Fairytale retellings & Myths Reimagined

Swans of a Demon

 Based on the fairytale "The Eleven Swans"

 2024 note: I decided to re-write this story and add more elements. This was my short story submission for the Owlcrate anthology which did not make it. Enjoy!

TW: (blood, gore, sexual themes, magic, consider it an adult version NOT YA)                    

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NOW

Back and forth. Up and down.

And soon the sleeve will be done.

Back and forth, up and down. And finally, the eleventh shirt would be completed. But the needle and the nettle pierced her skin once more, letting the red flow down to her skirt. Her hands had long lost their softness, calloused from the hard work and the agonizing knitting. But she didn't pay attention, muffling her soft cry and trying to hold back her tears. Despite being used to it, a new kind of desperation was a vice around her heart. Amber had to continue, both for the sake of her brothers and for taking her revenge.

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THEN

Amber lived happily; she, her eleven brothers, and their father. Despite her ten years of age and being the youngest of all, she cared and loved each one of them, just like their mother used to do. Though her memories of her were hazy, like blurred drawn images, Amber remembered soft hands and a melodious voice, whispering to her that she was loved.

Amber's father was one of the most respected traders in the City of Commerce. He was wealthy but he cared for his children and tried to offer them a pleasant life, despite his wife's death, from an illness two years ago. The City of Commerce was one of the three in the Federation, following the City of Flowers and the City of Magic. Allied through treaties dating hundreds of years back and a good chuck of magic woven in between them, Amber's father, had made quite a fortune offering protection to caravans via the security company he held as also by transporting fabrics through the Cities.

The only daughter of the family carried the traits of her mother. With light brown hair and glowing, hazel eyes, she was a jewel to be cared for. Her skin was golden and dusted from freckles as she loved playing in the sun with her younger siblings, while the older ones assisted their father with the family's company. Her brothers loved her deeply and they were showing it to her every day.

The day their father brought home the young woman, Amber, and her brothers saw her with awe, surprised by her beauty. She was tall and blonde with a slender body but most of all, piercing eyes like ice, a pair which had made Amber shiver, when Susan, her new stepmother, laid her eyes upon her. She felt like coldness, despite the saccharine smile Susan bestowed on her and her brothers, as their father introduced them to her.

"She will be your new mother. Be kind and gentle with her." Their father had told them and the boys nodded, eyeing their father with suspicion. He was a man who had loved their mother deeply, and while life did carry on, it was quite a sudden introduction to them.

When Susan's eyes locked on little Amber, who continued looking at her with curiosity, she smiled and pinched Amber's chin lifting her head higher, as if inspecting goods and not a girl.

"You are beautiful." She said with that voice of hers, soft but steely.

"Not as beautiful as you Miss Susan," Amber replied, feeling her whole body growing cold.

Her father laughed, saying that Amber had to address her as "Mother". But Susan simply nodded, released her and after casting a glare at her, she left with Amber's father following her from behind, smiling at him as if he had given her one of the three moons.