Once a wizard had so many spells scheduled that he made more than a few mistakes. Oh, he conjured a hidden glade protected by dragons and 4-headed dogs well enough. The tree in the heart of the glade was certainly lush and green. However,the wizard had accidentally given cleverness to the single great globe of […]
Once there were three tulip sisters, Lily, Rose, and Petunia. One fine summer day they decided to leave the bed and travel the world. ‘We wish to discover what lies beyond the path between the boulders,’ Lily announced to Mama and Papa Tulip. ‘But you can’t go,’ said Papa Tulip. ‘How will you walk?’ ‘On […]
The Blue Bingle Chapter One Next to a charming and nasty moat on a pile of sticks lived the blue bingle. It was larger than a hen, but smaller than a forest. In happy desperation one day the blue bingle decided to travel far, wide and narrow in order to satisfy its curiosity about the […]
Once Jill was lost on a mountain Once Jill was trapped in a fountain Once Jill was captured by geese Once Jill was jailed by her niece Therefore, naturally Jill now lives perched in a tree
There was once a sad Queen whose infant twin daughters had been taken off by the Feathered Dragon. The Queen spent her afternoons sighing in the palace garden. She could be soothed only by the singing of Melodia, one of her young handmaidens. So beautiful was Melodia’s voice that songbirds from all the world over […]
Once deep down in the underground kitchen of a great palace a little sculger toiled for all she was worth day after day after day. The sculger, being the lowest servant possible, didn’t even have a name. The cook ordered her about with ‘Here, you!’ or ‘Hurry up with that, you!’ The sculger, up early […]
‘Go to the beach,’ her grandmother told her. ‘Sit on our favorite bench,’ her grandmother told her. ‘Here’s a sandwich. Wait there until noon,’ her grandmother told her. ‘And then watch closely,’ her grandmother told her. Ambelinda followed her grandmother’s instructions without hesitation. For her grandmother was wonderful, magical, enchanting, and she had raised Ambelinda […]
A long time ago a maid by the name of Hanna tended the three cows of the master, milking them, taking them to pasture in season, and returning with them to the byre each evening, where Hanna ate her gruel and then bedded down on straw in the loft. She was content with her lot, […]
Once before the world was as it is now, an old man and an old woman tended their sheep and worked at their looms to make a poor living as weavers. The couple was childless and often sighed in regret of an evening when the old man filled his pipe for a smoke and the […]
Far ago and long away a grandmother struggled to raise her granddaughter in a tidy cottage next to the windmill by the canal. One night, after a long day’s sweeping and scrubbing, the grandmother sat by the fire resting while Elsa, the granddaughter, prepared the gruel. A knock on the door sounding as if from […]
