Week 2 Story: Beauty and the Hydra

 Story

Once upon a time, there was a girl born with two older sisters. There had been a twelve-year gap between the births so the older sisters convinced the mother that the youngest one was wicked and evil.  The mother who loved her children dearly trusted the sisters and the youngest began to be treated differently. To cope with her family the youngest daughter found a hobby of gardening. As she grew up her sisters always got everything but she didn't need or want like her sisters instead she got joys working outside and enjoying the birds, rabbits, bugs, and other animals that would visit the garden that she worked on. On the day before her 21st birthday, a horrible storm came and destroyed the town and ruined her Garden all that was left was a single rose. She was sent into town to replace the things that were lost being sent alone into town to get everything that took more time than was expected and when she was leaving town it was nightfall. On her way back home she saw an injured dear that ran away from her as she tried to help. She followed it into the woods and came upon a beautiful castle with the most beautiful garden that she had ever seen. In the middle of the garden was a single rose. She became entranced with its beauty. She found herself picking it out of the ground before she realized what she was doing there was a booming voice behind her demanding what she thought she was doing. She dropped the rose scared and it turned to dust when it hit the ground. when she turned around she saw a giant serpent behind her. He said that because she had ruined the rose now she was indebted to him for life. She begged that she would serve her life to him if he would just let her return to her home and drop off the supplies to her family who needed them. The serpent said that will be fine but if she did not return by the next day he would find her and her family and kill every last one of them. She rushed home to her family and told them what had happened and they laughed at her and said she got what she deserved. She packed up that night to get ready back to serve the serpent for the rest of her life. When she returned to the castle in the morning the serpent was surprised to see her and asked why she didn't try to escape. She reached into her bag and pulled out the only thing that she brought with her the single-serving rose from her garden and explained that it was the only thing that survived the storm. The serpent was moved by the gift and allowed her free access to the garden and the grounds. While initially, the serpent had seemed excited to kill the girl it turned out that the serpent really longed for a connection. They found they both shared an interest in gardening and the serpent had befriended much of the wildlife at the castle she was given range of the castle and told she can do whatever it is she wants but if she were to leave the grounds again she would be killed. As they talked and began to know one another she shared stories about her family. The serpent seemed strange after he heard about the family and brought her a sword and asked her to cut off his head she refused and said that she couldn't do it but he said she had to. Resigned to her fate she took the sword and cut off his head where two grew back. He then told her to cut off another one of his heads and she showed much less restraint this time but again two heads grew back. He then vanished and returned later that night with her two sisters and mother dead one in each head. He then began to glow and transform into a prince who said I have been trapped as a hydra for all these years and me doing an act of kindness for you has freed me. They then got married and lived happily ever after. 

Author's Note

I started with Beauty and the Basilisk and I decided to tell the story from the perspective more from the daughter's perspective I also wanted to give her a little bit more of a back story and I thought the roses were a good place to start. I got the idea for the hydra from her cutting off a head and another one growing back.  I also gave more time to get to know each other so that they would be more likely to want to get married. 

Bibliography

Fairy Tale: Beauty and the Basilisk: The Key of Gold by Josef Baudis (1922) 

"Czech-03932 - Six-headed Hydra" by archer10 (Dennis) is licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0