Here’s another fractured fairy tale. I think that this one with transfer over to bardic circles well…because it’s short 🙂

The Feathered Princess

Once there was a fisherman. He was small, and greedy, lecherous and lazy. He was not a good man, and an even worse fisherman.

One day he was leaving his boat after a meager day’s catch, when he saw a fair maiden bathing. Being lecherous and generally unpleasant, he hid in the bushes to watch. And he noticed that on the lake’s shore was acloak made of feathers.

“Oh! I know what she is. I know the legends, and this maiden is secretly a Swan Princess! If I can steal her cloak, she’ll be forced to marry me, and all of her riches will be MINE!”

He crept forward, very sneakily, for he was lecherous and used to creeping sneakily, and grabbed the feathered cloak.

“Ha ha! I have your feathered cloak, Swan Princess! Now you must marry me, and I will have all of your riches!”

The maiden slowly left the lake and walked toward the fisherman. Her steps were small, but she walked with purpose, her flaxen hair falling behind her. She raised her arms in the air, as if to embrace the fisherman, and ran to him.

“Here comes my wealthy, beautiful…and also wealthy princess,” the fisherman thought as he rubbed his greedy palms together. “Look at how eager she is for me to hold her. And I will be so rich! I can buy nets of silver and gold! I can buy…a huge fishing boat, with a fishing boat inside of it, and another one inside of that!”

The maiden stopped in front of him. She let her arms fall to her side.

“What do you have to say to your husband, my blushing bride?”

The maiden looked him in the eye…and hissed

“What?”

She leaned in until her face was inches from his. “HONK!”

“What?”

“HONK!” She snapped her head forward, breaking the fisherman’s nose. “HONK!” She headbutted him again, flapping her arms as she attacked.

The fisherman had made a terrible mistake, for it was not a Swan Princess, but a Goose…a horrible, horrible goose. “No! This isn’t how it’s supposed to happen. You’re supposed to be my bri–”

The goose maiden honked again, and her call brought a flock of geese to her aid. It was a flurry of honking and pecking as they savaged the fisherman, who was now crying for mercy and for his mother.

When the fisherman was finally a bleeding, crumpled mess, the geese lined up one by one. Each of them took a possession of his: the first took his net and threw it in a tree. The second took an oar from his boat and waddled away. The third took a boot that had come off of him and swam off. And they continued until everything he had was gone. Then the Goose Maiden took back her cloak, kicked him, and pushed his boat out to the center of the lake.

For she was a Goose. A horrible, horrible, goose.