Germany x Reader: Florinda and Yoringal

They said strange things happened in that forest. They had said such things since you were a little girl. As you grew older you didn’t really believe the tale of the witch who lived in the forest quite as much, but the eerie feeling you got from it never went away. So witch or not, you tended to avoid the forest. But that was before you met Ludwig Beilschmidt, a tall, blonde, German man that had captured your heart. He had rode into town with his family – his grandfather and older brother – one day and you were instantly smitten. He was too. It was hard to miss you, you had grown into quite the beautiful young maiden, and he had to have you. He learned that you had a very colorful personality as well, often conflicting with his rather black and white one, but he wouldn’t have it any other way. One of the places where you met with conflict had to do with the forest. He frequently liked to take walks in it, and you avoided it like the plague. And by some miracle, he managed to get you to take walks with him. Maybe it was just because of how safe he made you feel. He didn’t really know what it was that frightened you so much until the day you told him the story of the witch.

“A witch?” he looked at you skeptically.

“Yes,” you said, understanding how silly it must have sounded, “There’s an old castle in the middle of the forest where an old woman lives by herself. She’s also a shape shifter. She’s a cat by day, and an owl at night, and when the evening has yet to set in and the day is fading she is a woman.”

“What’s so scary about that?” he said with an amused smirk and quirked eyebrow. You blushed, in embarrassment and at how flustered he could make you with a single glance from his icy, blue eyes.

“It’s not necessarily the shape shifting that scares everyone. It’s what she does to the people that get too close to the castle. Only one person lived to tell about it. She took his wife, turned her into a bird and locked her away. She kept him trapped there for two days before letting him wander back into town dirty, hungry, thirsty, and half-crazed. No one would have believed him if it weren’t for the constant disappearances that seemed to occur afterwards whenever villagers would go to investigate. It’s believed that she has seven thousand other birds that were once women locked away there, and God only knows what she’s done to all the men.”

“Hm. It does seem odd….”

“Please, don’t!” He looked surprised by your outburst.

“Don’t what?”

“Every time you get curious about a problem, you want to investigate to see if there’s a rational explanation and a reasonable solution. Please, don’t. I can’t lose you. I love you entirely too much. My heart couldn’t take it.” Your eyes were already brimming with tears. That was another thing. You were far more in touch with your emotions than he was.

“Relax, _________,” he said as he took one of your small hands in his large ones and brought it up for a kiss, “We can go for a walk to clear your head if you want.”

“Fine,” you answered.

~

“This evening seems particularly beautiful,” you sighed as the two of you walked through the forest hand in hand. Ludwig hummed in agreement. But something was off. “But what is this feeling of pure fear?”

“I don’t know. But I feel it too,” Ludwig said. Normally walks were so peaceful, but something wasn’t right. And Ludwig felt on edge the entire time.

“Ludwig…,” you choked out, your voice trembling and tears beginning to stream down your face.

“It’ll be alright. We’ll turn back if you’re that worried,” he said as he took your face in his hands and gave you a gentle smile. Usually this was all it took to calm your frayed nerves, and while it did stop your tears and take the edge off of your fear, it did nothing to eliminate it.

“It’s getting dark anyway.”

You looked up into his icy blue eyes and looked for reassurance but your eyes strayed behind him to a castle that stood looming behind the two of you. In your unease neither of you had noticed the two of you approach it. The color drained from your face, and your heart nearly stopped. Ludwig looked at you with a worried expression on his face at your sudden look of terror. He tried to spin around to see what it was that had caused it but was frozen in his place. He couldn’t move or speak. His eyes locked onto yours.

“Ludwig…,” you uttered before in a puff of smoke you were gone. No, you weren’t gone. You had turned into a nightingale. You chirped and sang your song of distress, flitting to his shoulder. If birds could cry you would have. Then an owl swooped down, screeching loudly in a manner that seemed unnatural even for owls. The owl landed in front of them and as the last rays of the setting sun disappeared, the owl began to morph in front of them, turning into a hunched over old woman with baggy, wrinkly, ashen skin covered in moles. Her nose was long and hooked, almost touching her chin, and her crimson eyes flashed with malice as she eyed the two lovers before her.

She clutched you in her hand while you continued to chirp out what felt like your swan song and smiled a wicked, black-toothed grin at Ludwig. He briefly wondered what she would do. But then she just left, taking his beloved fiancée with her. And that was worse than any punishment or torture that could befall him. He took his love from him.

It felt like forever before she returned though it may have been only a few minutes that she’d been gone. She stared deeply into his eyes.

“Leave this place. There is nothing for you here,” she hissed then spat in his face. Ludwig felt himself gain the ability to move once more. He fell to his knees as the woman, draped in a black, torn cloak slithered past him. He grasped a handful of her cloak and looked up to her. She turned to him with a sneer.

“Please. Give her back. I can’t live without her.”

“Then die.” She snatched away her cloak, just as well, Ludwig felt his body lose its strength. He couldn’t have held her there if he wanted to. He laid there for what once again may have been hours before picking himself up and leaving.

He wandered into a town that wasn’t his own before plopping himself down against a wall of a building which, based on the sounds coming from inside, was probably a bar of some sort. He felt silent tears drip down his face, and he didn’t feel the strength to wipe them away.

“Rough times?” a gruff voice spoke from beside him. Ludwig looked at him, and just silently nodded.  He was old and rather lanky. There was a slight hunch in his posture that was probably the result of age. He was bald on top with a cul-de-sac of white hair surrounding the sides of his head with sideburns that swooped down into a thick beard. One of his eyes was milky white in color. “Need an ear?”

“What’s the point? That won’t bring her back,” Ludwig lamented.

“Wanna know a good way to forget your troubles?”

“I prefer to not drink them away.” The old man chuckled at his response.

“As good a thing as any I suppose, but I was going to say hard work. Hard to think of troubles when you’re working.”

“I don’t need work.”

“You got a job?”

“No.”

“Place to stay?”

“No.”

“Food?”

“No.”

“Sure sounds like you need work. I gotta loft in my barn, and you’re welcome to stay and have a few hot meals a day and a little coin if you work tending my sheep. I’m too old and can’t keep good watch anymore now that I lost my sight in one of my eyes. You’re young and able. You come down to my farm if you wanna take me up on my offer. I live a few miles outside of town. You follow the road, and you can’t miss it. Name’s Frederick by the way.” And just like that he disappeared down the road.

Ludwig sat there for a good two hours feeling sorry for himself and mourning your loss. Before he picked himself up and began walking out of town down to the farm. There was no light coming from the home. The old man was probably asleep by now, but Ludwig knocked anyway. He waited a little while before seeing a small, dim light made its way towards the front of the house. Frederick opened the door.

“Wait here,” he instructed. Ludwig did as he was told. A few minutes later, the old man came back with two bundles of clothes, a blanket, a small loaf of bread, an apple, and a carrot, and an unlit candle and candle holder. “Now follow me.” Ludwig followed him to the large barn. The animals barely stirred at their entrance to the barn. He led Ludwig to an upstairs loft.

“This is where you’ll stay. Use some hay to make a bed for yourself. If you want your own, I suspect you’ll build it yourself. Here’s some food and some clean clothes. The wife will wash your other clothes, just be sure you drop it off in the house tomorrow. Drive the sheep down to the stream just south of here every morning at the break of dawn and let ‘em graze for a bit then drive ‘em back here. The dog will help. He knows what to do. In a few weeks we trim the wool, but you don’t have worry about that for now. My wife will have breakfast ready by the time you return from the stream. Here’s a candle too,” he said as he put it in the holder and lit it with his already lit candle. “Don’t burn down the barn though.”

“Thank you,” Ludwig muttered before making a makeshift bed out of hay. Despite the fact that his body was exhausted, he couldn’t find sleep. He just tossed and turned with the image of your face pale with terror burned within his eyelids and the sounds of your melodic chirping ringing in his ears. So he waited until the sounds of daybreak would call him to work and pull him out of the heavy weight on his chest caused by guilt that he couldn’t save you.

At long last, the first few rays of the sun rose over the horizon, and Ludwig drove his body to rise and start his work. He changed into his new set of clothes and made his way down to the first floor of the barn. Just as he reached the bottom, the doors opened. In walked Frederick with a German shepherd.

“Good to see you’re already up and that the clothes fit you. Doesn’t look like you got much sleep though. This here is Berlitz. Best sheep dog you’ll ever meet.” Ludwig stooped down and held out his hand for the dog to sniff. Berlitz did so before nudging the hand to be pet. Ludwig scratched him behind the ears.

“You’ve had a dog before?” Frederick asked.

“Yes, once. Had two actually, but they died of old age. They were German shepherds too.”

“Then you two should get along just fine. Well get to work. Breakfast will be on the table by the time you get back. You can ride my horse, Dismann out to the pasture. You won’t have to do too much. Just make sure they don’t wander, and if you want a little more work, then there’s more to be done around the farm. Get going.” Ludwig nodded before gesturing for the dog to follow him. He saddled up Dismann and opened the corral housing the sheep. Just as he was supposed to, he drove the sheep south to the stream. They drank their fill and grazed for about three hours before Berlitz became restless, alerting Ludwig that it was time to drive them back. The entire time he tried his very best to just concentrate on his job, but he always found himself thinking of you.

~

It had been a good six months since Ludwig had taken this job, and while life had been good to him, he could scarcely appreciate it. He loved you and missed you still. He’d just managed go through the days, doing practically all the work on the farm just to distract himself. Frederick and his wife Michaela had been wonderful to him. They even sympathized with him when told the tale of how he’d lost you. They’d heard the rumors of the witch of legend but hadn’t believed them until now. Of course they said that if there were anything they could do for him to let them know, but he humbly declined. He was certain he’d never see her again.

One night he dreamed for the first time in a long time instead of the nightmares of reliving the moment he lost you.

There you sat in a field clothed in a dress of pure white with a veil covering your face. In your hand was a red bud of a flower. You held it out to him. He was crying because you were here with him, but he was aware he was dreaming and knew he couldn’t keep you. He took the flower and stared at it and it bloomed before his eyes revealing dew tipped petals and a pearl growing in the center. He looked up at you and you smiled at him before saying something to him that he couldn’t hear.

Just as well, the dog woke him up before he could ask what you said. That wasn’t the last of his dreams.

He was in a strange forest when he heard the familiar singing of a nightingale. He looked towards the euphonious sound and saw you perched on a branch looking at him. Then you began to fly away. He followed you, running for what felt like forever through a mountain pass until you came to a valley and landed next to a budding red flower which, like before, bloomed with a pearl dotting the center.

Then there was another.

The witch was chasing him, and he was chasing you. You flew into a large red flower, and he jumped in after you. The large red petals enclosed around the two of you, and you both heard the screams of the witch. Ludwig wasn’t sure how he knew, but somehow he knew the witch couldn’t get to you now. He turned to you, and you were human.

“Ludwig, find it. Free us,” you pleaded. Next all he could hear were the cries of the birds locked away in the witch’s castle. Among them, yours rang out the loudest.

Ludwig shot up in his bed. That night he told Frederick of his dreams. Frederick stroked his beard in thought as he mulled over what Ludwig had just told him. Ludwig was sure Frederick would just brush it off and that he was only lending an ear to be polite. But he appeared to be in genuine deep thought.

“And you’re certain that this flower had a pearl in the middle?”

“I’m more than certain.”

“There’s a legend that this flower blooms once every few years, but only reveals itself to those who truly want it. Do you think this might be the solution to your problem?”

“I don’t know, but I have a good, strong feeling about it.”

“I’ll tell you what. Go look for this flower, and if you find it, then go get your girl. If not, then you’re welcome to stay here.”

“Thank you.”

“You’ve saved up enough money by now that you could get a small home for you and your fiancée. But don’t forget to introduce her to my wife and I. She’d love to meet the woman you would go to the ends of the earth chasing legends for. I wish you the best of luck, and your job will be waiting here for you when you get back.”

~

Nine days. He searched high and low for nine days; suffering through the biting cold of the mountains’ icy peaks and hiding from the wildlife that sought to kill him. He had run out of packed food on the third day, and hunting didn’t yield much – maybe a rabbit or two every now and then assuming he could catch it. By the ninth day when he reached the valley in which he dreamt he could find the flower, he was near starved to death. He looked across the vast field, and as the sun began to set he could see something sparkling in the distance. He shambled towards it as quickly as he could, stumbling as he did so in his severely weakened state until he came upon it. He fell to his knees before it as tears dripped from his eyes onto the unopened bud. As they slid down the velvet, blood red petals, the flower began to open revealing dew tipped petals. In the center was not a pearl but a dew drop which greatly resembled one. When Ludwig touched it his hunger ebbed away and his strength returned. Truly this flower was something magical. He plucked it up and began his journey back. As he did, predators shied away from him, unable to touch him or even come near.
He didn’t eat or drink as he had no need to. And he never tired. And he never stopped. Now that he had the answer to getting you back, he would never stop until he did.

It was ten more days before he came to the witch’s castle. He stood staring at it warily. The memory of your capture played fresh in his mind as if it had just happened, and the edges of the scars it left burned with a searing pain and hatred.

He took a step forward. Then another. The circle hexed by the witch had no effect on him, and he walked on with being frozen by her power. He slipped quietly through the door. The castle didn’t look lived in. It was covered in dust and cobwebs. There were spiders and rats everywhere. The rats hissed at him but couldn’t touch him. The spiders merely scurried away. He stood still in the quiet of the castle, listening for the sounds of the birds she’d locked away. He heard them faintly and swiftly moved towards where they were held. There stood the witch in the doorway facing him, her red eyes burning bright with hatred.

“You’re returned,” she rasped.

“I have. I’m freeing my fiancée and the other women you’ve imprisoned here. And you can’t stop me.” The witch morphed her form into that of a beautiful woman.

“Could we organize some sort of trade?” she asked seductively. She’d have touched him if she could, but she knew she couldn’t.

“I wouldn’t betray _________ for all the riches and women and kingdoms of the world.” And he meant those words. The witch frowned but moved out of the doorway.

“Very well.” Ludwig stepped into the room where he saw thousands of caged birds, all crying for help. But he had trouble picking out the one song he longed to hear most: yours. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw the witch moving with something tucked under her arm. It was a basket with muffled chirps coming from it. He grabbed her wrist with the hand that was holding the flower quickly and she dropped the basket. You promptly flew out of it. The witch screamed in pain as the flower seared her very flesh. Even after Ludwig let go she yowled in pain. She yelled and cursed at him and spat poison and venom. The flower, even though it was no longer touching her, continued to burn her and began to drain her of her power. Her skin began to crack and peel away and her body began to dry out and hollow out. Soon there was nothing left of her but an empty husk. The witch was no more.

The flower began to glow and so did all the birds and their cages. Soon all of the trapped birds were transformed back into women. Each of them wept with joy and thanks before fleeing the castle back to their homes and families. The last to transform was you. You stood before him, tears dripping from your face before throwing your arms around his neck. You cried. You both did, sliding to the floor weeping bitter-sweet tears of happiness.

~

Frederick and his wife sat in their kitchen, dining on breakfast talking about some news from the town over. Apparently a great darkness had lifted from the forest and a grand celebration was held along with a wedding. It was a mystery to them why such a large celebration was held that the entire kingdom rejoiced, but there was no time to think it over. There was work to be done. Then there was a knock at the door.

Frederick answered it before calling Michaela over to have a look. There stood Ludwig with a young, beautiful girl with sparkling __e/c__ eyes and shiny __h/c__ hair.

“Frederick, Michaela, I’d like you to meet my wife ________.”