More Unfairy Tales

by T F Carthick

  I nodded my head and replied gruffly, “That would be me. What do you want with me?”

  “Madame—I want to learn magic from you.”

  “You…what?”

  “I want to learn magic.”

  “Who told you I was running a school for magic? I teach no magic. Be off with you.”

  “Madame, I beseech you. Do not turn me away.”

  I slammed the door in his face.

  * * *

  I feared he would make a nuisance of himself by banging on the door and shouting. You know, people never do take rejections gracefully. They just don’t understand ‘no’ means ‘no’. But I was in luck—this lad did nothing of that sort. I was both relieved and, truth be told, a tad disappointed. He had seemed so keen to learn magic. I had expected him to be at least a bit more persistent. He had left without even a fight. Anyway, good riddance, I tried to convince myself. But the next morning when I opened the door, I was in for a surprise. Who should I find sleeping in a corner on the porch but the very same fellow?

  “Hey, you! What are you doing here?” I brought a pail of cold water and threw it over him. He jumped up with a start, shivering of cold. “Who told you I allowed my porch to be used as a resting place for vagrants. Shoo! Scat! Get the hell out of here.”

  “Madame…please.”

  “Please what? Want something to eat? Here take this and be off with you.” I threw him some moldy bread.

  He said nothing. He moved away, but only to position himself below a tree within sight of my house.

  For the next one week, it became a daily routine of sorts. As soon as I opened the door, he would emerge with the same request. The boy was persistent indeed and it seemed that he would continue like this for eternity. Whatever be his other qualities, I had to give it to him for his dogged persistence.

  Eventually, I had to yield. “I will teach you whatever I know. But when you are in my house you will do only what you are told. You shall not speak unless spoken to and do everything I order you to do without questioning. Furthermore, when I don’t summon you, you shall remain out of my way.”

  “Yes, mistress. I will do anything to learn magic from you.”

  And thus, the magic lessons began. To my surprise, he turned out to be a very good pupil indeed. I had never had a student before and I began to find I enjoyed teaching. It felt wonderful to share my magic with someone. For so many years, the study of magic had been a lonely path. It was delightful to have a companion now. He picked up skill so fast and, in few weeks, we were interacting almost as equals exploring the realms of magic, hand in hand—and that is where the trouble began.

  You see, I had never found men attractive until then. I saw them as lowdown creatures of limited intelligence who gawked at women with lecherous eyes. Now, for the first time, I was seeing a different breed of man. His very presence made my heart flutter. I was glad he had persisted. My life, before he came into it, seemed like a distant dream; now the very thought of life without him was nothing short of a nightmare. I hoped he would stay with me forever.

  But that was not to be. The terrible day did arrive when he came to me and said, “Mistress, I have something important to say to you.”

  I was surprised at the formality of his tone. There was an ominous sound to it.

  I nodded my head. He then spoke up. “I cannot tell you how obliged I am to you for teaching me all the magic you know. I shall always be indebted to you.”

  Now where was this leading? Why all this sudden expression of gratitude? Why today? Then it came out.

  “I have been away from my kingdom for too long. Now that I have accomplished my dream of learning magic, I would like to return to my people.”

  This came to me like a bolt from the blue. “Kingdom? People? What are you saying?”

  “My father is the ruler of a little state and I am his only son and heir to his throne. Due to my heart’s deepest desire of learning magic, I had left him and come to you. But I have stayed away for too long—he must be missing me, and I must return to him.”

  “Can’t you see him and return to me?”

  “How I wish I could, mistress. But I have my duties as a Prince. I have neglected them all this while. It is time I took them up again.”

  Duties as a Prince indeed! What do Princes do? Strut around palaces looking important and giving orders? Any knave could do that. Why was he becoming all pompous about it as if that was something really important—like earning bread for a hungry family? As long as he was learning magic from me, the kingdom got on well enough without him. Now that he had learnt all that I could teach him, suddenly all these things became important, eh?

  “And me? What about your responsibility towards me?”

  “I am grateful for all that you have taught me. I will ensure you are adequately compensated; I will have my father build a mansion for you in our kingdom and declare you as the Royal Sorceress. Come with me—you will have all your wants fulfilled.”

  The ungrateful wretch! Does he think he can buy me off with his wealth?

  “No. I am going nowhere. Nor are you. I want you to stay with me.”

  “No, mistress. I told you. I must return to my father.”

  “Then see him and come back to me. I am sure the kingdom can do without a Prince. Or if you insist on going, take me along. But I want no mansion. I would like to live with you in your palace.”

  The words just came out involuntarily.

  “But how can I do that? Only the royal family stay there?”

  “Then make me royal family. Marry me and make me your Princess.”

  There. I had said it. Even I had not known what my intentions with respect to him were till now. Now I did—I was in love.

  His face turned red and an ugly scowl appeared on his face. “I have always looked up to you, Madam, and shall remain grateful for all you have done for me. But marry you? How could you even think of something like that! You are my teacher.”

  I noticed ‘mistress’ had suddenly changed to ‘madam’. “So?”

  “I respect you. But I have never seen you that way.”

  Why was he being so difficult? Now what was all this nonsense of seeing me this way, that way and all? Either he likes me, or he doesn’t. If he likes me, why can’t he take me as his wife?

  “What way?”

  “As a wife or lover.”

  Clearly, he never liked me. He had been deceiving me all these days. I should have known. My interactions with people had never been good. People were always greedy, selfish and untrustworthy. Why, oh why did I expect him to be any better?

  “So that’s your final decision? You will leave me and go?”

  “I explained how things stand.”

  “Don’t beat around the bush. Answer my question. Are you going to leave me and go?”

  “Yes.”

  As he turned to go, I felt a terrific rage rising inside me.

  “Stop,” I said.

  He turned back.

  “I have a gift for you.”

  I summoned all my magic and hit him plumb on his chest. His face began to transform into that of a lion: a lion with the horns of a goat. And his body began to take the shape of a grizzly bear. A most grotesque chimera stood in front of me.

  “Well, there you go. This is my parting gift to you. Go wherever you like now and do whatever you like. Goodbye.” I said.

  He looked at himself with shock. “What have you done to me, mistress?”

  Back to mistress again, eh?

  “Nothing. I just thought you looked better this way.”

  “Please turn me back, mistress. Please don’t leave me this way. I can’t go anywhere like this. People will mistake me for a demon and drive me away with sticks and stones. I can never ever appear before another human again.”

  “Then don’t. Live the life of a recluse like me.”

  “No, mistress. Please!”

  I was not done yet. How he had broken my heart! One more cruel twist was needed to p
ay him back for his betrayal.

  “Very well, I am moved by your pleas. I agree to reverse the transformation. But on one condition.”

  “What is it, mistress? I am willing to do anything.”

  Now I had him where I wanted.

  “The day you receive a kiss from someone you truly love as I have loved you, you shall be a man again.”

  “But mistress, how will a grotesque being like me find love?”

  Ha, Ha, Ha! Wasn’t that the whole catch?

  “That is my final offer. Take it or leave it. I have already been too merciful to you, given how you betrayed my affection.”

  * * *

  He slunk amongst the shadows that night and secretly made his way to his father’s palace. I found out later that, while fully sympathetic toward his son’s situation, the King wouldn’t hear of him resuming the duties as a Prince. In fact, he thought it inappropriate for a chimera to be seen anywhere in the capital. It would scare the subjects, he said. So, the King purchased a mansion in a remote province and had his son sent there. I secretly watched and followed after him. Yes, I did. Doesn’t seem like me at all, does it? You would have imagined I would have forgotten him and got back to my magic studies? But you see, that’s the problem with love. Love is bad enough; spurned love is a raging passion. I had to be around and see him suffer. Or did I? I seemed to feel sorry for him at the same time. I was still in love with him. If that was the case, then why was I subjecting him to all this?

  I can’t say. I am a witch, not a philosopher to be able to give the answers to such questions.

  I found an abandoned cottage in the vicinity and took up residence there. Weeks turned to months and months to years. Life was settling down to a humdrum rhythm. The Prince seemed to have completely reconciled himself to the situation. He found solace in devoting himself heart and soul to the study of magic like I had done all those years. How I wished I too could return to my studies! But no! My mind wouldn’t let me—it was still too full of him. For a long time, nothing seemed to happen. He seemed content enough, and I was the one being punished. This was going nowhere. If it continued this way, he would lose himself in his magic, forgetting everything else and I would be stranded watching him and getting frustrated all my life. It seemed as though I had done him a good turn with my curse, unless I did something again. But what was I to do? I was a scholar, not a schemer; ideas didn’t come to me easily. The most obvious thing to do was to subject him to further curses. But what worse could I do to him? I was not interested in subjecting him to any form of physical suffering. That seemed too crude for my sensibilities. I had still not turned into a callous monster.

  Then one fine day, my chance came. All of a sudden, from a most unexpected direction—a stranger. He strayed into his gardens—an old fellow from a distant land. He was one of those typical humans and did what all humans do—he just broke into the mansion without permission, ate the food that was set on the table and made himself comfortable on one of the beds. Somehow humans seem to have this habit of breaking into dwellings of others and helping themselves to whatever they liked. I have never seen more uncouth, avaricious creatures. Not only do they do this but talk about it proudly in their stories. I could remember at least two of them—one a story of this girl named Goldilocks who broke into a bear family’s home and the other of a girl called Snow White who had similarly broken into the bachelor pad of a bunch of dwarves.

  My young apprentice too had noticed the trespasser but just let him be and watched him from hiding. He didn’t want to make an appearance and scare the poor wretch out of his wits. Such a considerate young fellow he was—so different from his fellow humans. That is what made me love him in the first place. How I wish he had not rejected me and made me do all these things. He almost shamed me with his magnanimity. I was in half a mind to transform him back and get on with my life. But no! His rejection still hurt, and I would find no peace till I made him suffer all that I had suffered.

  Eventually though, even my Prince’s patience and forbearance wore out, as the senile idiot discovered when he began plucking the roses in the garden. Hardly had his fingers reached out to pluck the second rose, when he found himself face to face with a monster he probably had not seen even in his worst nightmares. I say this with a touch of pride, for it was my handiwork. A piece of art in chimera form he was.

  A sense of aesthetics was another thing we shared in addition to our love for knowledge. While I had found limited means to express myself except in that curse, his artistry had found expression through his garden. If there was anything that came a close second to his love for magic, it was this garden of his. He tended it with so much care. And the roses were his most prized possession. No wonder he had lost his temper when that old lout had gone about so carelessly plucking those flowers of his.

  “A demon’s got me! A demon’s got me! Someone save me,” yelled the squeaky voice of the trespasser.

  “You, vile man, you enter my home without permission, dine at my table, consume my food and wine with abandon, repose on my bed in all its luxury like a prince and now call me a demon? I will show you what a demon can do.” So saying, he seized him by the collar and lifted him up in the air.

  “No! No! Please spare me. I meant no harm. I didn’t know the place was yours. I will pay you for all I have taken.”

  “Pay me? What will you pay me?”

  “A hundred gold coins?”

  “Gold coins? What do I want with your gold coins? I have more gold coins than you have seen in all your life.”

  “Then what do you want?”

  “Well, let me see. You have trespassed into my rose garden, which is the most precious to me. And you have taken one of my roses. The right price for that would be something that is as precious to you. Give me that which is most precious to you. Yes—if you promise to send it to me as soon as you return home, I will not only let you go unscathed but take home a bunch of my best roses.”

  I could sense he was no longer angry, and only jesting with the old fellow. Though I had made him look monstrous, he still had the same soft heart that wouldn’t bear to see even a fly come to harm. He probably expected the fellow to go back home and completely forget his promise. And he would not have minded, either, just gone back to his life and eventually forgotten about the old man as well.

  But I could smell an opportunity for me here! I was not going to let it pass! I followed after the old wretch and accosted him about a mile down the road from the Prince’s castle. I got into a conversation with him and made him tell the whole story of his encounter with the beast, to which I listened keenly as if I was just finding out about the events that had transpired. Then I said, “You better keep your promise to him or he will come for you and kill you and your family.”

  The man’s face turned pale in fear. Then he said, “Maybe I will go home and send him some trinket. Hope that should do.”

  These trickster humans!

  “No. He was specific. He needed the most precious thing in your life.”

  “But how would he know what that is?”

  “He is a mind reader. He knows what is most precious to you. If you don’t send that he will definitely come for you.”

  While there were lot of things we could do with our magic, mind reading was not one of them. But this old fraud did not know that.

  He was deep in thought for a while. “But the thing most precious to me is my youngest daughter. How can I send her to him?”

  I had stuck gold. My efforts had not been in vain. My dear apprentice was sure to have been adequately mellowed by the loneliness of the two years. The company of a pretty young girl would be just the thing to kindle feelings in his woe borne heart. Yes! He should be made to feel everything I had felt! That would be the right revenge.

  “You have to. Otherwise he will come for you and kill not only you but your entire family. Would you rather your daughter come to live with him or have her die a cruel, painful death alongside you?”

&nbs
p; He shook his head mournfully—I had managed to convince him. As he was leaving, I added a word of warning. “When your daughter comes, let her tell him she has come to be with him of her own free will. If he comes to know that she has come unwillingly, he might fly into one of his rages and kill her then and there. Also, he might test her by suggesting she return. She must refuse. For if she doesn’t, he will realize she has come unwillingly. Do you understand?”

  He nodded his head and was soon on his way.

  * * *

  In two weeks’, time, a comely young lass was at his door. Just the kind I had hoped for. I had feared she may turn out to be unattractive. Don’t get me wrong here. I would be the last one to put a premium on physical attractiveness. But let us face it—in these kinds of matters, looks do matter. Even I have to admit—his handsome appearance before I transformed him into a beast had been one of the reasons for my attraction to him. I sincerely hoped she had the brains and character to match. Knowing him as I did, he would not fall for a shallow girl.

  The front door was open when she arrived. Unlike her father, she was hesitant to enter without permission and stood there by the door. Only when it became dark and it started raining did she enter. When she did, she found the dinner table laid out like her father had found it. But she did not even go near the table.

  I wondered if she was adopted.

  She just sat in a corner and waited for her host to make his appearance. I knew he was watching her from hiding. He kept her waiting the whole night and finally made his appearance early the next morning.

  “Hello, my dear, what brings you here?”

  She shrunk back in horror at the first sight of him. I wondered if I had overdone his ugliness. Of course, I didn’t want her falling in love with him. I was satisfied with him being ugly enough for her to not even like him all that much. But if she found him entirely repulsive, it might reflect in her behavior. And how would he fall for a girl whose feeling of repugnance for him was so evident right from the start. He needed to have at least a sliver of hope. Hope! That is the greatest betrayer.