The peddler held the ring out across the volcano. “Do you accept this trade?” she yelled.
The lava demon bubbled thoughtfully, before creasing a smile. “As you wish, mortal.” It extended a giant molten hand towards her, dribbling bits of lava on the rock. Out from its ring finger fell a magnificent diamond, the size of the peddler’s head.
Without delay, the peddler scooped it into a bag, then sat down on a shield. She skidded on it as a toboggan down the mountain to where her horse waited. Galloping for a day and a half, she would reach the castle of a great kingdom.
In the hall of the king, she stood covered in soot. The king leaned forward to inspect the diamond, the prince hanging back anxiously.
“I will give you this diamond to marry your son,” the peddler said without hesitation.
“Of course!” the king said, greed dancing in his eyes. He pulled a scroll of paper from his sleeve. “Please, sign this marital contract.”
The peddler signed the document: Shiloh of Nott Forest. Without a word, she tipped her hat and exited the hall.
On her way out, she nudged the shoulder of one of the guards. “He’s all yours, Shiloh,” she said.
The guard looked at her with tears in her eyes. “You really mean it?” She looked into the hall where the king stood aghast reading the signature that bore her name, and the prince was running towards her.
He launched into her arms and she swept him high, kissing with the relief of ages. Setting him down with a blush, Shiloh pressed an satchel into the peddler’s hand. “This doesn’t come close to repaying you,” Shiloh said to the peddler, “But I want you to have it.”
“That was our deal,” the peddler said simply.
As the castle gate closed behind her, the peddler set a course for the wild lands, taking care not to jostle the satchel.
She brought her horse to the shell of a burned-down village. As she wandered the wreckage, she was stopped by an angry brigand, wearing a large toothed necklace across his bare chest.
He came up to the peddler, as tall as she was on the horse. “Where is it?” he snarled impatiently.
The peddler opened the satchel to show him that it was brimming with grain.
“Khelua seeds!” the brigand gasped, then grinned wide. “We can replant!”
He untied his tooth necklace, then hugged the peddler to tie it around her. “When next you visit, this place will be thriving again,” he promised.
“I don’t travel unless I need to,” said the peddler, but with a small smile nonetheless.
Her next stop was an antiquated dungeon. It was looted of monsters and resources, save one. A treasure chest sat in a hidden room on the deepest floor.
As she reached into the box, it snapped hungrily onto her hand. It was a mimic, trying its hardest to eat her alive by gnawing with wooden slats.
The peddler couldn’t free her hand, so she gestured to the necklace, and the mimic’s jaw went slack. Carefully, the peddler removed the necklace and attached the teeth to the inside of the box.
“Teeth!” the mimic exclaimed. “I can eat again!” It snapped its teeth, giggling at the sound they made. “Oh, I’m raring to test them out! Throw me some meat!”
“Find your own,” the peddler replied, reaching into the mimic and pulling out a book. It supposedly had been enchanted never to decompose, but one hundred years in the belly of a mimic had decayed it nonetheless.
The peddler took extra care as she exited the dungeon, and made her way over to the dark lord’s prison tower.
The evil enchanter’s specter loomed over her as she neared, coating the tower with his dark aura. When the peddler presented the book, he pinched the covers with his astral fingers and opened it. “I see,” he said. “This is the one.” Then, with a flash of his eyes, the book was incinerated in an obsidian flame.
The dark lord’s face was grave as he looked at her. “That book contained spells that could end the world’s wars and create nothing but peace and love among them.”
“I can see why you disposed of it,” the peddler replied.
“You would think,” the spectral lord said, lifting his head, “But they were an evil much greater than mine.”
The peddler shifted uncomfortably. “Do you have what I asked for?”
The dark lord looked puzzled. “Ah...perhaps. What was it you wanted again?”
“Golden yarn,” the peddler said. “For my grandmother.”
She rode away from the tower across the sunset, the golden yarn flying in the wind behind her. The ball of it, she clutched close to her heart, but the end had unspooled slightly, and it made a shimmering tail in the twilight.
It was dark when she returned to her hometown, like one those those firelit nights when Grandmother would tell stories of ghosts and gods. “If I had some of that magic yarn,” she would say, “I would knit you a scarf with my spirit inside to keep you warm from the world when you’re adventuring. That way, I could always be with you.” Being tucked in then, was being swaddled in her golden light.
At the town gate, she was greeted by the guard (her childhood friend) as she dismounted her horse. They hugged with a sense of release, though there was a certain speechlessness between them that clung to the peddler as she disengaged, going to see her grandmother.
She did not head for her childhood home, for she sensed it on her return. She would not find her grandmother there; she headed for the graveyard.
It did not take long to find her. Her favorite knitting needles had been laid across her grave, forming the holy cross. The peddler knelt down, presenting the ball of yarn.
“Grandmother,” she mumbled, “I’ve brought that golden yarn you wanted.”
She sat beneath a clouded, moonless sky, the enchanted yarn shining, its light churning in her teary eyes. But her face changed slowly, she realized what her grandmother had asked her.
“But...I’ve also brought you a story,” she added, picking up the knitting needles. As she knit, she spoke of wondrous things, the yarn of her peddling people’s wishes. The golden yarn shone softly like a hearth, and the trails of light spun like the stars.
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