Once, a wealthy and powerful nobleman received an imperial summons. Reluctantly, the nobleman gathered his household into a caravan and started for the empire's capital city.
As the road twisted through a dark forest, brigands set upon the caravan and killed everyone they could find.
The horses pulling the ladies' coach panicked. The coach overturned, trapping the nobleman's daughter and her servant girl. The girls heard the screams of their friends and family as the outlaws rampaged.
The servant girl cried silently, terrified of being discovered. The nobleman's daughter sobbed and wailed, overcome by her grief. The servant girl tried to soothe her mistress to no avail.
The brigands heard the daughter's mourning and surrounded the upturned coach like hungry foxes circling a turtle.
Unable the right the coach, the brigands argued and squabbled. One peevish man jabbed his sword through an opening and felt it bite flesh.
The men laughed as the nobleman's daughter squealed and convulsed on the blade.
Satisfied by the daughter's death rattle and by the pool of blood seeping from the coach, the outlaws walked back into the forest leading the nobleman's horses laden with treasures.
The servant girl started clawing at the ground under the coach. It took her two days to dig a hole large enough to push her bloodied hand through. At night, the forest wolves snuffled at the coach and fought over the bodies.
On the third day, she pushed herself through the hole and stumbled into the forest.
After walking for some time, the girl could go no further and she collapsed at the edge of a clearing.
An ermine scurried from the clearing to examine the girl. It's coat shone as white as bleached bone though it was the middle of spring.
The ermine rushed off into the grass and returned, dragging a full wineskin. It nipped at the servant girl's cheek to wake her up. She drank greedily.
The girl thanked the ermine and he replied: "I have bread and cheese if you're hungry. Follow me."
The girl followed the white ermine to the center of the clearing where a sword lay on a bulging leather pack called a loculus.
"Open the pack and you will find what you need."
When the girl had eaten her fill, she pulled at her frock, dark and stiff from her mistress's blood, and she began to tremble.
"Open the pack again and you will find what you need."
The girl pulled back the flap of the loculus and found a bundle of linen trousers and shirts. She donned the new clothes. Drowsy from the wine and food, the girl fell asleep.
That night, the wolves sniffed at the edge of the clearing, but they did not enter.
In the morning, the ermine nipped the girl's cheek to wake her and asked: "Will you help me?"
"Of course," said the girl.
"We can't stay here. Do you agree?"
"Yes, I agree," said the girl.
"You must carry the leather pack and the sword to a castle at the edge of this wood. It will be a journey of several days and you must do as I say."
The girl agreed and they started off into the trees.
The ermine told the girl how to lay the heavy sword across her shoulders and how to carry the loculus at her side so that she could walk more easily.
The leather bag provided their meals and dry tinder and flint for fires to ward away the night chill.
On the first morning of their travel, the girl heard a terrible crashing ahead.
"Ready the sword!" the ermine squeaked.
The girl dropped the pack and raised the sword. The metal felt wonderfully light in her hands.
They felt and heard the rhythm of massive hooves beating the earth.
A giant wisent smashed the trees in front of them, its eyes wide. Its breath left smoky puffs in the cold morning air.
"Stand firm!" the ermine barked.
Closer and closer it came, until the girl was sure to faint. She could smell its musk.
The wisent slashed a hooked horn at her and the girl stepped aside. She looked the animal in its red-rimmed eye as it drove past and she brought the sword down swiftly.
The wooly beast gouged a trench in the forest loam as it collapsed.
The girl hefted the now-heavy sword on her shoulders and they continued their journey.
On the second, day the forest floor grew lighter and the trees began to thin.
The saplings in the distance appeared to sway in a breeze though the air was still.
As they neared the edge of the forest, they saw that it was not the trees that moved, but a line of gray, misshapen men shifting back and forth from foot to foot.
"Ready the sword!" the ermine squeaked.
Once again, the sword fairly sung in the girl's hands. The mass of pallid forms swarmed towards her.
"Stand firm!" the ermine barked.
The girl swung the blade through the gray mass, carving claylike flesh. A cold, cloven hand or jaw would fall against her skin and leave a livid smear.
When the last grotesque body lay in pieces, the ermine urged them onward.
The sword was now almost too heavy for the girl to bear even on her shoulders.
They finally left the forest and entered a land of sweeping, grass-covered hillocks.
A hulking black castle darkened the landscape: Dłn Sonan Marbh or "Hill of Slain Joys". Its bulk muted the sunlight on the lush spring grasses.
The ermine spoke again: "You must wield the sword a final time. The gate to the castle is on the south rampart. The emperor is now more confident than paranoid and the drawbridge will be lowered. Enter the keep from the door on the right. When you enter the throne room, you will know what to do. Most important of all, do not speak a single word to anyone."
The girl entered the castle and was immediately attacked by imperial guards. The elite of the empire's martial retinue fell before the girl's flashing sword. The blade split arrows in midair to fall harmlessly to the black stone.
The girl fought her way through the right door of the keep as the ermine instructed. When the thrashing pieces of the last guard splashed to the floor, the girl stood before the emperor on his throne. He smiled and said "Good day my child."
The girl did not reply but slew the old man where he sat. She did not lower the sword.
The girl heard a strangely familiar voice behind her say "Finally."
She turned and a handsome young man in a fine ermine robe stood amongst the gore.
"You have broken the spell placed on me by the emperor so many years ago," he said. "Now I can retake my rightful place as king and you will be my queen."
The man walked to her with open arms and she drove the sword down through the king's chest.
The girl ruled the empire well for a long, long time. People said she never left the sword, not even to sleep or bathe.
Pakeha