A Fairy Tale [kind of]

By Steve Saville

Once upon a time, in a kingdom a long, long way away [yes it is going to be that kind of a story] — there was a small village nestled in the middle of a great forest.

A ngāhere full of kōtare calling at dawn, tūī arguing in the treetops, and winding paths that bent like rivers because nobody there believed life should be straight when the land itself curves.

It was just a normal type of ‘fairy tale’ village. All the villagers knew it was not a perfect village, and they were OK with that because they were happy. They looked out for each other as whanaunga do. They smiled and laughed with each other, shared kai, shared burdens, and always tried to be kind — even on the days when the clouds sat low and their hearts sat lower.

You could almost say they held manaakitanga as their quiet village law, though they didn’t need to call it that. They simply lived it.

When I say ‘all’ the villagers were happy, I am not being entirely honest, because there was one who was, in fact, very unhappy. You could even say she was angry.

In the last house in the village lived an old and wizened woman, all bent and hunched. She lived alone on the edge of the forest and spent most of her time complaining about her fellow villagers. She hated the way they acted in such random, joyfully individual ways; they built paths that were not straight, painted their houses in bright colours, and generally behaved with a freedom she despised.

“These idiots need to be more obedient,” she would mutter. “Everything would be so much better if they just did as they were told — did what I told them to do.”

Now, many of the villagers thought this strange old woman was a witch or had magical powers —but she wasn’t and she didn’t, she was just a bit grumpy and thought that she knew better than everyone else. There was no mākutu in her, no ancestral wisdom, no connection to whenua or people. Just the brittle sharpness of someone who forgot how to belong.

One day the villagers decided it was time to have a festival — a hākari of sorts — to celebrate... well, nothing really.

Just being alive.

Just being together.

Just being a village that didn’t need permission to shine.

There would be singing and dancing and performances and lots of eating [maybe even some drinking].

This was too much for the old crone.

“Nonsense. Time-wasting nonsense,” she grumbled, and in a real mood she stomped out of town to go for a very long walk [and quite possibly to shout at some squirrels].

As she was out stomping along, she happened across a group of travelling apothecaries who claimed to have a potion to solve anything and everything.

“Ah-ha,” thought the old lady. “This makes perfect sense to me. These are obviously highly intelligent medical experts. This potion will fix the stupid villagers.”

So she bought a bottle of the wonderful-sounding elixir and a recipe book to go with it, along with a year’s subscription to “future great deals available only to valued customers,” and shuffled back to town.

The villagers were not overjoyed to see her return so quickly, as they had hoped her walk was going to be a very long one — possibly even a permanent one. But they were a polite bunch and, after all, this was her home, so they smiled and gave her a friendly wave.

Imagine their surprise when, instead of going straight home, she stood in the town square, loudly thanked them for being such wonderful neighbours, and announced that to show her appreciation she would prepare a delicious and nutritious broth for the whole village as her contribution to the coming celebration.

The old lady scurried home to prepare the broth. Now, it is true she did prepare it in a very large black cauldron — but that was because it was the only thing big enough to make industrial quantities of the stuff. And yes, maybe a black cat wandered by, but that was merely by chance.

Into the broth she put carrots and parsnips and chicken bones and heaps of other things and, of course, a heavy dose of the potion. As she did this, she read out the recipe [some might call it a spell] that the apothecaries had given her to make people do as they were told.

“This will stop all of their silly running around laughing and playing. This will stop all of their silly singing and dancing. This will make them listen to me — and then we will get some straight roads built,” she muttered. “All they have to do is listen to me... oh, and drink my broth.”

Because she was not a great — or even careful — cook, she did not get the recipe exactly right. And so, on the day of the celebration, as she ladled out huge servings of her broth to the appreciative villagers, things did not go exactly to plan.

The villagers found the broth a little sour, but they were too polite to say anything and, in fact, many of them suddenly became violently ill. So ill, in fact, that they had to take to their beds, where they lay, unable to move — unable to do anything, actually, apart from moan and feel very unwell.

Not surprisingly, this did not please the villagers. They stood around the groaning sickbeds of their whānau, unsure whether to weep or swear. Even the kuia who usually had a proverb ready for every situation fell silent.

“Kāore e tika,” she whispered. “This isn’t right at all.”

“What have you done, old lady?” others cried. Some raised their voices, one shook his fist. “Your broth has made people sick!”

The old lady was disappointed; she wanted obedience, not crook guts.

“I am so sorry. I made a mistake,” she said. “But I can fix this. I need to make another broth and, if you all drink this, everything will be fine... honest.”

She disappeared into her cottage to make another batch. This time she spent less time muttering and more time reading the recipe [and adding even more of the potion].

The villagers were trusting, so they agreed to give her another chance. After all, she did seem genuine.

Her second batch was no better than the first. In fact, it was worse. The sick villagers drank it and got even sicker, and the other villagers who drank it — well, half of them were dramatically transformed into giant slug-type creatures who slithered around town looking very sorry for themselves.

“Oh dear,” muttered the old lady. “This doesn’t seem right. This is not the obedient workforce that I wanted. Slugs can’t build roads or fix fences; they just leave trails of slime everywhere.”

You would think that, by this stage, she might question the claims the apothecaries had made for the potion.

Sadly, no.

Questioning was not on her agenda.

Obedience and straight roads were.

The remaining villagers were really angry now — angry in the way people get when their whakapapa is threatened, when their everyday joys are stripped away, when someone meddles with things they don’t understand.

They made placards out of old fence posts and marched around the old lady’s cottage, stomping their feet and shouting loudly.

“Some of us can’t get out of bed, and some of us no longer have legs!” they wailed. “What have you done?”

“No, no, no!” cried the old lady from her window. [She thought it unwise to go outside, as the villagers were stomping quite loudly and some of the placards were rather rude.]

“Please, give me one more chance. I know where I got it wrong. Let me put it right — just one more chance, please.” She even wept a few tears, and the villagers — trusting and rather naïve — agreed.

To be fair, she shared their frustration. She wanted obedient villagers who did as they were told, not slugs and sick people.

So she returned to her cauldron, her potion, and her recipe, and tried again.

This time she nearly got it right — but not quite.

The sick remained sick, the slugs remained miserable, and those who [rather foolishly] drank version three turned into mindless zombies who shuffled around town bumping into things.

So the old lady now had a village of sick people, slugs, and zombies.

“Bother,” she scowled. “This is not what I wanted at all. Look at them — slithering, moaning, walking into each other. Hopeless.”

But as she surveyed the mess she had created, a flicker of a smile crept across her face.

Even though this was not the perfect outcome, at least no one was angry anymore — and no one was singing or playing or dancing or building curvy roads. Mainly because no one was thinking anymore — but to the old lady, this was a definite improvement.

“At least it’s quieter,” she sniggered [or cackled; either word works].

She declared the village fixed. She had done it. Everyone should thank her.

No one raised a voice in disagreement — because no one could — and so she proudly announced the village obedient.

The fact that they were bedridden or slugs or zombies was beside the point.

The village had now had all the colour and song and wairua sucked out of it.

All the threads of life that once glowed with mauri dimmed to dull grey.

Even the wind went quiet, as if embarrassed to pass through such a joyless place.

“Much better,” said the old lady to the cat — who promptly turned and stalked away in disgust.

But what she didn’t know was that not all villagers had drunk the broth.

One little boy — he iti, he tangata — had been too shy, too unsure, and too connected to his own instincts to ignore the twist in his puku whispering:

Kaua e inu. Something isn’t right here.

He hid under his house, heart thumping like a pūtātara calling across open water.

Now he was feeling very alone. He didn’t like the grey village he saw outside, and he did have an idea of what he could do about it.

He took a sheet of paper, laid it out on the ground, and started to paint on it. He was no artist, but someone had to start bringing the colour back, so it might as well be him.

As he painted, he hummed his favourite song to himself. He was no singer, but someone had to start bringing the music back, so it might as well be him.

And as he painted and hummed, he remembered a line from his favourite book:

“Sometimes to survive we must become more than we were programmed to be.”

He liked these words. They lifted his spirits and gave him hope and, after all, someone had to start bringing the poetry back, so it might as well be him.

And in that little corner of the village, under a house that used to be his home, the boy felt a tiny glimmer of joy start to warm his heart again.

“Sometimes to survive we must become more than we were programmed to be.”

— Peter Brown, The Wild Robot