she stood barely over 5 feet tall
— and looked so fragile that you would hesitate to touch her for fear
she might break. Her eyes focused on a distant point, there was a person
standing there right outside the boundaries of the lands that surrounded
the castle where she lived.
The castle was made from stainless white marble, topped
with splendid red towers. It had a great gate that always stood open in the
day, and was carefully guarded by night. The woman continued to stare in
frightened fascination at the person. He was a giant compared to her (if
she guessed right, he’d stand nearly 7 feet tall), and was encased
completely in a black suit of armor with a great sword hung at his side.
He looked up at the castle, and although such a thing seemed impossible,
the woman was sure that he looked her straight in the eyes.
“Uh...” the woman turned around and saw Darna,
the princess of the Castle. “What are you looking at, Rhenia?”
the woman asked. The woman addressed as Rhenia looked once more out of the
window.
“There is a stranger right outside our
castle…” Her voice trailed, unsure what to say next. Darna looked
out of the window.
“Eeeeeewww, that is one of the evil Ogres that live
in that filthy village in the forest. They are rumored to kidnap babies –
and worse. But don’t worry about people like him – they may not
enter our land, it is forbidden to them.”
Rhenia wanted to say something more, but Darna continued:
“Come: let’s play with our new things. We have gotten some nice
new magical diaries that will repeat everything that we say to them, again
and again, whenever we want it. 'Tis very sweet.” Rhenia wanted to say
something, but Darna just grabbed her hand and pulled her away from the window,
into the hall of the castle. Unknown to her, at the very moment she left
the window, the figure outside turned on his heel and walked away from the
castle.
It had become night in the castle. Rhenia walked along
the hallways to her bedroom; her new diary was in her arms. She really did
not like it at all — it was just silly. It merely babbled everything
it heard, over and over again, mimicking the voice of the person that used
it. Rhenia felt the strong urge to drop it into the pond outside, so that
the fishes in it could try to make any sense of the journal. The other girls
were beaming about theirs, so Rhenia thought that maybe she was lucky to
have one too, even if she still thought it was a frivolous toy.
As she was about to open the door when she heard a strange
sound, nearly inaudible, in the hallways. It was the sound of someone crying.
Rhenia was a bit disturbed — crying here? But in this hall everyone
was lucky and happy all the time. She walked down the halls, following
the sound; it got louder till she finally reached a door.
She looked around. This was the door to the room of Sara,
a younger girl that had come to the castle only weeks ago, and she was of
an even smaller frame than Rhenia. Rhenia thought Sara was a very talented
artist. She knocked on the door, carefully listening to the sounds beyond
it.
The room fell silent; only the sound of her own breathing
now reached Rhenia’s ears. She knocked again.
“Are you all right?” Rhenia asked. No one answered.
Rhenia stood there, not sure what to do; finally she heard Sara’s voice.
It sounded awful.
“Go away, I am fine.” The older woman hesitated,
and she rallied herself to speak again, but there were no more answers, just
silent sobbing from beyond the door. Rhenia went into her bedroom and after
a long fight for sleep felt into a nightmare-ridden slumber.
The next morning dawned; it was a perfect morning, as were
all mornings here in the castle. Rhenia woke up covered in a cold sweat.
Wet strands of her hair were plastered to her face. She changed her clothes
and washed; afterwards she felt a bit better. As she ate her breakfast she
looked for Sara, wondering if she had just imagined the scene as a part of
her nightmares.
Sara did not turn up for breakfast, nor for lunch, Rhenia
was beginning to have troubled thoughts about her. Finally after much wrestling
with herself she went to Sara’s Room again.
She knocked at the door, but got no answer. After a minute
or two she knocked again, still no sign of life from the door. Rhenia hesitated
for a moment longer then she pressed the handle down and entered the room.
At the sight of the room she was shocked, it was a mess
— more than a mess, it was chaos. Clothes and toys lay all over the
floor, the table was upside down and the bed was turned against the wall.
Rhenia looked around in terror — what had happened here? Then, with
a shock, she remembered the Ogre from yesterday. Darna had told her he could
not enter, but the room looked ransacked and Sara was gone.
Rhenia burst out of the room into the main hall; one foot
trod heedlessly on a piece of paper on the floor reading…
Dear Friends,
After what happened today I just cannot stay any longer,
I am unworthy to belong to you, all my works are bad. I have seen that my
attempts to make art as beautiful as yours were foolish.
I am leaving for the forest; the monsters in there will
make an end to my suffering.
Sad that she has took your precious time for so long,
Sara
Rhenia arrived in the Main Hall, Darna and some of the
other Girls were painting together on a large screen. They all looked really
occupied. Rhenia breathed heavily, she had run all the way. She tried to
speak but could not; she just did not enough air. Finally, Darna looked up
to her and spoke.
“Uh… Do you see our new painting? What do you
think of it?” Rhenia was stumped.
“This is looking good,” was all she managed to
say.
Darna smiled, "I would even say, 'Tis looking great.'"
Rhenia managed to get the control of her voice back.
“Sara is gone, maybe she has been kidnapped by the
Ogres,“ she said in a high-pitched, excited voice.
“Uh… Ogres cannot enter the castle grounds,”
Darna replied without really thinking.
“But she is gone, and her room is a mess as if there
was a fight” Rhenia screamed, so excited was she over the whole affair.
“Ogres cannot enter,” was Darna’s only reply.
Rhenia could not believe it.
She spoke again, “We have to find her, she might be
in danger!”
“But Ogres cannot enter the castle,” Darna said
yet again.
Rhenia screamed and shouted as she ran out of the Main
Hall, “Then I will search for her by myself.”
As she turned around a corner she heard a faint, “Do
it, but Ogres…" Rhenia stormed down the stairs, over the courtyard and
across the drawbridge. She hesitated for a moment, and then headed down the
road into the black and evil-looking forest.
In the forest the light was of a strange grayish-green
quality. The path wound through the trees and was overgrown with all kinds
of plants. Rhenia heard the voices of birds and small animals as she walked
deeper into the woods. Tree roots had grown far into the path, and she had
to devote more attention to keeping her feet than to looking for signs of
the Ogres that took Sara.
Time went by, the shadows already went darker in the forest.
Rhenia stood still and listened; there were footsteps in front of her, footsteps
that sounded like the steps of heavy boots. She hid quickly in the shrubbery
and did not even dare to breathe.
Two figures in blackened armor came down the path, both
large, the smaller one was about 6’10 and the bigger one stood easily
over 7 feet tall. Worn-looking swords hung from their belts. Both talked
in low voices as they went along the path.
“Andrew, I am really glad you decided to throw in
with us. We all were troubled that Jorek and his bunch would convince you
to do their dirty work," the larger one said.
“Thank you Rahoul, I cannot tell you how much that
means for me that you guys always thought of me. Even when I was in Jorek’s
Tower, you people cared for me,” the smaller one — Andrew —
replied.
“Yes, we all hoped only to warn you of the evil plots
and show you Jorek's true face. We will have a great celebration this night
in the stronghold, and everyone from the village will come too,” Rahoul
said, chuckling. Rhenia’s heart cramped at those words. They spoke of
a celebration, and they had kidnapped Sara, she squeaked at the thought what
these monsters might do to her.
Suddenly both armor-clad figures turned in unison; they
both stared in Rhenia’s direction of Rhenia. She let out a fearful scream
and started to run — not running toward anything in particular, just
trying to get away from those two monsters.
"Hey, that’s another of the girls from the castle.
We should catch her before…” one began, but she heard no more;
she was running away as fast as she could.
She stumbled over roots, fell and got up again, branches
were tearing at her clothes. She did not even realize it; she just had the
urge to get away from them. She just ran and ran, till she collapsed on the
soft forest floor from exhaustion, sobbing and gasping for breath.
Rhenia had no way to know how much time had passed. She
slowly sat up and looked around; she was completely lost. She had made it
to a small clearing, the clearing was roughly 200 feet in diameter, and in
the middle a single, ancient oak tree stood its ground. While she was looking
around, something caught her eye. She saw a pair of green glowing points
in the forest undergrowth, then another one. Finally over a dozen of glowing
pairs of eyes where to be seen.
A low growling suddenly started, Rhenia jumped up in fear
as the foliage parted and a big gray wolf with only one remaining eye came
out.
“Argh, fresh meat!” it growled in a low, menacing
tone. Rhenia walked a few steps backwards, and her back met the oak tree.
All around her more wolves came out of the wood.
Rhenia counted 8 of the gray beasts; she looked around,
nowhere to run from here, nowhere to hide. The one eyed, who seemed to be
the leader of the pack, ducked a bit and got ready for the jump to bring
her down.
“Hey, girl,” Rhenia heard a voice say suddenly,
“don’t stand there and wait to be eaten, take my hand.” She
looked up and saw a mossy green hand hanging down from the tree, she grabbed
it and was pulled up to the tree in a powerful motion just as the one eyed
Wolf jumped at her.
She was pulled up to a low branch and sat on it trembling.
Opposed to her stood a tiny woman, she stood not more than 5 feet tall and
looked very fragile. The woman smiled at her: “Hello. Good thing you
were leaning on my tree when the wolves came, else you would be lunch now.”
Rhenia was still trembling; the woman got up and gave her a long comforting
hug, stroking her hair.
“Shh it's all good, help is coming already. I am Elisya,
the dryad of this Tree.” Below them, the Wolves growled and stalked
around the tree;one even tried to jump onto the branch. Elisya grabbed Rhenia
and pulled her onto a higher branch as if she was a twig. “Don’t
worry they will be here every second.” Rhenia just nodded and stared
down fearfully.
Then a big, armor-clad figure stepped out of the forest,
and behind him another one. Rhenia's heart cramped as she saw the both Ogres.
A short scream of fear came through her lips. The dryad hugged her again
protectively. “Don’t worry they may not look like it, but those
two are just big softies and here to help you.”
Under the tree, the wolves were in a kind of panic, three
of them fled outright, and three more stood still in terror. Only the gray
beast that lead the pack and another one, a scary black wolf that was even
bigger than the leader, seemed willing to confront the two men that just
stepped out of the wood.
“Get the girl and bring her into safety, I ask you
Andrew,” the bigger man said in a casual tone of voice. “I will
deal with our old friend Lupus here.” The slightly smaller man went
to the tree; completely ignoring one of the wolves that cowered in terror
before him and reached up to help the woman down.
Rhenia hesitated for a second, but then Elysia nodded with
a friendly smile and she let herself slip down into the arms of the ogre.
He held her in his arms and asked with a soft concerned and all over young
sounding voice, "Are you able to walk, or should I carry you?”
Rhenia’s legs felt weak and she seriously doubted that she would even
be able to stand, so she replied with a nearly inaudible voice,
“…Carry, please…”
The man just nodded and carried her from the clearing,
shielding her carefully from the low branches and twigs with his steel-clad
body. Rhenia leaned her head against the breastplate of the ogre; she felt
tired and drained, more than ever before and even cradled against the steel
plates of his armor, she felt quite comfortable in the arms of the tall man.
“The woman, Elysia, looked so fragile, but she was
so strong …” Rhenia said, half asleep and not really paying attention
to what she said anymore.
“She is a dryad,” the man replied softly, “A
tree spirit. She has inherited the power of the tree, the power of a thought
that can, with his roots, crack open even the strongest rock over time. She
is a kind soul that could never harm a living being, not even old gray One-Eye,
but I think Rahoul will take care of him now and for always. The Lupus has
disturbed the peace in this forest once too often.”
Rhenia looked up, the voice of the Ogre had sounded somehow
different now, and she immediately saw the reason, the heavy helmet had vanished
from the head, and had given the view on the face of a young man, not much
more than a big boy. Rhenia stared in mild amazement, the boy must be many
years younger than her, but he carried her with ease, and himself with an
aura of self-assurance that was marvelous.
She finally spoke, “You mean he will…” The
man stopped her sentence in midway.
“Take care of the situation,” he smiled and Rhenia
suddenly did not really want to know what would, or maybe even already, happen
in the clearing. She closed her eyes once more, and leaned against the
breastplate again, and before she knew it she fell into a deep exhausted
sleep.
Rhenia drifted through an ocean of sleepiness, all around
her was warmth and contentment. She drifted in a state of half-consciousness.
Something pulled at her shoulder; she ignored it, but the pulling grew harder.
Rhenia rolled over to the other side and buried her face in something soft.
“Wake up, sleepyhead!” she heard a familiar voice
calling. “Wake up, or I have to get the bucket,” the voice continued
with a childish giggle that suggested that this option would not be as unwelcome
for it as for Rhenia. The woman rolled back again to her back and slowly
opened an eye. Then she pulled open her eyes as wide as she could; in front
of her, with a mocking grin on her face, stood none other than Sara.
The young girl stood there grinning and did indeed have
a bucket full of water in her hand; she seemed slightly displeased about
not being able to give Rhenia an untimely shower. Rhenia rubbed her eyes
and yawned.
“What…? How…?” she mumbled to Sara,
feeling already a few seconds behind the events. Sara finally put the bucket
down and smiled.
“I will explain everything to you, long sleeper —
do you know that you slept for almost 21 hours? Ok, get dressed; there are
some fresh clothes next to you. I will wait outside for modesty’s
sake.” The girl turned and left.
Rhenia got up and washed herself. All her cuts and bruises
seemed to be gone, and she felt rested like never before in her life —
no wonder, considering she had slept for almost 21 hours according to Sara.
She dressed quickly in a casual looking dress like the one that Sara wore
now. Though plain, it fitted her perfectly and felt very comfortable, and
with it came a pair of solid, nailed shoes, much more useful in the rough
forest area she was in than her old shoes would have been.
As she left the room Sara walked to her side and took her
arm. Rhenia looked around, as she was lead out of the house towards another
building. She was in a village of sorts, but the houses looked more like
they were grown than built. The roads wound through the village like mountain
streams, seemingly following no plan at all. There were children playing
and chickens roamed the streets, a dog slept lazily on the middle of the
road and the people just walked around him. From the people around her she
heard loud chatter and friendly laughter. Sara skipped at her side and every
now and then she greeted one of the persons. Finally Rhenia pulled herself
together and dared to speak.
“Oh Sara I cannot say how happy I am to see you —
I thought you had been kidnapped from the castle by the Ogres of the…
forest.” Rhenia’s voice grew silent with the last words as she
remembered where she was and what happened yesterday. Sara saw the look on
her face and smiled at her.
“Don’t worry, it’s all right. I was afraid
too before I came here, and no, of course I have not been abducted by the
Ogres.”
“So what happened then, and why were you gone and
why was your room wrecked?” Rhenia asked wanting to know everything
at once.
“Patience,” laughed Sara, "let's go the last
few steps to the tavern. There we can eat and I will tell you everything."
Rhenia nodded in agreement; she felt hungry enough to eat a sheep, whole,
without mustard, and she told herself grinning. Both women entered the low
tavern and sat down at a table. Sara nodded to the woman that stood behind
the bar, a good-natured looking woman around the age of 35, she stood around
5’10 tall and was, in Rhenia's eyes, very pretty. She must have been
a true beauty in her younger days. She nodded back at the two younger women
and began to amass a table with food and drinks.
Sara turned back to Rhenia. “I left the castle of
my own free will that day. I had a big row with Darna. She said that I was
unable to paint and all of my works were not worth burning, so I screamed
at her and fled into my room. I cried for a while till you came…”
she made a short painful break, but continued before Rhenia measured the
power to talk back to her. “Afterwards, I got angry, I thrashed the
room in a rage like I’ve never felt; then I sat down, wrote a last letter,
and left the castle with my few belongings to never return.” The other
woman interrupted the two; she brought a large meal and lots of drinks.
“Thank you Noire,” said Sara with a smile. The
older woman just smiled on them and left without a word. Sara began to pile
food on her dish and made a gesture to Rhenia to do the same. They ate and
Sara continued, “I took my belongings and left the castle, I did not
know where to go, but as soon as I was out of sight of the castle I was greeted
by Rahoul as if he had waited for me all the time. We talked a lot and he
asked me where I wanted to go now, I told him honestly I did not know so
he invited me here.”
Sara smiled as she took a bit from her meal and continued,
“This place is fantastic, you know? No one cares about your heritage,
or what you did before you came here, you can just live among the people,
they made me feel more at home here than I felt ever before in the castle.
The people love you for being yourself, not for giving an image they like
to see.” Sara looked at Rhenia, her face shining in joy.
As they continued their meal Sara chatted on about her
experiences and the people who lived in the village, Rhenia had trouble keeping
up with the flew of words, but she smiled and nodded to all that the young
girl said. It was good seeing her happy, and more than that, it was good
to see her alive and unhurt.
The door of the Tavern opened again and two men came in,
both were clothed in the simple robust style of the villagers, but Rhenia
recognized the young man as Andrew, in whose arms she had slept the day before.
The other man was even larger. He sported black hair already streaked with
white and a mighty salt-and-pepper beard. His right hand was bandaged. He
spotted them both and waved friendly a greeting. The two sat down at the
bar and started a conversation with the woman called Noire.
Rhenia leaned over to Sara and whispered, “Is
that…?”
Sara grinned back at her, “Yes it is Rahoul, with
him is Andrew as you know, those two are never-do-well pranksters always
up to cause some trouble.” She grinned at Rhenia even more. “Let
them tell you their anecdotes sometime, you will be surprised at the stuff
those two do.”
Rahoul finished a mug of whatever he drank at the bar and
stood up, walking over to the girl, he smiled friendly and asked in a deep
voice, “May I sit down with you? We have to talk about the future of
your friend.” Sara just grinned at him and Rhenia, still a bit scared
of the large man nodded politely.
“What are you going to do next?” he asked straight
away: “Don’t get me wrong, I will be honored to have you here as
a guest for as long as you like, but I sense that you are not yet ready to
leave your home in the castle.” Rhenia nodded: “I don’t know,
I really don’t, I mean I see how I have wronged you and the Og…
the people, I mean, here but…” her voice drowned out and Rahoul
picked it up.
“But your soul is ripped apart about it, the castle
is home even after what happened. Well how about this: Don’t decide
yet. Stay with us for a while, and go back when you feel like it, and when
the halls of the castle become too long, come back here. We are always open
for a friendly face or a nice chat here.”
Rhenia nodded again, this time thankfully. Rahoul settled
a bit, he grinned at Rhenia and asked, “So how is everyone in the castle?
I haven’t been in there for some time. Is Darna still working on painting
a perfect picture?”
The woman looked at him in surprise, “But how, I mean
that …” His grin went even wider.
“Ogres cannot enter the castle? Well, that is a myth
we encourage.” His eyes twinkled with mischief and suddenly it was not
really hard for Rhenia to imagine that he could play pranks on anyone.
“Well I think I can tell you about Darna…"
Did Rhenia go back to the castle? What adventures did
she have while living in the village? Well, maybe I will tell you in another
story; this one is now at an end.