Once upon a time, there was a forest covered in snow. A small wagon bumped and bounced along the dirt path that wound through these trees. Now, this is no ordinary forest. The trees can walk and talk and all other kinds of things. The path is never the same from one hour to the next, and who knew where the unlucky travelers would come out. The wagon was perfectly ordinary and so was the driver, a poor man coming home after a long day.
This man had a kind and generous heart, perhaps too generous, given the fact his family had a bit of moldy bread for dinner tonight…and the night before. When the man saw a huddled figure just inside the woods, he stopped. Climbing down from the wagon, he saw that the figure was an old woman, so thin you could see her ribs through the holes in her cloak. The man couldn’t leave her there so he picked her up and set her gently in the back of the wagon. He climbed in and kept driving, hoping the path would take him home soon. More than once he had turned up miles away from his little cottage on the tricky path.
Luckily, he arrived soon after. Unluckily, his home was the one he remembered. The grass he learned to walk on all those years ago was trampled. The glass windows his father’s father had made were shattered, spread across the dirt. The door swung loosely in its frame. The inside of the small cottage was in ruins. The generations-old crib was missing two sides, revealing the silent body of a baby. His baby. The man’s wife lay crumbled on the floor. Bread dough covered her hands, now covered in blood. Just a quick glance told the man all he needed to know. His wife and four children were all dead. When he stepped back outside, something crunched beneath his foot. A single arrow lay on the ground. He kept walking.
Leading the horse to the untouched stable, he slowly began to comb her tangled man. He heard a soft sound outside. A tall woman with billowing robes stepped inside. When she spoke, her voice was deep and powerful. “You, who have so little, stopped to help a starving woman, when so many with so much simply passed by. You are truly worthy of any reward you desire.”
The man closed his eyes and didn’t wipe the tears that flowed down his cheeks. “My family…” His voiced cracked and he could say no more.
The woman said no more. She simply turned and left.
The man didn’t open his eyes until he heard a soft wail. The cry of a baby. His baby. He quickly finished grooming his horse and rushed to the cottage. The windows were intact. The door was open, revealing a baby fussing in an old crib, a woman kneading bread, and children running to and fro.
The man smiled and joined his loving family.
The End