I turned over diamonds again! In case you don’t know, not actual diamonds. I’m participating in the Deal Me In short story reading challenge. We arbitrarily associate short stories with playing cards, turn over a card every week, and read a story based on the card. I’ve associated diamonds with Andrew Lang’s Rainbow Fairy Books.

So I turned over diamonds, and I read a fairy tale from Lapland. It was so short, I read another.

So.

The Elf Maiden

So random. Two guys have a crush on one girl. The girl likes Boy A better than Boy B, so Boy B tricks Boy A into missing the boat from the summer fishing grounds to the winter quarters. Apparently nobody, including Girl, notices, which is fine, since nobody from home has any further connection to the story.

A bunch of elves come to live in the abandoned fishing village, making me wonder if they live in the fishers’ winter quarters while the fishers are over here fishing. ANYWAY, one elf maiden pricks her finger on a pin Boy A has sticking in his sleeve — and who doesn’t, right? — and has to marry Boy A because he’s drawn her blood. And he says, “Why not?” What a charmer! No wonder Girl liked him best!

So blah blah blah and her daddy tries to kill him but she warns him, blah blah and there’s an Orpheus and Eurydice bit only with cows, and the Elf Maiden tells Boy A how to keep her from ever leaving the house and he does. The end.

I don’t think I even have to waste ones and zeroes pointing out the subtext in all that.

How Some Wild Animals Became Tame Ones

TL;DR They didn’t listen to a kid. He warned ’em what people would do to them, if they went to the Miller’s wedding. If they listened, they stayed alive and wild. If they ignored him, boom! Horse, cow, reindeer, I’m lookin’ at you.

~*~

If YOU need a short story to read, I have free ones here on my Free Reads page. I also have four collections for 99 cents each linked from my Short Stories page.

I also gotta say that I just had a new collection of short stories published. These ones are plain ol’ everyday humor, with no mystery or science fiction or fantasy — nothing but a natural born fool named Lonnie and his jumbo-sized friend, Tiny.

LONNIE, ME, AND…. is available at Amazon in print and for Kindle and Kindle apps. Soon, it will be available through independent booksellers and in multiple formats through Untreed Reads.

A WRITING PROMPT BASED ON MY POST: Write about someone who loses something or someone they had their heart set on yet they don’t care that they lost.

MA