In her prison cell, Prudence had three ways of escaping. She could detach her skeletal arm and use it to choke the guard, she could pick the lock with a hair pin that she was carrying in her mouth, or she could cast a spell and blow a hole in the wall.
Blowing a hole in the wall might be the most fun, using my skeletal arm might be the most satisfying, but using a hairpin would be the most practical. She spat out her hairpin and began picking the lock. Once she heard a click, she opened the door and stepped outside—keeping to the shadows.
She had the makings of a plan; she would hide outside the castle and wait for Thierry. Once he was leaving, she would kill him. The details could be ironed out later; right now, she just wanted to escape, and she set about doing so.
She kept to the shadows as she made her way out of the dungeon. When she heard a guard coming, she would keep still for minutes on end, waiting for them to move past her. It wouldn’t be long before they realized she had escaped.
While she was tucked away in the shadows, she listened to the small-talk of the guards. “I hear Captain Thierry finally caught that old wife of his.”
“Really?” The other guard was flabbergasted. “God, she’s been tormenting him for twenty years, hasn’t she? She broke his arm on one occasion, and he has suffered many scars because of her. Do you know why she is so insistent upon stalking him?”
“He won’t say. The rumor is that he left her for a prettier, younger woman, but there’s not much evidence for that. I haven’t seen the man with any woman since they separated.” The guard replied.
Prudence’s fists clenched.
Bastard doesn’t even tell anyone the horrible thing he did. She thought to herself. She was so furious, that she almost considered coming out of the shadows and killing the pair of guards, but she kept her anger in check, deciding it was better to save it for trying to kill Thierry.
But while she remained cloaked in the shadows, her cold, dark rage kept growing and growing. It’s like he doesn’t even remember our son…
But Prudence would never forget him. Never in her life.
Eventually, she could think of nothing else but her miracle child, and how he had made her life whole.
***
When she was twenty, Prudence lived in the village of Tieley in the kingdom of Ariskran. She was a poor girl who lived by herself in a tiny, one-room house made of mud and straw. Prudence had only one job; tailoring. It didn’t make her rich by any means, and she wasn’t the best at it by far, but that was fine by her. Her life was bland, but not bad by any means, and Prudence always had a good attitude about it. She thought that every day she managed to pay her taxes and her rent was a good day to be alive.
She worked from sunset until sundown, and when she was finished, she would cheer in elation after making enough to support herself. She would spend the rest of the day excitedly deciding what to do with her time. Although she loved tailoring, there were other things she had far, far more interest in, such as art and writing. She would dedicate at least an hour to each, and it would fill her with even more elation. But despite being happy, she never felt entirely satisfied with her life at the end of the day. In fact, she would spend many nights looking sleeplessly up at her ceiling, wondering why she was feeling so empty.
But one day, she managed to figure it out. All of the other men and women in her village were married and had children, and she was not married and had no children.
She had grown up on the streets as an urchin—albeit a well-liked urchin who people were more than willing to give gold to—and had no idea who her parents were. She remembered singing terrible songs for money, playing the guitar horribly for money, and even coming up with her own dances for money. But a life on the streets had its difficulties, and Prudence had the scars to prove it.
Sometimes, when she really needed money, she would have to resort to stealing it, and it garnered her two, long scars running across her face for doing so. She deserved to be chastised for it, for sure, but she didn’t think the scars were necessary.
Regardless, she was all alone. She had a few close friends, but not having a family or anyone to share her troubles with was difficult. She decided it was time to net herself a husband.
She visited all the shops in town to help her in this endeavor, looking for a man who was her type in personality and looks. Eventually, she gave up on the looks department and concentrated only on personality. Once she did that, she realized that she had a great time talking to the butcher. They had a lot in common, after all.
“After work,” he told her. “I like trying to do something artistic. If I don’t, I swear I’ll go mad.”
He gets it! Prudence through to herself. “I like doing that, too. I like painting after work. How about you?”
“Oh, I like crafting things out of wood. Maybe I can show you a chair I made sometime?” He suggested.
Prudence nodded eagerly. “Sure. What time?”
The butcher—whose name was Earl—was suddenly blushing. He realized that this had turned into some kind of outing. He was a very tall, muscular man—he looked a little like a bear—and Prudence thought that such a man blushing was to die for. He answered her, “How about after work?”
Prudence nodded excitedly. “That sounds wonderful!”
When they met up later, the man showed her the many things he had crafted out of wood. Prudence gasped at a particularly beautiful, adorable chair the man had made. It was painted with flowers and the perfect size for a child. Prudence examined it excitedly. Earl had finished it with lacquer, and it looked fine enough to be sold.
The emptiness of it, however…
It reminded her of how much she wanted a child. She turned to Earl. “It looks like it’s the perfect size for a child! Oh my goodness! It’s so cute… look at the little bees you painted on it.”
“Yes, well…” Earl cleared his throat. “I really want a child, but not every woman is interested in marrying a man who looks like a bear.”
Prudence’s eyes lit up. She turned from the chair to look at Earl. “Yes, well… I would be… I’d be interested.”
Earl was silent. His eyes were alight with delight, but he was otherwise silent.
Just then, the pair knew they were going to be married. And about three months later, they were married. And after that, they immediately set about trying to have a child. They had no luck for a week, and then another week, and then a third week, and Prudence was heartbroken by it.
In the middle of the night, Prudence got up to be by herself. She took a walk in the drizzling rain, finding a bench to sit on and weeping heavily.
This is all my fault. From the beginning, I was cursed. Prudence thought to herself. Her parents had abandoned her when she was just five-years-old, she had to live on the streets, and now, she couldn’t have any children. She wiped her eyes, climbing to her feet. I’m sorry Earl. Perhaps I should run away and give you a chance to have a child with someone who can give you one.
Prudence walked through her little village that was now covered under a sheet of heavy rain. She shivered as she strolled past the blacksmith and the bakery, and kept going until she had walked out of the town and onto a barren, dirt-pathed road. Still she walked, until…
In the distance, she saw a bizarre woman cackling by a fire that somehow resisted being put out.
Her bare feet sunk into the wet dirt path; her toes were freezing. The only thing that felt more frozen than her feet, was the cold fear spreading throughout her body at the sight of the disheveled woman.
When she came close enough, she saw that the woman had glowing, red eyes peering out from a mass of wrinkled skin. Prudence gasped. “Who are you?”
There was a long pause.
The only sound was the crackling of the unnatural fire. Eventually, the woman whispered, “I am a witch.”
Prudence gasped. A witch! Witches are evil creatures—I must get away! Prudence turned away, intending to run back to town, but was somehow held still by an invisible force.
“I have something you want, girl.” The raspy-voiced witch replied.
“No thank you. I wish to go home.” Prudence knew better than to bargain with witches.
“You can have a child, if you only bargain with me.” The witch’s red eyes lit up at her sentence. Now, she knew she had Prudence’s attention.
Prudence focused on the witch. “Truly…?”
“Truly.” The witch answered.
Prudence’s eyes became watery just from the thought of having her own bundle of joy. But she knew making a deal with a witch always came with a cost. She asked, “What would it cost me?”
The witch’s glowing eyes approached her in the dark. The witch stood, her silvery hair dragging across the floor and covering her eyes.
“What is having a child worth to you?” The witch asked. “I must tell you; I have probed your body while you slept, and it is not capable of having children. This will be your only way.”
Prudence felt the hair raise on her neck from the fact that the witch had done something to her while she slept. The fact that she had done so made Prudence trust her even less. How would this witch possibly know what my body is or is not capable of?
As much as it pained and devastated her, she decided it would be best to defy the witch. After all, the witch might have been lying to tempt her.
The witch, as if reading her mind, said, “Well, you don’t have to decide now. But if you would like to have a child, then summon me with this potion, and I will help you in your endeavors.”
The witch plopped an electric blue, bottled potion in her hands, and then the witch disappeared as if she had never existed. Prudence growled, intending to throw the potion to the floor—breaking it—but she stopped herself.
No matter what it costs, I will have a child. I don’t care what I have to sacrifice. But first, I must ensure that I can’t have one just by sleeping with my husband. Prudence thought to herself.
Prudence went home after that--shivering and sneezing from the rain—and her husband wrapped her in a blanket. “Prudence, what on earth were you thinking? You could catch a cold out there?”
Prudence murmured sadly, “I’m sorry… I’m sorry I can’t give you a child. It’s all my fault, I know it.”
“None of that talk,” Earl said, wrapping her in his strong arms and hauling her to bed. “It would be tough if we never had children, but your company is enough to keep me happy for a lifetime.”
Even though she knew he told her the truth, she could feel his disappointment over the next few months when she still could not provide him with a child. More than that, she could feel her own disappointment. The pair had made up a child’s room in their small house, and were gazing at the empty, child’s chair Earl had crafted with a pang of regret in their guts.
“I don’t understand it!” Prudence wept. “We would be amazing parents! Why won’t god grant me this one boon?”
Earl soothed her, stroking her hair. “Don’t cry Prudence. Let’s just keep trying.”
But the heartache of trying to no avail made her feel like a failure. She wanted to hold a bundle of joy in her arms. She wanted to raise it with her beloved husband. She wanted to share her wisdom with it and give it the love she herself never had as a girl.
She became obsessed with the perfect life she would have if she could only have a baby, because without a baby, her life felt incomplete. And before she knew it, she was drinking the blue potion late at night when her husband was asleep.
The witch was summoned in a poof of blue smoke. Now, contrary to the witch she had seen before, she was beautiful—high cheek bones, red hair, and a small nose—and she looked at Prudence with a grin on her face.
“What is a child worth to you?” The witch asked.
“An arm and a leg.” Prudence answered.
The witch cackled. “It will be done.”
The witch snapped her fingers and a bed appeared beside them. “Lie down. I will give you what you wish.”
Prudence laid down on the bed without regrets.
The witch said, “I’ll have to put you under, of course. It’s quite a painful process. I also feel it is necessary to tell you that you, too, are a witch. That's why your parents abandoned you and you are incapable of having children.”
Prudence’s eyes widened. Just as she said, “What?” the witch put her under.
When Prudence woke up, the flesh of her arm and leg was missing and the sound of a crying baby was in her ears. She looked to her left. She was elated; beside her was a baby. She moved the child to her arms. She gasped, nearly dropping the baby when she saw that it had no eyes. She swallowed.
In a moment, she wasn’t disturbed at all.
This was her child, and eyes or no eyes, he was perfect. Now, her life was complete.
***
Prudence snapped back to reality when the guards had passed her by. It was time to move. She dashed through the dirty, dank dungeon and up a flight of stairs.
I’ll kill him. He should have known better than to mess with a witch. Prudence thought to herself as she arrived on the first floor of the castle.
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