Once upon a time, in a land far, far away, there lived an
elf named Fitch. He lived deep into the forest in the base of a large tree.
Running just past the base of his tree was a path that connected the two neighboring
towns. Most travelers used the road that was on the other side of the forest to
get from town to town, but there was the occasional traveler who would walk the
path that went right by Fitch’s tree.
The area surrounding Fitch’s tree was covered in small,
red flowers called Torch Gingers. These were flowers that normally grew in
warmer climates, so they were unusual for this particular forest. But Fitch
would tend to his Torch Gingers by watering them, talking to them and even
petting them, each and every day. Fitch loved his Torch Gingers and he would spend
hours making sure that the grounds surrounding his tree were clean and kept.
One day, a couple was walking along the path that went by
Fitch’s tree and Fitch strolled out towards the path to meet them. He gave a
pleasant smile and offered a refreshing drink of cool water to the travelers.
But when the travelers refused his hospitality, Fitch became irritated and his
countenance changed. He gathered himself and asked the travelers what they
thought of his flowers.
“Tell me youngsters, what think you of my red garden?”
The young lady noticed the strange flowers and commented
on the contrast between the red of the flowers and the green of the grass.
“Why, these are the most unusual flowers I have ever
seen,” she said. “What are they called?”
“They are called Torch Gingers, and they are all my very
dear friends.”
The young man sneered and grabbed his lady’s arm.
“Flower friends? Let us go from this place or else we won’t
make town before nightfall.”
As the young lady and young man turned to walk away,
Fitch called out to them in a manner that made them stop.
“Why in such a rush? Why don’t you join my garden?”
The young man looked at Fitch as if Fitch were insane. “Join
your garden? Whatever could you mean by that, little man?”
With a wave of his hand, Fitch transformed the young man
and the young woman in to two Torch Gingers that became part of his growing
garden. He watered his new flowers, petted them and then spoke ever so gently
to them.
“When you refuse my hospitality, you become part of my
garden,” Fitch said to his new flowers. He gave off a disturbing cackle and
went back into his tree home.
A few days later, Fitch was sleeping in his bed when he
started to hear the screams of dozens of voices in his head. He grabbed for his
ears to try and make the screaming stop, but it persisted and persisted.
Finally, Fitch jumped to his feet and realized what the screaming was. “My
garden!”
Fitch ran to his doorway in time to see a young boy
skipping down the path, away from Fitch’s Torch Ginger garden. In the little
boy’s hands was a bouquet of Torch Gingers that was screaming in pain. The
little boy could obviously not hear the screaming, but Fitch could and it
disturbed him so. He tried to run after the boy, but Fitch’s tiny legs were no match for the boy’s long stride.
Fitch did his best to keep pace with the young boy and
saw the boy enter a cottage just on the edge of town. He snuck over to the
kitchen window of the cottage and watched as the boy’s mother put the Torch
Gingers in a vase filled with water. The screaming started to subside.
“No!” Fitch thought to himself. “My beautiful Torch
Gingers will drown!”
Fitch went around the back of the cottage and saw an ax that was used to cut logs for the winter. He grabbed the ax and slowly made
his way towards the back door of the cottage. He would sneak into the cottage,
kill the boy and his mother and retrieve his Torch Gingers. Then he would
replant them before they drowned.
As Fitch slowly opened the door, he saw the boy sitting
by a window in the front room of the cottage reading a book. The mother was in
the kitchen preparing lunch, which consisted of a bowl of fruits from the
garden and some greens mixed in.
Just as Fitch made the turn towards the kitchen to strike
the mother, she turned to head towards the front room. She saw Fitch and
screamed. The young boy heard his mother and jumped to his feet to run towards
the kitchen. Fitch turned to address the boy and the boy stopped in his tracks.
“You!” Fitch exclaimed. “You have stolen my precious
Torch Gingers. Now you will join my…”
But before Fitch could finish his sentence, the mother
had struck him soundly on the head with a wheat grinding pedestal. Fitch fell
to the floor and the mother instructed the boy to take the elf into the
backyard. As Fitch laid on the ground in the backyard, the mother used the ax to finish off the intruder.
When the mother and son went back into the house, they
saw a pile of dead bodies in their house. The boy noted that that the number of
dead bodies corresponded to the number of flowers he had brought in his
bouquet.
Without realizing what they had done, the boy and his
mother had freed Fitch’s victims from their Torch Ginger forms when they killed
him. But they had also drowned the flowers when they put them in the vase of
water.
Back at Fitch’s tree, all of the Torch Gingers turned
back into their human form and the people ran off towards the two towns to tell
their tales.
