Legend has it that Jack and Lenore tumbled into the world in a salty rush of fluid, one hand firmly holding the other’s ankle though they neither knew nor cared who’d arrived first. As twins, they fought often but always knew to trust each other when things went south. Understanding this became increasingly important over the years, as they grew up and their parents did not.

In the family’s early years, townsfolk dropped gifts on the doorstep of their broken-down shack: loaves of bread, buckets of milk, rags for diapers, simple wooden toys. Others trekked from the village to knock on their door and hold a crying child, or lend an ear to ease the wailing despair of the disillusioned young parents. By the time the twins could walk and talk, hard times had overwhelmed the small community while nothing seemed to change for the sorrowful family at the edge of town. Wailing despair settled into bitter resentment. Gifts dwindled, visits ceased, and a decade later, the now isolated family lived mostly hand-to-mouth as the village slowly recovered.

***

“We have to do it now, Lenore.” Jack idly twirled the deerskin bag he’d crafted from a lucky kill his father had managed. The bag clinked, satisfyingly full of the thumbnail-sized stones he collected. “We’ve got to go and seek our fortune. There’s no fortune to be found here.”

Lenore snatched the bag from him and hissed, “Will you be quiet? They’ve stopped yelling. You know when Mother and Father aren’t yelling, they’re making plans about us.”

The two children looked across the yard to the single lit window of their home. Empty squash vines and broken cornstalks hunched like goblins in the frosty light. The waxing quarter moon did nothing to dispel the twins’ unease. Still, there was no screech of hinges from the front door. For the moment, they were safe.

Jack grabbed the bag from Lenore, pulled its neck open, and plunged his hand into the comforting smoothness of the tiny, white stones. His mind raced as the stones soothed. “We’ve got to make our own plans.”

“I agree, but your magic stones won’t buy us much,” pointed out Lenore.

“They’re not magic. I’ve been reading from Father’s books about how the Romans marked their roads with white stones so travelers could journey safely by night.” He leaned in. “I say we run away into Talvitumma Wood at the next full moon, before Father takes us there again. These stones will reflect and shine, and we won’t get lost. The last time Father left us out there, our bread trail was eaten by night creatures. We were lucky to make it back.”

“Well, listen to what I’ve been up to. Get your paw out of that bag for just a minute.” Grabbing Jack’s hand, Lenore placed it on the hem of her skirt. “When we get to wherever we go–when we go–we’ll need to grow our own food: beans, corn, squash, maybe a sunflower.”

“What’ve you got here?” Jack squeezed the hem, heavy with seeds. “Where’d you get these?”

“I harvested these from our own yard.”

Jack glanced over at their scant summer garden and snorted.

“Well, okay. Some I scavenged from the roadside when the townsfolk rolled by, taking harvest to market.” Lenore frowned. More than one passing wagon had dropped a fistful or two of grain, a twist of small seeds or dried fruit as they passed her crouching in the weeds of the roadside ditch. Others had let slip scraps of fabric, tied around bundles of thread and the odd button. Sometimes mismatched balls of spun yarn had rolled her way. And more than once, spools of thread wrapped around papers of precious needles for both fine and rough work had tipped out of the pocket of a forest-green cape, a woman’s sharp blue eyes smiling from within its hood, the raven on her shoulder gazing past Lenore to turn his shining eyes to Jack, tinkering in the yard.

***

The children didn’t leave home that night or the next. They didn’t leave that season or the year after that. During this waiting period, Lenore made herself useful by mending the family’s worn clothing, sewing pockets in her skirt and cape, tending the garden for her mother, and learning to build snares for rabbits. Jack wandered the wood with his magic stones, testing their uses in different light conditions. Once he’d ventured deep enough into the wood to discover a winding stream, teeming with fish and more of the small white pebbles. He’d begged Lenore for one of her precious needles to fashion into a sturdy hook to catch those fish. The stream also yielded larger rocks that, thanks to his father’s books, he was able to flake into sharp knives.

Jack’s knives sold well enough at market as did Lenore’s rabbit pelts. Some of the money was given directly to their parents, but most was secreted in a hollow tree trunk, in a birch grove behind the collapsing barn that sheltered  the family’s aging cow, Millie, and a small brood of scrawny hens. Millie, despite her bony shanks, still gave a little milk. The three maiden chickens were too tired to lay anywhere but in their tiny coop, so their few eggs were easily gathered. Both parents were content to let the children handle most chores.

That is, until Mother, stretching and strolling around the backyard in the cooling sun, espied the cache of coins, her scant pile of evening potatoes scattering as she grabbed the bag and ran, shrieking, back to the shack to tell her husband. 

***

“Where did this come from?” Father growled, eyes glittering. The bag of coins clunked onto the wooden table. “Did you steal this, Jack?”

“He didn’t,” said Lenore, stepping beside her brother to block the blow that would surely come. “We earned it, together. His knives, my skins…that’s where it came from.”

“Nonsense,” hissed Mother. “Who would ever pay you so much? None of those townspeople give either one of us the time of day. Not anymore.”

Father lowered his hand slowly. His eyes narrowed. “Let’s see all of what you’ve made, then.”

In the end, most of the knives and skins were confiscated as were the coins. “We’ll just take these. You’re our children, so your work is our gain.” Like magic, the goods were snatched away, except for a fistful of coins slipped into the pocket of their Father’s best, and only jacket.

The twins stood hand in hand on the doorstep as Mother and Father disappeared down the road and into the sunset, on the swaying back of old Millie. A raven croaked and clicked from the roof of the lean-to, then flew off in the opposite direction. 

***

Jack and Lenore gathered their meager belongings together under the full moon. Their parents would be gone until the barkeep tossed them out, likely even longer, as poor Millie would be exhausted and slow going on the road home. That is if their parents hadn’t sold her for a handful of coppers or a scant palmful of magic beans. The children cheered themselves with this last thought. Millie would be better off if she were sold; they were leaving home this very night.

Their traveling money was gone as well as most of the knives, but clever Jack had hidden three blades behind the woodpile, where Father would never have looked. Jack also took the axe, and wrapped his stone knapping and fishing gear in a leather shoulder pack. He slid a goodly portion of dried venison into its side pocket, next to the last small bag of salt left in the shack. Their parents could easily resupply with the money they’d confiscated. It wasn’t really stealing.

Lenore checked the seam of her skirt’s hem, ensuring none of the precious seeds of corn, squash, and beans would be lost as they fled. Apologizing to the hens, she slipped their eggs into one of her many pockets, sending out a prayer that the ladies might be provided with a rooster and many chicks. She slid the loaves of bread she’d baked that afternoon into her inner pockets. She curled her rabbit snare into a side pocket of the rucksack she’d made for herself, and stored needles, thread, and other necessaries into another. A pair of worn blankets, wool hats, and mittens followed. Jack tucked his bag of tiny, white stones into the belly of his tunic, and they set off.

Lenore led the way, careful to choose deer paths more heavily traveled by forest creatures, but not as tempting for humans. Jack dropped stones to mark their passing in case they had to backtrack and choose another trail. Overhead, a raven watched the two keenly, picking up Jack’s shiny stones and dropping each into nests high up in the canopy. There would be no going back. 

The twins followed the fading path through Talvitumma until they ran out of stones, and continued still. By and by, the twins discovered a creek and stopped to make camp. The raven roosted in the dark trees above. Exhausted, the twins fell asleep by the fire, having eaten only a morsel of the bread Lenore had brought.

***

The next morning, Jack hooked a fat, shiny fish and baked it on a flat rock the creek had offered up. Lenore skewered bread on a thin branch she’d found near where she’d set her rabbit snare. She watched it toast to golden brown over the glowing embers. The two travelers were in no hurry to move along. They’d already journeyed farther than their parents would ever have ventured, and they reckoned they were safe from being overtaken.

“Maybe we stay here a day or two?” Jack, eyes half shut, watched the raven pick at the discarded fish bones and sparkling scales.

Lenore looked over at Jack, shielding her eyes from the bright sun. “We could. The wood has plenty to keep us alive. There’ve got to be berries in the clearings where the canopy breaks, and purslane and probably mustard greens in the shadier spots by the willows.” She heard the snap of her snare and a rabbit’s scream. “There’s our dinner. Toss me one of your knives, will you?”

“It’s in my pack, near the bottom,” Jack mumbled as he rolled over on his side to nap.

“Thanks for nothing, brother.” Lenore shook her head and laughed, then dug the knife out and jogged into the wood to check her snare. A rabbit struggled, front paw and neck trapped in its wires, skin already detaching in its effort to escape. Nearby, a fox sat neatly on her hindquarters, tail twitching and eyes intent as she licked her jaws. She stood and growled at Lenore’s approach.

“Whoa! Easy there, missie.” Lenore raised her hands. The fox tipped her head, and the growling stopped.

“How about if we share? Either way, this poor creature needs to be put out of its misery and right quick!”

In answer, the fox sat.

Carefully avoiding the rabbit’s powerful hind legs, the girl trapped them under her knee and slit its throat. Untangling the snare, she tossed it to one side, decapitated the rabbit, slit its belly, and tossed head and entrails to the fox. 

“Easiest kill you ever had, eh?”

The fox was too busy eating to answer.

***

Jack and Lenore had roast rabbit that night, with purslane, wild garlic, and raspberries that the fox had led them to, on the far side of a bend in a nearby brook.

Jack sat by their fire, poking the embers. “It’s a little weird that we’ve escaped to the wood on an amply lit path, been provided with nature’s bounty of food and water and friends…” Here the raven cackled, and Missie the fox laughed. “and no one’s bothered us. It’s like we’re in a fairy tale.”

“Well, it’s not like we came unprepared,” countered Lenore. “Maybe we’re just in the right place at the right time.”

A sudden breeze puffed, tumbling fallen leaves toward the campfire. Settling on the embers, they smoldered and burst into flame.

“Which reminds me,” the girl continued, watching the leaves collapse into ash. “Autumn is coming. We need to find more permanent shelter. We should leave tomorrow.”

“Or maybe the next day?” drawled Jack.

“Fair enough.” 

***

Missie hopped from stone to stone across the creek, barking encouragement. The raven flapped overhead. Over the next few weeks, Nature provided as she could, but it wasn’t all fair weather. Night temperatures began to drop before sunset. Light rains and no signs of human habitation forced the two to shelter in tiny caves in the few hillocks; they squeezed together like babies in a womb. Missie and the raven found cover elsewhere but always returned at sunrise. 

Eventually, the forest path narrowed, frost stiffening the fine growth beside it. Their stores of food had dwindled to nothing, and with the tumble into winter, plant life and game all but disappeared.   Lenore and Jack huddled into all of the clothes they’d brought, still hoping for an abandoned hunter’s cabin. The raven hunched on Jack’s shoulder, and Missie trotted beside Lenore, her tail sweeping just above the cruel ground.

At long last, the tree canopy opened to a moon-bright clearing, a tiny cottage in its center. It was graced with a green door and shutters, its deep-red roof a candy contrast to its white, limewashed walls. Jack and Lenore glanced uneasily at the front gate, topped with bear skulls on either post. It made no sense to have a gate. Though fence posts circled the clearing, there was no fencing between them. The twins shivered, and shrugged. Grasping one another’s hands, they stepped through.

The cottage door swung open soundlessly and golden light limned the figure of a tall woman standing at the threshold. Wrapped shoulder to hip in a forest-green shawl, her ankle-length, black wool skirt stitched in fancywork of scarlet, gold, and blue, swayed as she stepped forward. A mop of silver curls framed sharp blue eyes that softened from stern to warm.

Smiling broadly, she waved them in. “Poe! Missie! You’ve taken your time getting them here. Come in, children. I’ve a kettle of venison stew and a fresh loaf of good brown bread, and there’ll be gingerbread if the cat hasn’t eaten it all.”

Fox and raven broke from the two, Poe cackling as he dove under the lintel. Missie turned once to bark encouragement and disappeared behind the woman’s full skirt. There was a crash, a cat yowled, and wooden spoons and bowls clattered to the stone floor. The woman rolled her eyes and sighed. “It always goes this way.” 

Stepping back from the door, she continued, “I knew you’d reach me eventually, shiny stones and breadcrumbs be damned. Stay as long as you want. I could use your help getting ready for winter.” Raising her eyebrows, she nodded toward the hem of Lenore’s skirt. “And for planting in the spring.”

She spun and over her shoulder, added “Maybe you’ll move on when the time is right for you, maybe you’ll stay. But for now, come in and be welcome.”

Will you believe me if I tell you they lived happily ever after?

Details? Less important. It’s the grit, the love, and laughter.

Did they stay at Baba’s cottage or travel on to the next hill? 

If the gingerbread’s not finished, they are eating it still!

END

[Tessa Kjeldsdottir is a Midwest US dabbler in fiction, folk and fairy tales, and free verse. Her work can be found in the occasional chapbook/anthology, but mostly on her flash blog and e-sketchbook (Valley of The Trolls dot blog), under the pseudonym Liz Husebye Hartmann. ]