Wolfskin
Wolfskin
So it happened a long time a go in a place that is elsewhere. It was the kind of place where the forest was deep and dark, and the winter was deeper and darker still.
There was a hunter in the forest one cold, dark evening. He was the kind of hunter who caught animals for their pelts which he then sold to wealthy men. He had had a long hunting trip and was trying to make his way home but the weather was worse than he had imagined and he still had a long way to go. He’d had a long day and hadn’t caught anything but it seemed the night was about to catch him. He was tired as he dragged his sledge covered in pelts along behind him and as the freezing night closed in he was looking for somewhere to shelter.
As he trudged through the snow he saw lights through the trees. He headed towards them and found himself in a clearing in the middle of which stood a sturdy cabin. The lights were on and smoke was coming from the chimney so he left his sledge at the side of the the cabin and went and knocked on the door. He waited but no answer came so in desperation he let himself in. Looking around he saw the cabin was neat and cosy. The fire was burning brightly and there was a big pot of broth bubbling on the stove. He helped himself to broth and settled down to warm himself in front of the fire. Just as he was dozing off he heard the sound of footsteps in the frozen snow outside. Not knowing who owned the cabin and fearing they may be dangerous he jumped up and hid in the eves of the roof.
As he watched from his hiding place he saw the cabin door open and in came the biggest wolf he had ever seen. It was magnificent with fur the colour of moonlight. His amazement grew as the wolf stood up straight on its back legs and its fur dropped from its body to reveal a woman. She was the most beautiful woman that he had ever seen, tall and slender with long hair the colour of moonlight. He knew instantly that he had to have her as his wife. He waited as she ate a bowl of broth and as she laid the wolfskin on the bottom of her bed and fell asleep.
Once he was certain she was sleeping he crept from his hiding place, took the wolfskin outside,lashed it tightly to his sleigh and went back in to wake her. As she woke, startled, she immediately reached for her wolfskin but it wasn’t there. Fearfully she looked at the hunter looming over her and asked what he wanted. He told her he wanted her as his wife. She asked if he would give her her wolfskin back if she married him and he said he would once she had pleased him well enough. Not knowing what else to do she agreed and so they were married.
Every day the woman would clean, cook and do everything she could for the hunter and every night she would ask him if she had pleased him well enough. He would always reply ‘Not yet’. And so the seasons rolled by and in time the woman gave birth to a baby. She had hoped that her baby would be a wolf but it was a human boy and she loved him with all her heart. On the night of his birth she presented the hunter with his son and once again asked ‘Have I pleased you well enough?’ And once again he replied ‘Not yet’. She knew then that he was never going to return her wolfskin and she wept all night long.
And so the years rolled by and the baby grew into a boy. He loved to play in the woods with the other children who lived nearby until one day one of the other children said they didn’t want to play with him anymore because he was a cheater. The boy was confused because he had never cheated in any of the games even though he always found the other children in hide and seek and won all of the running races. But the other child would not be convinced, she said that the boy was definitely cheating because his mother was a wolf and that gave him an advantage. Now this struck the boy as a very strange thing to be told so he went home to his mother and told her what the other child had said. ‘Are you a wolf?’ he asked her and she replied ‘I am your mother and you are my son. If I were a wolf so too you would be one.’ The boy thought about this for a long time and still he didn’t know what to make of it so he went to speak to his father and asked him if his mother was a wolf. His father told the boy that he was old enough to know the truth and told him the story of the cold winters night when he had come across the cabin, the huge wolf with fur the colour of moonlight and how he convinced his mother to marry him by hiding her wolfskin.
The boy felt extremely sad for his beautiful mother and as the years passed he watched as she grieved her lost wolfskin. He knew that his father had been wrong and several times he begging his father to return her wolfskin but the hunter would not and eventually he told his son that he had sold the wolfskin to a wealthy man on the night of the boy’s birth to make sure that his mother would never again turn in to a wolf.
More years rolled by and the boy became a young man. One spring day, after a particularly harsh winter, the boy went into the cabin to see that his mother had baked up a storm. There was bread, honey cakes and baklava which his mother was packing up in to a large basket. She covered the basket with a gingham cloth and told the boy that she had heard that the prince had taken ill over the winter and so she had baked some treats to help him build his strength. She told the boy to take the basket of goodies to the palace and leave them with the housekeeper for the prince. It took half a day for the boy to walk to the palace. When he arrived he knocked on the door and when the housekeeper answered he explained that his mother had baked goodies to help the prince build up his strength. The housekeeper showed the boy in to to palace and asked him to lay everything out on a long table in a vast dining room. As he was doing so he sniffed the air and was surprised to smell the scent of his mother. He was confused because he knew that she was at home half a day’s walk away but he was certain it was her scent. He followed his nose until he came to the throne room and there on the throne was a huge wolfskin the colour of moonlight. Without thinking the boy grabbed the wolfskin, rolled it up tightly and pressed it into his basket covering it with the gingham cloth. Then he ran from the palace and didn’t stop until he reached the cabin in the clearing.
They say that from that night on two enormous wolves with fur the colour of moonlight were often seen in the woods. They also say that the hunter was never seen again.
