[She closes her eyes and recites slowly, with the air of someone carefully reaching into the back shelves of their mind and dusting off old memories.]
This is a story I was told when I was still just a hatchling, and the one who told me heard it when she was just as young, and on backwards, so no one is alive now who can say whether it was false or true.
But even if we don't know what is true, we can know what is said:
They say that once there was a village by a river. The river was calm and gentle in the fall, but it was wild and raging every spring. When it raged, it could smash houses and drown men, but it left behind rich mud and fertile soil once it passed.
The villagers were farmers, and could not afford to leave behind their only source of income, nor build farther away from the danger. Everyone spent their lives trying to stay above the water, building higher and higher...
Except for one who lived beneath it.
In the river lived a little water spider- small and swift enough to dash across the top of the water, deft and delicate enough to spin silk around bubbles of air, and take them down under the water to breathe.
She rarely spoke to her neighbors above the water, being easily overlooked, but one day she was out walking and heard a woman weeping. Curious, she approached and saw one of the village girls sitting on the riverbank, crying bitterly.
"Why do you cry into the river?" she asked. "Surely, it is the last place in need of water."
"It is near spring," the girl sobbed. "This river is too hungry, too cruel- the spring before it took my brother. The spring before that one, it took my father. And still, we will go even hungrier than these waters if we leave, so I wait for this spring, knowing in my heart it will take me."
The spider was surprised to find herself sympathetic to the girl- she had thought herself solitary by nature, but something about her made her wish to give her comfort.
So she resolved to tame what had always been wild.
"Listen to me," the spider told her. "I can keep the waters from ever again taking anything you do not choose to offer- but you and all your village must cast into the waters whatever I ask of you."
The girl was suspicious and confused, but she agreed. What did she have to lose? The rest of the village was less thrilled to find that she had bargained on their behalf, but they too were tired of feeding the hungry waters, and agreed to try.
The next morning, a voice whispered from the river:
"Take the heaviest thing in your possession, and cast it into the river."
Puzzled but hopeful, the villagers obeyed. They gave up to the waters large tables and old stones and one very big box. No one saw the spider that night.
Again, the next morning, she whispered from the waters:
"Take the longest thing in your possession, and cast it into the river."
Again, the villagers obeyed. They gave up to the waters dusty brooms and rusty pitchforks and one very spindly lamp.
Still, the spider did not appear.
Finally, on the third morning, she whispered from the waters:
"Take the widest thing in your possession, and cast it into the river."
Once more, the villagers obeyed.
All but one.
One man refused to trust the spider. "Why does she not appear, and speak to us in person? I tell you that this girl is a thief. She is like a spider, for she has spun you all a story, weaving her lies to rob you of your possessions, that she may swim down and steal them in the night."
He refused to give up anything that was his own to the waters. The villagers went home that night troubled.
The next morning, spring began.
The villagers heard the rushing and the rumbling that always came before an angry river, a warning that gave them enough time to dread but not enough to run.
But the water did not come for them.
Astonished, they rushed outside and saw the untamable waters tamed. The spider had woven together all their belongings, weaving in and out and around them with her own silk to form a massive wall, hoisted up to bar the river's passage.
It did not seek to bar the river entirely. Rather, it had carefully-positioned gaps, made to let the water through in safe places and guide it to where it would not do harm.
But there was one gap that should not have been there.
On the inside curve of the wall, a spot that could have been blocked by something wide risked to let the water through to the village.
And it that spot, threads twined and knotted around all eight of her limbs, was the spider, holding it closed by strength alone.
By nightfall, the water had all come through safely. The villagers, finally daring to approach the woven wall, rushed over to the water spider and found her drowned and dead.
All wept, until quietly the girl who had listened to the spider approached her body. She cried not, for she had given her tears to the waters, and would not ask for them back.
Softly, she turned the spider's body over in her hands... and found, tied against her chest, a bundle of spider eggs.
The girl declared that she would take her friend's children into her household, and raise them well. She grew to be a woman stronger than many and wiser than most, and all her children made the village very proud, whether they walked on two legs or many more.
[Finally, Muffet takes a deep breath and looks at Pyrrha again, smiling softly.]
And while none who know the truth of this are living now, it is said that they were all happy while they lived.
So I kinda maybe made up a fairytale. Oops?
[She closes her eyes and recites slowly, with the air of someone carefully reaching into the back shelves of their mind and dusting off old memories.]
This is a story I was told when I was still just a hatchling, and the one who told me heard it when she was just as young, and on backwards, so no one is alive now who can say whether it was false or true.
But even if we don't know what is true, we can know what is said:
They say that once there was a village by a river. The river was calm and gentle in the fall, but it was wild and raging every spring. When it raged, it could smash houses and drown men, but it left behind rich mud and fertile soil once it passed.
The villagers were farmers, and could not afford to leave behind their only source of income, nor build farther away from the danger. Everyone spent their lives trying to stay above the water, building higher and higher...
Except for one who lived beneath it.
In the river lived a little water spider- small and swift enough to dash across the top of the water, deft and delicate enough to spin silk around bubbles of air, and take them down under the water to breathe.
She rarely spoke to her neighbors above the water, being easily overlooked, but one day she was out walking and heard a woman weeping. Curious, she approached and saw one of the village girls sitting on the riverbank, crying bitterly.
"Why do you cry into the river?" she asked. "Surely, it is the last place in need of water."
"It is near spring," the girl sobbed. "This river is too hungry, too cruel- the spring before it took my brother. The spring before that one, it took my father. And still, we will go even hungrier than these waters if we leave, so I wait for this spring, knowing in my heart it will take me."
The spider was surprised to find herself sympathetic to the girl- she had thought herself solitary by nature, but something about her made her wish to give her comfort.
So she resolved to tame what had always been wild.
"Listen to me," the spider told her. "I can keep the waters from ever again taking anything you do not choose to offer- but you and all your village must cast into the waters whatever I ask of you."
The girl was suspicious and confused, but she agreed. What did she have to lose? The rest of the village was less thrilled to find that she had bargained on their behalf, but they too were tired of feeding the hungry waters, and agreed to try.
The next morning, a voice whispered from the river:
"Take the heaviest thing in your possession, and cast it into the river."
Puzzled but hopeful, the villagers obeyed. They gave up to the waters large tables and old stones and one very big box. No one saw the spider that night.
Again, the next morning, she whispered from the waters:
"Take the longest thing in your possession, and cast it into the river."
Again, the villagers obeyed. They gave up to the waters dusty brooms and rusty pitchforks and one very spindly lamp.
Still, the spider did not appear.
Finally, on the third morning, she whispered from the waters:
"Take the widest thing in your possession, and cast it into the river."
Once more, the villagers obeyed.
All but one.
One man refused to trust the spider. "Why does she not appear, and speak to us in person? I tell you that this girl is a thief. She is like a spider, for she has spun you all a story, weaving her lies to rob you of your possessions, that she may swim down and steal them in the night."
He refused to give up anything that was his own to the waters. The villagers went home that night troubled.
The next morning, spring began.
The villagers heard the rushing and the rumbling that always came before an angry river, a warning that gave them enough time to dread but not enough to run.
But the water did not come for them.
Astonished, they rushed outside and saw the untamable waters tamed. The spider had woven together all their belongings, weaving in and out and around them with her own silk to form a massive wall, hoisted up to bar the river's passage.
It did not seek to bar the river entirely. Rather, it had carefully-positioned gaps, made to let the water through in safe places and guide it to where it would not do harm.
But there was one gap that should not have been there.
On the inside curve of the wall, a spot that could have been blocked by something wide risked to let the water through to the village.
And it that spot, threads twined and knotted around all eight of her limbs, was the spider, holding it closed by strength alone.
By nightfall, the water had all come through safely. The villagers, finally daring to approach the woven wall, rushed over to the water spider and found her drowned and dead.
All wept, until quietly the girl who had listened to the spider approached her body. She cried not, for she had given her tears to the waters, and would not ask for them back.
Softly, she turned the spider's body over in her hands... and found, tied against her chest, a bundle of spider eggs.
The girl declared that she would take her friend's children into her household, and raise them well. She grew to be a woman stronger than many and wiser than most, and all her children made the village very proud, whether they walked on two legs or many more.
[Finally, Muffet takes a deep breath and looks at Pyrrha again, smiling softly.]
And while none who know the truth of this are living now, it is said that they were all happy while they lived.
The end.