Beyond the Wicked Willow: Chronicles of a Teenage Witchslayer

THE LIFE OF THE BEFANA

With the ancient origins of the Befana's lineage established and the wellspring of her mystical Essence revealed, Ambroggio went on to recount the pivotal events that so harshly shaped her long circuitous life, a life not only laden with tragedy, but more notably one redeemed by the blessings of hope and love and purpose. So, as they trudged along the path, Frankie and the others listened spellbound as Ambroggio charted the enigmatic life of the Befana. By his account, her childhood growing up in the small woodland hamlet of Giardino di Tressa was, by and large, one of peace and joy until she reached the age of seven. Then a terrifying wave of unprovoked violence and utter chaos spilled over into the borders of her tranquil community. The abrupt upheaval in her young life was the inevitable result of an age-old blight that has plagued humanity since time immemorial...arrant social injustice imposed at the hands of brutal warlords.

Marauding slaves pursued by Roman legions overran Befana's tiny hamlet. Befana's parents packed enough food to last the child a day and told her to run until her feet would no longer carry her. The young girl turned bravely and ran until she could run no further. It was there, in the spot where she stopped, that she would make her new home. A couple weeks later a young boy, a fellow villager, named Lorenzo wandered aimlessly into the Befana's encampment. Together the children grew, helping one another survive, and even thrive. Befana tended the land, cultivating gardens and foraging. Lorenzo, over the years, through trial and error, became proficient in the timeless arts of carpentry and masonry. He built a snug little home in which he and Befana lived. As time passed, the young pair became a couple; nature took its course; and the Befana gave birth to a beautiful boy, Angelo. For the next fourteen years, mother, father, and son lived together as contentedly as any family could ever hope to. But, in the midst of his fourteenth year, Angelo fell gravely ill. Racked with aches and pains, ablaze with fever, and mostly bedridden, the boy suffered incessantly for weeks on end.

Befana and Lorenzo recalled that this very illness had swept through Giardino di Tressa the year before their village was overrun. The elders called the blight "mal'aria," meaning bad air. The malady had taken the lives of several villagers, including Lorenzo's baby brother, a tragedy that left him deeply scarred. Now, they watched sadly as their own son was forced to endure the horrible effects of the disease. Although imbued with the mystical Essence, Befana was still rather young and had yet to master all the powers, which she possessed. Even so, she concocted—by sheer intuition—all manner of medicine in hopes of curing her boy.

Alas, Befana's efforts to heal her son proved all for naught as, in the end, the insidious mal'aria overtook him. Angelo died at sundown on the autumn equinox in the year 45 BC with both mother and father at his bedside. It was, without question, the darkest day in the lives of each Lorenzo and Befana. For it is nature's manner that a child should, in time, lose a parent, but an utter abomination of nature should a parent ever lose a child. Throughout the night, Befana prepared young Angelo's body for burial, while Lorenzo dug a deep grave at the edge of a beautiful pond, in Angelo's favorite spot, just a stone's throw from their home. The next morning, at first light, they sadly laid their child to rest. As they stood over his grave, Befana reached into her leather satchel hanging at her hip—the very same satchel that her mother and father had sent her off into the woods with so many years earlier.

She delicately plucked a small brown seed, somewhat flat and elliptical in appearance, and held it tightly in the palm of her hand for a moment, then buried the seed atop the grave. As she bowed her head to mourn for a life cut tragically short, a single teardrop rolled down her cheek and fell to the soil below, as if to nourish that tiny seed in Angelo's honor. From that point Befana spent her days incessantly cleaning and sweeping and tending the land. Lorenzo died of a broken heart leaving the Befana to live mostly alone amidst the sanctuary of the deep forest. Her only company, the woodland creatures and other animals that had wandered into her life after Lorenzo's passing.

Many years had come and gone living amid the solitude of her woodland and though she had aged considerably, the Befana remained as spry as ever. Day in, day out, her routine was rigorous and her hours long, and in Befana's eightieth year her life took a dramatic turn. It was in the final days of December when Befana's nightly chores were interrupted by a loud rap on the door. Befana had not had a visitor since the day when young Lorenzo had meandered into her neck of the woods. When she opened the old plank door, standing before her were three very peculiar men. The first was draped in a striking green cloak and his head, full with brown wavy hair, was topped with a crown of gold, blazoned with green emeralds. The second was swathed in a flowing golden yellow robe, which was sharply contrasted by his brilliant white hair and beard. The third man, with his dark brown skin, royal purple cloak, and turban of the same color, appeared even more regal than the previous two.

The men had been traveling for many days and were tired, lost, and hungry, so the Befana brought them into her home and fed them fresh baked bread and a hearty vegetable zuppa.

The three men told the Befana they were on a journey to see the birth of a child and invited her along to join them. Busy with her usual sweeping and cleaning, she declined. But, after the men left, the Befana was feeling sad and regretted her decision not to go. She gathered up some of Angelo's old toys as an offering to the coming newborn and left her house in search of the three men. She was so excited about the possibility of seeing a newborn that she did not even realize she was carrying her old crooked handled straw broom along with her. She ran as fast as she could, but was not able to catch up with the men no matter how hard she tried. Her long harbored wistfulness for Angelo was so profound and her yearning to behold the baby so compelling, the true potency of the Befana's mystical Essence was, for the very first time, stirred from deep within her soul. As the Essence permeated her entire being, the grief within her heart was supplanted by an enormous sense of hope and love and purpose. As these new feelings swelled ever greater, the Befana's pattering feet lifted from the ground, and she began to fly through the woodland.

Her flight at first a bit precarious, Befana thought it wise to sit upon her old straw broom in hopes of gaining some stability. Once atop the broom, she weaved in and out of the trees with astonishing speed. Blazing her course close to the ground, a winding trail upon the forest floor was swept clean in her wake. In later years, the Befana would lay many a stone upon this bare trail, making it the central pathway amid the Hallowed Woodland, the very pathway along which the group was traveling. The Befana flew about the countryside searching out the three men to join them for the child's birth, but on the twelfth night, Befana gave up and began her journey back to the Hallowed Woodland. She stopped over in a small village where three children were standing in a circle playing a friendly game of morra under the shimmering light of the moon.

Befana watched their game for a while and eventually gave them the gifts she had packed for the child being born: a sweet chewy torrone, a leather pouch full of black and white polished stones, the games latrunculi and noughts and crosses, and a yo-yo. When the Befana saw the joy that her gifts had brought the children, she knew she had found her purpose: to spread love and give hope each year on that very date by giving gifts to all the children of the world.

By this twist of fate Befana became immortal. The elixir was not her own personal sense of hope and love and purpose, but rather it was her desire and resolve to give to others, through the kindness and generosity of her heart, the very same sense of hope and love and purpose.