Chapter 1

Once upon a time, in the kingdom of King Tanush, The Brave, there was an evil, ugly old woman named Abigail. I know this sounds strange, because Abigail is a nice, pretty name, and one would hope that anyone with that name would also be pleasant to be around, as well as fair to look upon.

But such was not the case with this Abigail. She was almost unimaginably ugly, with a crooked nose, upon which sat warts, out of which long, black hairs grew. Her chin was pointed and her teeth crooked. Dank, mud-colored, lifeless hair hung from her scalp. It has been hypothesized by philosophers, that her visage was the reason she had such an equally horrible disposition. And one with a horrible disposition is likely to be less than eager to be nice.

Especially to people who look at her and wince.

So most people steered clear of Abigail unless they had need of the herbs, potions and poultices she made. Though there was no proof, most people believed she was a witch, and that if she saw them and was displeased for some reason, she could cast some odious spell on them.

Some people had no choice but to interact with the wicked, old, ugly woman, however, and Galen was one such person.

Galen worked for a number of people. He basically ran errands, and did chores for whoever was in need of him at a given moment. And one day, as he passed the tavern on an errand for Old Tadec, who raised the biggest turnips any man had ever seen, a man wearing a dark, hooded cloak reached and a huge hand grasped Galen’s collar, jerking him to a halt and almost strangling him.

“Boy!” growled the stranger. “I have need of your services.”

“I’m busy at the moment, kind sir,” said Galen, lifting the garden fork in his hands. “I must take this to the blacksmith and have the tines sharpened.”

“And so you shall,” said the man, whose face could not be seen in the dark recesses of the hood, “just as soon as you deliver this parcel to the old woman who lives at the edge of town and makes medicines.”

Galen knew the old woman being referred to was Abigail, and like everyone else in town, he thought she was a witch, and sought to remain out of her sight.

“I cannot,” he said. “I promised Old Tadec I would get this sharpened and return quickly. There is a copper piece waiting for me in his purse, and it will buy my supper.”

The hand holding his collar did not waver. “I have a gold quarter-piece in my purse that will buy you many suppers,” said the voice coming from the hood. “It can be transferred from my purse to yours, should you be quick and deliver this as I instructed you.”

Galen had never held real gold in his own hand. He’d seen bits of it in others’ hands, but never felt it himself. The lure was irresistible. Still, he fancied himself a businessman, of sorts.

“I will do this, if you will take this garden fork to the blacksmith and leave it with him, so I can collect it when our business is finished,” he said.

“Done!” said the stranger. He thrust the paper-wrapped and string-tied parcel into Galen’s hands, while plucking the garden fork from the same. “Now, be quick. Take this to the herbalist, and tell her it is from a friend.”

“No sooner said than done!” announced Galen, proudly. He turned and dashed away, already thinking of all the things he could buy with a quarter piece of real gold.

Had he looked behind him, he would have seen the tall, mysterious figure negligently toss the garden fork on a pile of dung before turning to walk the other way out of town.

And he might have thought again about doing what the stranger had contracted him to do.

Galen came near to Abigail’s house, which looked like it might fall in a heaping pile of rotted wood at any moment. Upon coming closer, though, he realized the house was actually made of stone, though it was darkened with age, and covered with ivy.

He approached the door, which had shapes cut through it, those of a new moon, surrounded by stars. A dim light shone through the shapes as he reached for the huge, black, iron knocker on the door. He feared that knocker might cause the door to fall as splinters, but all there was when it fell was a flat thunk.

Nothing happened.

Then, as he was reaching for the knocker to try again, the door suddenly opened ... and there she was. His breath seized in his lungs as his eyes took in the wrinkled, sagging skin of her jowls, and the bulbous nose, with its warts and hairs.

Forcing his lungs to work, he gasped, “Here!” and thrust the package toward the old woman.

“And what is this?” asked the crone, her voice high and tremulous.

“A friend sent it,” whispered Galen. His voice had stopped working, but it doesn’t take a voice to whisper.

Rather than taking it, she extended one withered hand, and touched the package with her index finger. Galen stared at the long, blackened nail, almost a claw, on the end of that finger. No sooner than that nail touched the paper, however, than she jerked her hand back, and her voice made a keening sound.

“Magic!” she wailed. “Someone tries to destroy me!”

Galen dropped the package, and stepped back. He would have run, but it was all he could do to make his legs move him that short distance.

The old woman confirmed the rumors as she pointed that blackened fingernail at the package and uttered incomprehensible words in what could only be a spell. There was a burst of flame and smoke, and Galen saw all the colors of the rainbow as he tried to shade his eyes.

Slowly, his vision returned to normal, which would have been comforting, had not the old witch been staring at him. At her feet, devoid of its wrappings now, lay a blackened, gaping skull. It seemed to grin at him with evil intent.

“You tried to visit destruction upon me,” she wheezed.

“No!” he yelped. Now his legs became his own again, and he turned to flee.

He had taken but three steps, during which his ears heard her muttered voice again, and suddenly he was in the middle of more bright, colorful lights. At first he thought all was well, because the lights disappeared, and the way was clear before him.

Except things looked too big.

Or, to be more nearly correct, they looked too high up.

And his legs refused to work in the fashion of a boy running, meaning one leg would push him forward, while the other prepared to do the same thing in but an instant.

Instead, both his legs were pushing him at the same time.

He suddenly realized he was high in the air ... much too high, somehow. And then the ground was rushing up toward him with alarming speed, and he knew he was about to die.

Except he didn’t. All that happened was that he landed on legs that flexed and accepted his weight as if it were nothing.

He tried to yell “Help!” but an astonishing thing happened. His voice came out different than it ever had before.

“Ribbet!” he croaked.

He felt something grip his ribs and saw the ground rushing away again. But this time he did not fall to land. The world turned and his right eye saw the witch, who had an evil, toothless grin on her horrid face.

“Your punishment shall be to live as a frog for the rest of your years.” She cackled. “But I am not void of mercy. The curse may be broken if a princess loves you and kisses you.” Her cackling filled his ears as she dropped him. His legs caught his fall and then bunched automatically, making him leap, land and leap again, trying to escape.

The cackling of the old witch still rang in his ears but there was no pursuit as Galen hopped slower and slower until he landed ker-splat in a puddle. The water and mud felt wonderful on his feet. He tried to look at them, but couldn’t turn his head any more.

Things looked odd too. He could see one set of things on his right, and another on his left, but he couldn’t seem to focus on either set to the exclusion of the other.

He croaked again and, as the horror of his situation began to become evident, he smelled water. He had never smelled water before. Not like this. It was even better than the scent of newly fallen rain on a glorious morning. It smelled so good, in fact, that it was almost like a taste! Automatically he started leaping toward that glorious scent.

“She has turned me into a frog!” he tried to say, which came out “Ribbit, ribbit ribbit, croooooak.”

He was distracted as he arrived at what he knew to be the creek. He leapt into the water and instantly felt as if he could fly. He had swum with the other boys in the river, but that, compared to this, was like trying to swim in quicksand. He could bend and kick and dart any way he wished. It was fully five minutes before he realized he hadn’t taken a breath since leaping into the water.

He came to the surface, startled as the water whisked him along so rapidly he felt like he might be flying, somehow, in the water. But he knew how fast the creek ran, this time of year, and he realized its speed was magnified by his diminutive stature.

He swam to the shore and hopped onto a rock to think.

He had to find some way to get changed back into a boy.

His reflections determined that the powers that had made him what he now was were his only hope at reverting to his original state. She must have powders and potions that would undo her evil spell.

Swimming back upstream was child’s play. Or should I say frog’s play. The current was no barrier to his smooth travel. And, once on land, his hops took him quickly to the hedge that surrounded the witch’s abode. Granted, it took longer than it would have if he had boy’s legs, but he was also less visible, traveling low to the ground as he did.

He waited. A fly happened by and he was horrified when his tongue, of its own volition, shot out to strike the insect and bring it back into his mouth. He was then astonished when the fly tasted good!

By and by he heard the hinges of the door creak and the footsteps of the hag. She was leaving, no doubt on some errand to town. The gods knew no one like his former self would appear to do those errands for her, so she was reduced to doing them herself.

“Good!” he thought to himself.

Getting into the house was easy. There were gaps and cracks in abundance. Once inside he hopped around, looking for he knew not what. The separated vision his eyes insisted upon was vexing at first, but then he realized he could see the entire room at once, instead of having to turn his head, as would have been required were he still a boy. His left eye spied a table against one wall, upon which were various bottles, and baskets and bundles of things that had once grown. Above that were shelves lined with more of the same.

He hopped up to the table with ease.

Now hopping was not productive, but he found he could shuffle about and did so, his eyes examining the labels on the jars.

It was on the second shelf up on the wall that he found something that looked promising. It was a small glass tube, capped with a cork. A powder lay within the tube, pink in color, and a paper label on the glass bore the scrawled letters: One wish.

He tried to gnaw at the cork, and the tube spun to roll to the edge of the shelf, where it disappeared.

“Oh no!” he croaked, but then he heard the tinkle of glass breaking.

Hopping down, he found the pink powder scattered in a spray going away from the now shattered vial.

He lapped at it, knowing his sticky tongue would capture some grains.

“I wish I were a boy again!” he thought, frantically.

Nothing happened.

“Curses!” he groaned. “Her spell is too strong.”

Lapping up more of the powder, he changed his wish.

“I wish that a princess will find me attractive and love me as I am.”

Again, he felt nothing save a twisting sensation in his middle. That, he ascribed to despair when no princess appeared in a puff of smoke to save him.

He tried other bottles and packages but a frog’s feet are not configured for manipulating such. In the end he slipped out a crack and hopped back toward the stream.

Time passes differently for an amphibian. It was days later, though Galen could not have said how much time it was. He ate, and slept. Sometimes he slept while the sun rose or set, and so he could not count the days.

He was sitting on a lily pad, doing what frogs do, croaking, when a sudden movement startled him. A hand grabbed his body and he rose again into the air. The hand stuffed him into a bag with other frogs. It was dark in the bag and the other frogs squirmed and croaked, but he could not understand what they were saying.

There was movement, a swaying that made his frog stomach queasy, and he realized the bag was swinging in the fist of his captor.

Some time later he heard voices he could understand.

“Thomas! Where have you been?” came a woman’s strident call.