Abandonment Issues — The Changeling’s Bargain and Irish Fae Horror

0:00 In a black Irish forest, a desperate father grips a writhing fairy in one hand and a cold iron revolver in the other. The fae want his child, he wants a normal life. Tonight, love goes to war with ancient magic, and not everyone escapes. What's that You want to be scared? Come with me. You will experience tales over our ba who, ghosts and death. It is not recommended for the week At Heart Heart listen as in the dark. It's more fun at that way way. This is Weekly Speaking. Hello, my spookies, It's Wednesday, and you know what that means.

1:09 It's time for a little spooky in your weekly. I'm your host and narrator, Enrique Kuto, and tonight we have a fantasy tinged terror just for you to listen to. But before we get to that, I want to say simply thank you so much for joining me. Tonight. October is nearly upon us, which will bring thirty one shows in thirty one days. But here at Weekly Spooky Halloween is all year long, so thanks for joining us a little early. To get your taste of terror, make sure you subscribe on your favorite podcasting app and if you love what we're doing and want to support us. Headweklyspooky dot com slash join and for as little as one dollar a month, get two bonus episodes over five years of audiobooks and creepypastas and so much more at Weeklyspooky dot Com slash join. But as for tonight, imagine the woods of Ireland after a storm, wet leaves, whispering branches, and the feeling that something older than the hills is watching now. Picture a secret you've carried for your whole life, that you were never meant for the world that raised you.

2:33 When a carnival fortune teller shows you your true face in a dusty mirror and the fay folk come calling for what they think is theirs, how far would you go to protect your family tonight? Under the shadow of the Nochnara Mountains, iron meets enchantment, and a single spark of emerald fire could burn away everything that you love. Get cozy, my spookies. Our story begins momentarily right after this abandonment issues by Douglas Waltz. Slogging through the wooded area south of Nochnaria Mountain in Sligo was far from my idea of a good time, but I really had been given no choice. The forest shrouded in darkness, enveloped every corner and crevice, regular forest wildlife noises had ceased an hour before, so I knew that I was on the right path. I was the only source of sound.

3:58 My labored breathing concerned me a little. I wasn't that out of shape, was I? I chalked it up to the purpose of traveling half the globe to complete my quest or perish in the attempt. I stopped to check the scrawled map I had paid too much for at a nearby pub. The ancient drunk with roomy eyes claimed that this was the only way to reach the land of the fairy folk. Something made me believe him. The map, scribed with shaky hand, said I was traveling in the correct direction. As dark as the woods were, I had no trouble reading the map. I continued on my leather clad left hand, ached from being constantly clutched. I could feel my pulse with each beat, but dared not release my grip. Cautiously, I made my way down a path that circled a gigantic boulder. Its deep gray, glossy surface was home to multi colored moss and lichen. That was when the smell assailed my nostrils and told me I had arrived a mix of human feces and brown listerine.

5:26 It was a calling card of the fay folk. I made my way to an open glen near the boulder to have the proper room to maneuver if the situation warranted it. I had not come all this way to die in the woods of Ireland. I carefully squeezed my left hand, and a small piercing sound escaped. I had gone over this situation in my head so many times during my long journey, and nothing would have prepared me for what came next. A huge pillar of emerald flame irrupted near the boulder, and a being of immense height strode from it as leisurely as if they were on a Sunday stroll. Their equiline features with huge emerald eyes glared at me as their mouth compressed in a narrow slit.

6:29 Ten others came from the flame as well, impressive in stature but paling in comparison to the one who had first derived. We stared at each other for what seemed an eternity, before the creature before me spoke human. The voice was soft, yet commanding. I could feel it searching for an answer from me. No, I replied, far from it. A murmur of foreign voices whispered amongst them. As they all took a closer look. The obvious leader spoke again, Explain yourself, mortal, and here we are the moment of truth.

7:24 I told them of my family, who for a short period of time lived in Ireland, how their child was captured by the fay, and how I was left behind to be their own. I told them of the family caring for me, and we soon moved to the United States, where I lived a somewhat normal life. Certainly there were oddities as I traveled through my years of existence. How no cat liked me, but dogs would defend me with their lives. I explained how a bully at school once knocked me to the ground, and when he came in for another blow, I grabbed his arm. His skin sizzled at the touch, and his eyes widened as he screamed and unholy scream. The bully was never seen in school again.

8:24 Word in town was his family moved away and were never heard from. Another rumor was that he never stopped screaming. And died soon afterward. Any time I played in the forest, I could feel its life force, a talent that seemed to fade the longer I spent time in civilization. Then I explained my journey to the hills of Ireland. Three years back. I had made the acquaintance of a young lady, Matilda Cooper. In my twenty years of life, never had I seen such a ravishing creature. My luck held when she reciprocated my feelings, and after a six month whirlwind romance, we were wed. It was at a carnival where Matilda and I decided, on what I believed to be a whim, to have our fortunes told by a small, twisted old woman.

9:33 She said nice things about us and our child, who would arrive in nine months. She knew Matilda was with child before Matilda had a clue. As we went to leave the tent that smelled of sawdust and cooking grease, I passed the crone a few coins. She went to take them, and her eye went wide and a small cracking groan escaped her lips. She leaned forward and explained that she needed to show me something, but not in front of Matilda. So the following evening, as the circus was closing down for the night, I found myself at the Crone's tent. She beckoned to me to follow her to a back room in the tent. There she removed a purple cloth from a full length mirror and told me to stand in front of it. I gasped when I saw my inhuman reflection. She told me the tale of the Fay and all my memories of my short time here before the switch was made. With my tale told, I stood in front of the Fay. The elders spoke first, and what would you have from us? I want to

11:06 know how this will affect the child in my wife's womb. The elder put a slender hand to his chin. He looked at the ground for a moment, then a smile crossed his lips. It would seem that a new born Faye will be born soon. My brethren his entourage all chuckled in response. Wrong answer, I replied, and brought my left hand into view. In it, the wriggling, biting, tiny delicate fairy I had captured hours before screamed when it saw the Fay. The eleven creatures who had formed a semicircle all gasped in unice. Don't go away, weekly, Spooky will be right back now, I demanded. You will tell me how to rectify this situation, or this little one dies before your eyes. Wait, the elder exclaimed, consider what you're doing, Oh I have you monsters took one of your own and abandoned them into the cold, cruel world of man, a world with no magic, no wonder, a pale,

12:39 dull existence. Why did you not want me? An involuntary sob racked my frame. The elder's features hardened at my display of emotion. We left you for the reason we always leave a changeling behind. Our kind does not no love? A small child gives us that for a short period of time. And is the child here? I asked? In answer, a man the same age as I stepped from behind one of the elders. He looked exactly like me, without a care in the world. His smile brought me joy.

13:27 Then my features darkened with hatred. Here was this human that received all I ever wanted, the whole magical experience taken from me as a small fay child. But I adapted and made the human world my own, and now a small bundle of joy was coming into it, and I needed to make sure that no fay stink touched this child. I want my child to be human, I said sternly. The semicircle of fay rerupted into laughter. Fool, we will take your child and they will replace the void left by you. There is nothing you can do.

14:16 Your offspring belongs to us. Really. My hand had slipped around the revolver in my pocket. I freed it from the cloth confines and fired a single shot. The human's head jerked back from the impact of the bullet and crumpled to the ground. The fatal wound poured blood onto the forest floor. The elder screamed and took a step forward. I held up the forgotten fairy and locked eyes with him. He stopped moving. If you don't want her to join him, you will give me what I demand, And right now I could see him contemplating my request. Out of the corner of my eyes, I saw the others moving imperceptibly slowly.

15:13 I squeezed my left hand. The cry from the fairy stopped all movement. The elder sighed. In the human world, there is an iron supplement that women take because they think it will help them with their monthly blood ritual, give it to her on each Sunday of the week. Until the babe is born. No aspect of Fay will survive in that womb. I nodded. At that point, one of the other ten lunged towards me, pate, burning emerald fire in their eyes. I swung the pistol to them and fired. Once they dropped, writhing and screaming to the ground.

15:56 The elder gave me a questioning look cold iron bullets. He gave me a sage nod, with a tiny smile creeping into the corner of his lips. He glanced at my left hand. I opened it, and the small creature stretched their wings and fluttered to perch on the elder's shoulder. She made small cooing sounds in the elder's ear. He responded in calming tones to the fairy. Two of the other Fay helped their brethren to his feet, and they all walked back to the emerald pillar of flame. The elder entering the fire last turned back to give me a small nod. I returned it. The conflagration stopped as suddenly as it had begun. I found myself with a deep thirst and made my way back to the pub and then home to my family, my family soon to be born child, a child that, if I failed in administering the proper iron supplement to my wife, would be born much like me. Would that be so bad my entire life? I wondered about why I seemed so different from others that crossed my path, and the old crone gave me the answer, and the fay in the woods,

17:27 shadowed by the mountain Knochnera confirmed it. Would it be so bad? When the elder told me that they were incapable of love and found it by stealing children from their cribs, I almost spoke up. I nearly revealed that my entire life, surrounded by the love and affection of my human parents and the friends I made, including Matilda, had given me the same capacity of love, with the ability to return it tenfold. Would it be awful if my child was just like me? It was a thing to consider as I slowly made my way back to the pub, back to a civilization I wouldn't trade for all the loveless magic in the world. Well, my spookies, I hope you enjoyed that little fantasy departure to the hills of Ireland as much as I did, a nice change of pace from the monsters, killers and ghosts we often encounter. But don't let that fool you. The threat is just as dangerous. Thank you all so much for joining me as I'm preparing for the Big October, and I gotta tell you there is so much to record.

18:54 We have not only the usual weekly spooky short stories, but we have exclusive novellas, a few horror movie reviews to sprinkle in, some highlights of stories from Halloween's past, and of course some surprises. So make sure you're subscribed on your favorite podcasting app. We cannot wait to help make your Halloween just right. And if you love what we're doing here and need even more spooky in your weekly Headweeklyspooky dot Com slash join for as little as one dollar a month. You get two bonus episodes, as well as exclusive audio books and about five years of creepypasta readings. That's at Weeklyspooky dot Com slash Join. And I want to say an extra special thank you to our Patreon podcast boosters, folks who pay just a little bit more to hear their name at the end of the show, and they are Johnny Nix, Kate and Lulu, Jessica Fuller, Mike as Skewey, Jenny Green, Amber Hansford, Karen we Met, Jack Kerr and Craig Cohen. Thank you all so much, and if you want to hear your name at the end of every episode of Weekly Spooky Headweklyspooky dot com slash join and select a fifteen dollars a month or higher tier. Not only will you help us keep the show going and going and going for another six years and beyond, but you'll have my undead gratitude because remember on October thirty first, that marks six years of Weekly Spooky and I cannot wait. But now it's time for me to get back to work. So thank you all again and for myself, for my producer Dan Wilder,

20:26 my executive producers Rob Fields and Babbletopia dot Com, as well as my composer Ray Mattis. I will catch you next time, avoid the fact. Thank you for listening to me. Make sure to find your way back next week week. But for now you are safe, trust me.