[FN] The Evergreen
There was once a very large pine tree that stood separate from every other tree in the forest. This tree was not only physically alone, but it was also unrivaled in the hatred that it garnered from Lady Winter. She despised the needles on its branches and the cones that it dropped onto the ground, but most of all she hated that the tree refused to lose its color in the winter. At the end of each fall, she would visit the tree and demand that it shed its needles, but the pine always refused.
“No tree should be bullied into losing its color,” it told her. “I will not lose my needles just because you tell me to.”
This enraged Lady Winter, and she forbade any other tree from going near the pine. She threatened to destroy any trespasser with a terrible winter wind. For a hundred years the tree stood alone, and it longed desperately for a companion.
One summer, when Winter’s control over the world was at its weakest, a man with an axe entered the forest hoping to stock up on wood. When he saw the pine, he approached it and asked, “Why does such a mighty pine tree stand alone amid this great forest?”
The tree replied, “I have been cursed by Winter to a life of solitude.”
The man thought for a moment and then said, “My wife is soon going to deliver a child. I’m in need of wood so that she can make it safely through her labor this winter.”
The tree then said, “You may use my wood this winter. Please take me home and chop me up so that I may not be alone forever.”
The man did as the tree asked. He cut it down, split it into many pieces, and loaded it onto his cart to take it with him. The tree was enormous, being over a hundred years old, and it produced enough wood to satisfy the man. He took his cart and left the forest, leaving each other tree untouched.
That autumn, when Lady Winter arrived to give her yearly command to all of the trees, she noticed the stump in the middle of the clearing where the pine had once stood. The Lady was livid that someone had approached the tree despite her prohibition. In order that she might bring the violator to justice, she searched far and wide for the person who had cut down the pine tree.
Lady Winter found the man at his home. When she saw his wife’s belly she immediately devised a wicked plan. She would send horrible winds to the man’s home and devastate his wife with a terrible cold so that both she and the child would surely die. The man would live out the tree’s punishment of isolation that he had so abruptly ended.
The Lady waited until the woman was in labor, when she would be at her weakest, to carry out her scheme. When the time was right, she unleashed every cruelty of her season unto the family. As her winds blistered, the temperature dropped below anything the man had seen before.
The woman began to cough and show signs of a fever which terrified the man. Just then, he heard a voice coming from the pine wood. “Thank you for taking me with you this summer,” the voice said. “I was so lonely that I was willing to do anything to escape my curse, but now I see that I’ve brought you great trouble. Please, use my wood to make a fire. I’m determined to burn brightly to protect you and your family.”
The man did as the tree asked. He moved the wood safely away from the cabin and lit it. Overcoming even the intensely frigid air, the flames billowed into a massive inferno. The pine tree was once again denying Lady Winter, refusing to bow to her whim. Each blast of cold wind only seemed to give the flame more power. As it grew in both size and brightness, the fire’s warmth allowed the mother to bring the child safely into the world.
The new parents clutched their child close to their chests, huddled near the massive fire brought about by the wood of the pine while the winter winds blew the tree’s needles all around the property.
The fire still burned when springtime arrived, and Lady Winter lost her power and was forced to leave the family alone. As the fire simmered into nothingness, none of the pinewood remained. In its place were a couple hundred charred pinecones. Unsure of what they would do next winter, but grateful to have their little girl safe in their arms, the man and the woman gave thanks to the pine tree by spreading its cones all around their property so that it would be with them wherever they went.
Later that spring, where the pinecones had touched the needles that had been blown about by the winter winds, a countless number of pine trees sprang from the ground and surrounded the home. That fall, when all of the other trees lost their color for the winter, the new pine trees remained green, denying Lady Winter her power. Now whenever Lady Winter returns to the home to try to get her revenge, an army of Evergreen trees hold firm against her wind.