Leanna The Witch
Original Story By Bess Goden
Witches are always evil in stories. So are wolves. But I think you’ll find that most wolves are just trying to keep their families fed and go on about their lives. The same is true of witches. Perhaps one in a great many has a particular taste for harming children, but all in all a witch can’t help it if a stray child starts to nibble on her house. Or steal lettuce from her garden. This is what Leanna thought at any rate, who had always sympathized with the witches in stories. They often had glasses like she did, were very clever like she was and were often picked on just like her.
“Hey piggle pig.” they’d say when they wanted to call her fat.
“It’s fatty four eyes.” they’d say when they made fun of her glasses.
“You’re the biggest mouse I’ve ever seen!” they’d say when they pulled at her long, bland, mouse-brown tresses that brushed the floor.
In fact, Leanna began to feel she was treated so much like a witch that she started to dress like one and soon enough her neighbors added that to their list of taunts as well. One day when she was too old for school and it was time for her to think of marriage, her mother sat her down for a little talk.
“My dear Leanna, now that you are old enough to wed, we must begin to take your looks seriously,” she said. “I love you very much and know how sweet you truly are, but I don’t suspect there is a man on earth that would guess at your inner nature from the way you present yourself. Really darling,” and here she began to sound exasperated, “starting tomorrow you and I will choose something other than black cotton and make you some merrier outfits in smaller sizes. You really must be able to fit into them when they are ready,” She looked appraisingly at Leanna for a moment, then added thoughtfully, “Perhaps we will consider a cut for you as well, we’ll see what the ladies in town do with their hair when we purchase the cloth.” said her mother adjusting the lace ruffle on her cuff.
Really mother, Leanna thought, haven’t you gotten used to me by now? But she just smiled and nodded, not knowing what else to do.
Later that night, Leanna read one of her favorite stories. It was about a witch who’s daughter left her in the middle of the night to sneak off with a handsome, but dull-witted prince. It really isn’t fair, she thought to herself. Why should witches get beautiful daughters who want to marry and beautiful mothers get daughters who should probably be witches? But as she sat and considered, the phrase ‘probably be witches’ wouldn’t leave her mind.
I don’t have to tell you why she began to pack her bags that very night and why the next morning she was well down the road before her mother arose. Leanna knew that most witches were supposed to live alone, deep in the middle of forests. Indeed it seemed that the best way to find a witch was to charge right in and get yourself lost in one. So that’s just what she did.
Getting lost is just as easy as it sounds and Leanna found that she was quite good at it, if she tried. Trees intertwined with other trees and patches of ivy snaked around all of them, making one little dirt path look very much like every other. She walked all day and eventually it began to grow dark. Leanna had counted on this. She thought it may be many days before she could hope to find anyone living in so dense a wood. So when it was time to sleep, she picked a nice large tree with an empty hollow and wrapped herself in her long brown hair which matched the tree’s color exactly, (for you see mice are the same color as tree bark), and settled in for the night.
Well she came to two or three cottages before she finally found one that contained a witch and when she did find it, she was more determined than ever to become her apprentice. Summoning all her courage, she walked up to the cottage door and knocked. It creaked slowly open and an old woman peered out to see who was there. “Well, child?” said the witch, who eyed Leanna suspiciously, “I have no gingerbread, if that’s why you’re here. I’m not looking for any trouble and you can’t make any fortunes through bothering with me. So, be off with you if you know what’s best.” and quickly began to close the door.
Leanna, not really surprised at her brusque reception, pushed it back open and hurriedly replied, “Please ma’am, I am after neither fortunes nor sweets. As you can see, I have eaten enough of the latter for a lifetime. But I wonder if you have any work that needs doing? I’d like to become your apprentice.”
The old witch was so shocked that she just stared for a moment. Then all of a sudden, she let out a great bellow of derisive laughter. “You wish to become a witch’s apprentice, do you? Haha! I’ve never heard that one before! Most girls like you want to be magically made prettier, or learn the ability to spit diamonds and roses, or some such nonsense.” Then seeing that Leanna was serious, she said “Well, little witchling you’d better come in and tell me what on earth makes you want to do such a thankless and tiring job.”
Leanna went through the gnarled wooden doorframe and sat down at the small kitchen table. The old witch went about making tea, but realized she had run out of matches to light the stove. “I can help you with that,” said Leanna and promptly walked back outside. The witch was curious despite herself and followed Leanna to see what she was doing.
Leanna took a small branch and wrapped the tip in dried leaves. Then she looked up at the sun, took off her glasses and positioned herself just so. Her glasses were quite thick and with them she reflected the sun’s light onto the leaves and started a spark. She blew on it carefully, until it turned to flame.
Surprised, the old woman moved back to let Leanna start the fire in her stove. “Well, I certainly wasn’t expecting to see something like that when I woke up this morning.” said the witch approvingly, “Very cleverly done, girl. Perhaps my new apprentice is here to teach me a few things.”
And with that, it was settled. Leanna stayed on and learned a great many things from the old witch. How to make medicines, how to birth babies, how to pick herbs and dry them. There were often visitors from the nearby village, most were after doctoring of some kind. But once in a while an adventurer would happen upon them and demand the impossible, a love spell or enchantment to bring back the dead. It was rare that they could convince such a visitor that these things were not within their power and they soon found it necessary to devise a plan for the removal of unwanted guests. It went something like this:
Adventurer: Greetings good mother, won’t you reveal yourself and consider a request?
(The witch had always told Leanna that you could spot an adventurer by his ridiculous language. Furthermore, you could always tell that they wanted something from you when they called you ‘good mother’.)
Witch: Go away, or I’ll turn you into a toad!
(If they were very lucky, the adventurer would believe them and take their advice. They usually weren’t. But then again, if they were on good terms with luck I suppose they wouldn’t have any visits from adventurers in the first place.)
Adventurer: (Who by this point, was usually on his knees in begging position.) Please good mother, I am desperate and have nowhere to turn. My heart aches for one so fair, that only the angels can rival her beauty! Yet she has no thought for me. Won’t you keep my heart from breaking by offering me some spell to turn my maiden’s head? I am determined that she will be mine.
Witch: I don’t have any spells like that, idiot. Be off with you!
Adventurer: I can’t leave until my heart is satisfied!
Witch: Is there nothing I can say that will make you leave?
Adventurer: Not until I have assured my love.
Witch: Well, come closer so I can see you better.
(The stranger would usually stumble forward so eagerly that he didn’t notice the rope hidden in a leaf pile just in front of the stairs. He would also never notice that the other end of that rope was tied to Leanna, hidden in her bark-colored hair way up in the branches of a nearby tree. Down she would jump, up the visitor would fly and there he would stay until he promised to go away and never return.)
This strategy worked quite well for the witches. Not to mention what fun they got out of thinking up new insults and seeing the surprised looks on the dangling strangers’ faces.
One day however, they received an adventurer with a request they did not expect. An older woman came to their cottage and called out to the witch. She was as equally stubborn about leaving. When the stranger took off her hood, however, Leanna was glad she didn’t send this visitor dangling by her ankles. “Mother?” she cried, and rushed to hug the woman.
“Leanna? Goodness, child where have you been? I was happy you left before the attacks began, but I worried about you so!” replied her mother with tears streaming down her cheeks.
“Attacks?” asked the witch, “I hate to interrupt your reunion, but perhaps you’d better come inside and tell us your story.”
Leanna ushered her mother to a seat at the kitchen table and poured her some tea. “Thank you, dear, “ said her mother, “believe it or not, the last time I had tea may have been just before you left. A terrible famine has swept our village since you were there.”
“I am so sorry to hear that, mother,” said Leanna, “But I don’t know what we could do for you. We only know how to heal the illnesses of animals and humans, not crops I’m afraid.”
“Not an illness, daughter, but a beast! It eats our crops, plunders our storehouses and ravages our livestock, leaving nothing behind. Luckily it has been satisfied with our food, but we are terrified about what will happen when it runs out of that!” replied her mother, trying to contain her panic.
“A beast? How horrible!” cried Leanna. “And none of the men from the village could kill it?”
“No one has seen it! We can’t believe that something that eats that much could remain invisible for so long,” replied her mother. “We’ve kept watch on the storehouse at all hours, but food still disappears right from under our noses. It seems to come only during the night, but leaves no tracks.”
The old witch was silent until now, but at this she looked up from her thoughts and said, “How can you be sure it is a beast? If no one has seen it, might it not be thieves?”
Leanna’s mother said, “It might be a thief, if he didn’t leave such a dreadful mess behind himself. Whenever there is an attack, grain sacks are torn open, crumbs scattered everywhere. I won’t tell you what the livestock looks like.” She closed her eyes and shuddered at the memory.
Leanna looked at the witch pleadingly, “Can’t we go and help? Think of how clever we were at shooing away all those silly spell-seekers. No beast could outwit us!”
The old woman laughed at the idea of being a beast-killer, then shrugged and said, “Well, I suppose we’d better leave first thing in the morning, then.”
So they did. And when they arrived, Leanna volunteered to stay up and watch for the beast. She allayed her mother’s fears by showing her how well she could camouflage herself with her long mousy hair and hid in the crook of a tree that stood near the storehouse.
The sun set and the moon rose. And as she was waiting for the menacing beast, Leanna noticed that the moonlight reflected off of her glasses creating little spotlights on the ground next to her. She was just about to take her glasses of for fear of being spotted, when she noticed a small scaly black creature roll into the patch of reflected moonlight and up to the storehouse. It seemed to have small legs, much like flippers. It steadied itself and opened its small mouth far wider than it had any right to. Teeth as sharp as a razor glinted in the moonlight and the creature began chewing a hole straight through the storehouse door. Then she saw not just one, but two, three, four and more were piling through the newly borne hole to feast on what little was left.
Well, that explains where most of the food has gone, at any rate. But mother was wrong; this is more of an infestation than an attack! thought Leanna. She got down as quietly as she could and hurried to tell her mother and the witch what she had seen.
When she had told them her story, her mother replied, almost reverently, “How is it that you can see them, when other sentries haven’t? Are you truly magical, daughter?”
Leanna giggled and replied, “If you have to ask that, mother, perhaps I am not truly your daughter after all.”
The witch chimed in, “You say your glasses reflected the moonlight, just like the way they reflected the sun when you started a fire?” Leanna nodded in reply. “Well, if your sentries used torches to light their watch and these creatures are afraid of fire, that may explain it. Perhaps we have discovered our answer along with the problem.”
So, the three women bent their heads together and cooked up a plan. Something a little more fierce and a touch more cunning than any they had thought of before. They worked long and hard. And by the next night, they were ready for the creatures’ return.
Once again Leanna wrapped herself in her mouse-brown hair, hid in the hollow tree and waited. It wasn’t long before her glasses cast little circles of moonlight on the ground and not long after that until she saw the black lizard creatures roll into them. This time however, none of them made it to the store house. Each one of them rolled right into a freshly dug pit, making little squealing noises as they dropped in one by one.
Leanna was sure to keep watch for the last of the creatures to plop down, because when it had, her mother and the witch pushed a giant pot of burning coals right up to the edge and onto the tip of a wooden leaver. The two seized the other end of the lever and started to push, but the pot wouldn’t budge!
“Leanna,” cried her mother, “help us push!” And she did, she threw her weight into the lever and the pot tipped over in a second. It clanged down on the lizards burning them to a cinder before they could chew a tunnel to escape.
“We did it!” the three women cried. And they laughed so loud that all of the villagers came to see what all the fuss was about at so late an hour. Leanna’s mother cried, “We are saved! Friends, we are saved! Leanna has brought a witch and together they have freed us from the beasts!”
The villagers looked puzzled at first. Then they saw the ashen pit and cried with relief. They remembered Leanna as a quiet little girl, too occupied with books to be much use for anything. But the witch and Leanna’s mother started to unwind her hair and they saw it was really her. The villagers shouted, “Leanna has saved us!” and all of the children rushed out of their houses to help unwind Leanna’s hair from her body, skipping and laughing as if she was a maypole.
“Tell us how it was done!” demanded some of the villagers and the three women launched into their story. They told how Leanna had hidden herself with her brown hair, found the creatures with her large glasses and used her girth to push the pot over the pit’s edge. Ever since no one has called her ‘Fatty Four Eyes’ or ‘Big Mouse’ and when Leanna moved back into her mother’s house, the villagers welcomed her home. They asked, “Won’t you be our witch, Leanna?”
“As long as you don’t expect me to cast love spells or make gingerbread!” she replied.
And they all lived interestingly ever after.
