[IC] A serious supernatural problem

[Shadow Dragon]

He walks back, and places the folder on a chair. "Found them." He opens the folder, and begins flipping though it. "Which one did you want again?"

[Vampiretwilight]

Mary blinked.
"...the...original."

[Shadow Dragon]

"Which tale?"

[Vampiretwilight]

"...grimm."
Mary shrugged.

[Shadow Dragon]

He chuckles. "Here's the copy I had made." He holds out a thick, bound book, The Tales of the Brothers Grimm embossed on the cover, and he puts the folder into his cloak.

[Vampiretwilight]

Mary blinked. She nodded once.

[Shadow Dragon]

He opens to Cinderella.

[Vampiretwilight]

Mary watched and waited.

[Shadow Dragon]

He smiles, and begins reading it aloud. "A rich man's wife became sick, and when she felt that her end was drawing near, she called her only daughter to her bedside and said, "Dear child, remain pious and good, and then our dear God will always protect you, and I will look down on you from heaven and be near you." With this she closed her eyes and died.

The girl went out to her mother's grave every day and wept, and she remained pious and good. When winter came the snow spread a white cloth over the grave, and when the spring sun had removed it again, the man took himself another wife." He rubs her hand as he reads.

[Vampiretwilight]

Mary sighed and listened. She stayed quiet as she did so.

[Shadow Dragon]

"The woman had brought with her into the house two daughters, who were beautiful and fair of face, but vile and black of heart. Now began a bad time for the poor step-child. "Is the stupid goose to sit in the parlor with us?" they said. "He who wants to eat bread must earn it. Out with the kitchen-wench." They took her pretty clothes away from her, put an old grey bedgown on her, and gave her wooden shoes."

[Vampiretwilight]

Mary sighed and frowned at that part.

[Shadow Dragon]

He glances at her. "'Just look at the proud princess, how decked out she is', they cried, and laughed, and led her into the kitchen. There she had to do hard work from morning till night, get up before daybreak, carry water, light fires, cook and wash. Besides this, the sisters did her every imaginable injury - they mocked her and emptied her peas and lentils into the ashes, so that she was forced to sit and pick them out again."

[Vampiretwilight]

Mary bit her lip. She continued to listen.

[Shadow Dragon]

"In the evening when she had worked till she was weary she had no bed to go to, but had to sleep by the hearth in the cinders. And as on that account she always looked dusty and dirty, they called her Cinderella. It happened that the father was once going to the fair, and he asked his two step-daughters what he should bring back for them. Beautiful dresses, said one, Pearls and Jewels, said the second."

[Vampiretwilight]

Mary closed her eyes.

[Shadow Dragon]

"And you, cinderella, said he, what will you have. Father break off for me the first branch which knocks against your hat on
your way home. So he bought beautiful dresses, pearls and jewels for his two step-daughters, and on his way home, as he was riding
through a green thicket, a hazel twig brushed against him and knocked off his hat."

[Vampiretwilight]

Mary nodded and still listened.

[Shadow Dragon]

"Then he broke off the branch and took it with him. When he reached home he gave his step-daughters the things which they had wished for, and to Cinderella he gave the branch from the hazel-bush. It happened, however, that the king gave orders for a festival which was to last three days, and to which all the beautiful young girls in the country were invited, in order that his son might choose himself a bride."

[Vampiretwilight]

Mary simply nodded, etc.