"...Then the moon rises over the tops of the trees, and Aelthwy starts shiverin' with cold. She tucks herself up and makes for home, but the stranger holds her fast, saying “Come away with me”.
His voice is honey and opium, and his hands are strong as tree roots and it’s then that poor Aelthwy looks at him by moonlight and sees what he is. She sees the cat eyes, and his long pointed ears. She sees his hair is tangled black feathers running down his back, that his long legs and arms are far too thin, and she jumps back, yelling out the words that ward against his kind. But he only laughs at her, shrill and piercing, for he’s already made his mark on her.
“Come away wit’ me” he repeats, “or return to your folk in disgrace to nurse a bairn whose teeth are sharp and whose covered all oe’re with fur!”

Anyone could tell she was caught in faeri trouble- for a mortal girl who joins the land of faeri is lost forever. But your grandmother was far from being slow of wit. She trembles, but bites her lip and stands straight. “You’ve had your share of me. Now, by law you must make me your bride.” She says. “Make me your bride and I’ll stay with you for ever and always.”
The faeri shook his wild head, for a lord elf is not keen on marrying a human girl, no matter how fair. “If I marry ye, I’ll be tied to your world, for ever and always. I want no more of you, lass. Run home and do your weeping and I’ll see no more of you.” He laughed a man’s laugh and began to lope farther into the woods.
Aelthwy fought back her tears of anger and called again for him to marry her and stay, for though his kind meant her no good she was still very much in love.

The elf looked over one shoulder and smiled his bent grin, and said, “I’ll marry you on the day that you make me a vest with no stitches or cuts. I’ll marry you on the day you wash that vest in a dry well. I’ll marry you once you’ve plowed me an acre between here and the sea with a white ram’s horn, then sewn it all with a single peppercorn. I’ll marry you once you’ve reaped that crop with a sickle of leather, and tied your harvest up in a peacock’s plume. Send it to me on a butterfly’s back, and if all this is done by this day in three years time on a full moon- I’ll make you a bride as sure as I’m king!”
And with that he melted into the air and a thousand black feathers that blew away on the wind."
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Done in calligraphy ink, watercolor, pencil, and copic marker.
Story and image © to me