The Fairy Wife, Greek Folktale

Are you ready to fall into a deep healing sleep with a relaxing bedtime story for grown-ups? This is a Greek fairytale about a man who in one faithful night saw something strange in the fountain of fairies. This sleep story is narrated by Fairychamber and it takes you back into the heartlands of ancient Greece where shepherds looked after their sheep and goats and people believed in magic. Emotional Piano Improvisation by Alexander Nakarada | https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Transcript

Hello,

My name is Nina and thank you for joining me.

This story comes from Greece and it's a story about the fairy wife,

Demetros,

The cold herd,

Lived alone with his mother on the Kheafa hill,

Near his hut.

At the stronga,

A shed for the goats,

Was a spring named Neridoreshe,

Fairy spring,

For the fairies that had been seen there.

Demetros' mother went to the spring with her great earthen jar to get their water,

But one day she fell ill and Demetros had to go for it at night after his goats were driven home.

Since it was moonlight,

He could see clearly when he reached the Neridoreshe that three maidens in white were sitting on the stones at the edge,

Supposing them to be female shepherds who had come along,

Waved for water and had stopped to rest.

Demetros paid them no attention until he had filled his jar.

At that moment a cock's crow sounded across the valley and without a word,

The maidens rose,

Joined hands and danced westward across the hills,

Singing and whirling around,

Faster and faster,

Until they disappeared like a wisp of white smoke.

Demetros watched them,

Wondering who they were,

Why they had come and where they had gone.

He said nothing about these strange maidens,

But he could think of nothing else,

All the next day.

When night came,

He went again to the Neridoreshe.

It was about the same time,

The moon was shining,

The maidens were there,

But now,

In addition to the first three,

There were three others,

Just as the cock crowded.

The maidens rose,

Danced over the hills,

Singing and vanished as before.

Demetros filled his water jar and walked home with his head bent,

Thinking.

He was so quiet that his mother asked if anything were wrong,

He hesitated a little and then told her what he had seen on the two evenings.

Beware,

My son,

She cried,

The maidens may be fairies,

Evil may come,

Beware.

The mother was still no better the next night,

And for the third time Demetros went to the Neridoreshe.

This time,

Nine maidens in white were sitting on the stones.

Once again the same thing happened,

A cock crowded.

The maidens rose and danced away in the moonlight,

Singing.

Is there any harm in watching them?

The codherd asked himself.

They are so strange,

So beautiful.

This time he forgot to fill the water jar and he walked home still gazing westward at the four line of hills where the fairies had disappeared.

You must have seen them again,

His mother cried.

Demetros nodded.

Then do not go again to the spring,

She warned.

It would be better to die of thirst.

See,

Already you come back without water in the jar.

Tomorrow night is the night of the full moon when fairies' power is greatest.

Tomorrow night you must not leave the stronga.

Demetros intended to pay his mother.

All day he sat on the hillside,

Watching his goats and thinking of the maidens.

I will not go tonight,

He told himself.

I will never see them again.

I do not want to see them.

They might bring evil to my mother and me.

I will not see them.

How beautiful they were.

That night he put his goats into the stronga as usual.

Outside the door he looked up at the full moon and remembered the three other nights when he had gone to the spring.

How lightly the maidens had danced,

How brightly their golden hair had shone as it rippled over their shoulders.

It was now almost midnight,

And before Demetros knew what he was doing he found himself hurrying towards the Nerai Dovreshe.

He tried to stop,

But he was powerless.

As though he were being drawn on and on in spite of himself,

He reached the spring and found ten maidens waiting for him.

Nine he had seen the night before,

And he had thought of them all lovely.

But the one they had brought with them was many times fairer than they.

She was more slender and graceful,

With brighter,

More abundant hair,

And her face was more lovely than anything Demetros had ever imagined.

Even the flowers she wore above her head were sweeter,

And the little handkerchiefs she carried was finer and more delicately embroidered than those of the nine others.

The ten maidens rose,

Joined hands in a circle about Demetros,

And danced around and around,

Never touching the ground.

They sang in their silvery voices,

Hers the sweetest of all,

And this time he could understand their song.

O,

To be light,

And o,

To be light,

In the summer-non-day sun!

O,

To be light in the fairy night,

When moon-gossamers are spun,

On the sea-sands bright,

And the hills-nows white!

O,

To run,

And to run,

And to run,

O,

To be gay,

And o,

To be gay,

Where bright rivers glide and glance,

In gardens of May to skip and play,

While fairy-fruits in trance!

O,

To be gay,

And away,

And away,

To dance,

And to dance,

And to dance!

O,

To be free,

And o,

To be free,

As the north-wind grinding high!

O,

To be free with the lighting sea,

When the wild waves wash the sky!

O,

Swift and free and fairy to be,

To fly,

And to fly,

And to fly!

Suddenly Demetros longed to be as light and gay,

And free as they.

Come with us,

Beg the ten maidens,

Come with us,

Demetros!

Let men live in our palace with us,

Said the tenth fairy,

With her loveliest smile.

We shall make you happy,

Demetros!

Unable to resist,

He went with them a long way over the hills.

He laughed and sang,

And forgot everything but the fairy maidens,

Their flowers,

Their smiles,

Their golden hair,

Once he thought of his mother,

Ill and in need of him,

And of his goats that would cry for him in the morning,

He knew he should not go any further with the fairies,

But when he looked at the tent,

The most beautiful,

He felt that he could not leave her as long as he lived.

Now the loveliest one was near him,

In the dance,

Her long golden hair was sweeping past him,

He prayed the fragrance of her flowers.

He reached out to catch her,

But only her handkerchief remained in his hand.

The dance stopped,

There was a scream from all the fairies,

With a rush,

Like wind,

Through a forest they shot upward and disappeared,

All but the tent.

She sank down upon the ground,

With a kind of moan,

And hit her face in her hands.

The Metro stood for a long while looking down at this beautiful prisoner,

Then he fell to his knees beside her and tried to comfort her,

But nothing that he did could stop her tears.

Do not speak,

Do not touch me,

She said,

You have taken from me my freedom,

My happiness.

The Metro did not know what to do,

He stood up,

Tucked the handkerchief into his leather belt,

And walked slowly a little way off,

Thinking.

When he turned he saw that she had risen and was following him,

Weeping and reluctant.

He walked on and she came after,

Stopping when he stopped,

Moving forward as he did,

Until they crossed the hills to the little hut that was his home.

His mother was startled when she saw this strange,

Golden-haired maiden with her son.

She welcomed the stranger.

However,

And because she saw that,

The Metro slumped her,

She kept the wonderful handkerchief wrapped in silk and locked in a box in her own room,

Where the fairy-wife never entered.

Katena,

So she was called,

Spent her time spinning,

Sewing and embroidering.

She made beautiful clothes for the Metro's mother,

For herself,

And for the little child when it came.

Everybody in Loutro knew that Katena was a fairy,

Because whatever she did was finer and lovelier than anyone else could do in all that part of the country.

The child,

Too,

Was very beautiful,

With fine,

Golden hair and soft,

White skin.

All the villagers and country people called her Neraydo Koretson,

Which means a fairy child.

But Katena was not happy.

The Metro's couldn't do nothing to make her smile.

She never danced or sang or laughed,

But sat quietly at her work,

Scarily,

Glancing up or speaking a word to anyone.

The Metro's became very sad,

And to see him so unhappy made his mother grieved and anxious.

This went on for seven years.

One Saint Constantinos' day,

The mother went,

As is the custom,

To a neighboring village to visit a cousin named Constantinos.

She left,

Believing everything safe until her return.

Katena said to the Metro's,

Today is a holiday,

I should like very much to go to Loutro to dance.

I have not danced for a long time,

Will you bring out one of my pretty dresses and my best handkerchief?

We shall dance together,

As we danced on the night of the full moon seven years ago.

The Metro's could not speak for his delight.

His beautiful wife would dance and be happy again.

He fumbled with the keys which his mother had left in his care.

He got up the first dress his eyes fell upon.

He took the beautiful handkerchief from his mother's box and put it into his belt with trembling hands.

As soon as Katena was ready,

She and the Metro's,

With Erneraido Correzzo,

Hastened down to the hill to Loutro.

The folk were already dancing on the grass plot in the center of the village.

Their bright costumes,

Joyous faces and graceful movements making an attractive picture.

They formed a great circle,

But instead of joining hands,

They held opposite corners of a handkerchief stretched between each two of them.

Katena and the Metro's stepped into the circle,

Holding between them the very handkerchief which his mother had guarded these seven years.

Katena's turn came to lead the dance.

The Metro's dropped his corner of the handkerchief.

Katena sprang from him and went whirling madly about the circle.

The Metro's watched her amazed three times as she circled before the astonished villagers,

And rose a stove on wings and floated like a cloud in the sky.

The Metro's was heartbroken,

And he realized that his very wife had left him forever.

He wanted to die.

His mother returned from her cousin,

Tried to console him.

My son,

She said,

This is the evil which the fairy has brought upon us.

Let us try to be content.

Now nothing worse can come to us.

The Metro's feared that Neraydo Koretso would be unhappy without her mother,

But every morning the child would hurry away to the fields and in the evening run home again,

Skipping and singing as she came.

People said they often heard her talking or chanting to herself in words no one could understand.

Her grandmother was frightened at first because she could not induce the child to eat anything.

One morning the Metro's followed Neraydo Koretso.

She went straight to the fairy's spring and looking up,

Held her little arms towards the sky.

The Metro's heard her calling and he saw something white like a mist descending to her.

The silvery voice came out of the mist and the child answered in words of strange sound.

It is Katenna,

He told his mother.

She must come every day to talk to Neraydo Koretso and to feed her fairy food.

That is why she is in the fields all day and will eat nothing here.

Katenna is caring for her child.

As the years went by,

Neraydo Koretso grew more lovely,

Always more like her mother,

With long shining hair and the same beautiful smile.

When she went to the fields,

Now she took her sewing or embroidery and worked while she talked with the spirit that no one else could see.

Often the Metro's followed her and watched her,

Wonderingly.

She was his daughter,

But she never seemed to belong to him.

She did not need him and was happy without him or anything he could do for her.

She was so much more a fairy than a human child that it made him afraid,

He once said to his mother.

I believe something worse can happen to us than the trouble we have already suffered.

How can that be,

My son?

She asked.

I am afraid that Neraydo Koretso will not always be with us.

The Metro's and his mother looked at each other without speaking.

They both loved Neraydo Koretso very much.

On the girl's fifteenth birthday,

Her father followed her to the Neraydo Vreshen as he had done every day for a long time.

He saw again the white mist come to her out of the clouds and heard the sweet silvery voice.

She held up her arms and the mist,

Enfolding her,

Lifted her up and carried her away.

After it had vanished,

The Metro's caught the echo of two fairy voices.

He listened motionless as long as he could distinguish the sound.

Then he knew that Katena and Neraydo Koretso had gone from him forever.

The Metro's did not keep his goats any more.

He wandered day after day through the fields and woods and over the hills,

Looking hopelessly for his wife and child.

Sometimes a shepherd or goatherd meeting him would hear him chanting to himself,

Come back,

Come back,

My fairy wife,

Come back,

My fairy child.

Seeking and searching I spent my life.

I wander alone in wild.

Come back.