Week One, Night Two: Where The Bird Went

I had a dream last night...

I saw the golden bird flying through the cool night air, carrying the precious apple in its beak, passing over hill and forest, as the sky began to lighten to its right. When on the horizon, there appeared a great castle, hidden from the morning sun by the shadow of a great mound of earth just to the east of it.

But as the bird got closer, I could see that the castle shimmered in the same way as the bird and the apple, seemingly made of gold!

This golden castle had a pair of tall, pointed towers at its middle, joined almost all the way to the top, with shorter towers on each side, and a thick wall all around.

As the bird neared the castle, it turned down, and flew over the front wall and into the lawn, where everything long lay withered and dead.

Next, the creature’s golden wings took it to the right, around the side of the castle, and across the courtyard in the back. And there, lying beside the back door, was a human skeleton half-burried in the ground, with little sign of what happened so many years ago.

The fowl flew back around to the front, and up towards the tallest tower on the right, making its way for a window near the top. Gently alighting on the windowsill, the Golden Bird watched as something stirred inside the dark room. And there emerged from the darkness a hideous old woman, approaching the bird with an outstretched hand.

“Finally, the last one!” she said, placing her hand beneath the apple, and letting the bird drop it  into her palm. “I send you out four nights, yet only receive three apples! So what did you do with the first?” she asked, yet knew she would receive no answer.

The dimly-lit room was filled with strange and hideous artifacts, animal skulls, and twisted dolls of moss and fur, among unsettling vats and pots bubbling with vile concoctions.

The old woman took the golden apple to the far side of the room, to a small table where several brightly colored potions were churning and bubbling. And holding the fruit by the stem, she carefully dipped it into a liquid that was as red as blood, before raising it back up and letting the excess drip off its sides.

Setting the apple down, she turned back to the bird. “It is almost time. The princess will be reaching the age of her destiny. The destiny that you foretold!” turning back to her vats and trinkets as she added “But I will stop her. I will keep it from happening.”

She picked up the apple, and dropped it into a sack with two others. “This! This! Will certainly stop her betrothed! Whichever of those foolish princes it may be.”

Pausing for a moment, she cocked her head to one side, as if listening for something.

“Yes. Yes. In fact, I believe my errand boy is here now.”

The old woman stepped back up to the window, and stuck out her head, watching as a man on a golden horse came trotting up through the front lawn. But in looking down, she seemed to notice something wrong with the bird on the windowsill beside her.

“What’s this? A feather you have lost!” She stepped off to the left to think, rubbing her crooked chin. “Then the princes will likely seek you out. I will have to head them off before they get too far.”

She waved her hand before the bird’s face, causing its eyes to flicker with a purple light. “Now go! Return to your false master!”

And the Golden Bird took off, heading to the south-east, with the man and his golden horse looking up at him as he flew off.

–Charles M Warren

Week One, Night One: The Golden Apple Thief

I had a dream last night...

I found myself under the full moon of a cloudless, starry night, in the middle of a grand and elegant garden of a great king.

All around me were a collection of wonderfully extravagant plants: strange animal topiaries of beasts I had never seen, flowering bushes from distant lands, and fruit trees of every kind and color. All protected by a towering stone wall, encircling both the garden and the king’s castle itself.

Among these beautiful trees, there was one that bore apples as golden as the sun, with skins that even shimmered in the moonlight. And standing beside this tree, was a young man in expensive clothes, with a bow and arrow in his hands, and a quiver across his shoulder.

Staring up at the golden fruit, he asked “Why does my father doubt me so? For the past two nights my older brothers had their watch, yet two more apples were stolen!” And he raised his bow to aim at the garden wall in the distance. “Well the spoils shall end with three.” and he let the arrow fly, watching it as it deflected off a stone of the wall. “I will sooner die in the struggle than succumb to sleep such as they!”

The prince, for that’s surely what he was, must have paced around the golden apple tree for hours, waiting for the thief to appear, but never heard as much as a dog barking in the distance.

Beginning to grow weary, he approached a low-hanging branch of the tree, and reached out to cradle one of the fruits in his hand.

“Who wouldn’t want you.” he noted. “It’s no wonder father goes as far as to have you counted everyday, with the magic properties you’re said to possess.”

And as the prince looked at the apple, studying the reflection of the moon through its skin, something rose up into the sky behind him.

Turning around, he saw a large golden bird, resembling a pheasant, but as large as an eagle, with a long trailing tail and a crest that curled off the back of its head. The prince, stunned with awe, watched as the bird silently flew over him, seemingly unaware of the boy’s presence, and gently landed in the branches of the tree.

The golden bird turned its head around, as the moonlight shimmered across its body, and preened several of the glittering feathers on its back. Then, looking at one of the apples hanging beside it, the creature carefully used its beak to pluck off one of the apples.

The Prince was still lost in wonderment as he stared up at the bird, watching as it stood up on the branch, and began to spread its wings, before he finally realized that it was about to get away with one of the apples.

Quickly, he drew an arrow from his quiver, and raised up his bow, steadying his aim as the bird lifted itself into the air. He let the arrow fly, and it shot up behind the fowl, missing its body, but striking one of its feathers, sending the golden shaft floating down toward the ground.

Catching the feather in the air, the prince didn’t bother to draw another arrow, but watched as the bird flew across the night sky to the north. “Father has to think more of me now. Not only have I seen the thief, but I have a token of his identity, and proof of the splendor that lies behind it.”

–Charles M Warren

Week One: The Taking Of The Golden Apples

The first week, with five nights of dreams...

My Fantasy Blog

I've been having these weird dreams lately, so this is where I'll be posting one recurring one about a fairy tale I read somewhere.