Once upon a time, long ago, there was a tiny village by the sea.
It was a happy place of common folk with common lives and naught but trivial concerns. For generation, families had carved out a living from the dirt until they had their respectable homesteads and their sprawling farms. Nothing happened in this town, it had always been this way for generation upon generation, making barely a mark upon the world.
Then the troubles began. First it was the rats. It started small. They infested barns and didn’t trouble the folk. Then, the barns grew quite crowded. Lacking space for their rat kind, they moved onto the houses. Mousetraps were never a thing much required in this village and the rats themselves never bothered the people, they only needed shelter, after all. Then the rats moved on to the fields of golden wheat and barely. They filled the fields and could be seen from between ever blade of grass, staring up with their beady red eyes.
Strange things began to happen soon afterwards. Wheat was shrivelling up and disappearing from the once sprawling fields in vast quantities! The food grew limited and rationing began. Then, the plague started. More than many villagers were bedridden and ill with a strange sort of foreign pox that gave then sores and hacking, heart wrenching coughs.
Soon enough, the mayor of the village realized something was terribly wrong! A council was called, fingers were pointed and conclusions were swiftly made. The rats were becoming a plague themselves! But what could they do? Cats? But where would they get enough cats to do the job? Mousetraps? There weren’t enough mousetraps in the world to deal with them in such large amounts. The council of villagers was at a loss!
The stranger was indeed strange. He dressed rather fine in a velvet doublet and a magnificently feathered cap with shiny polished boots. At his side, was a simple and crude wooden flute. As the council bickered and squabbled with one another, the stranger made his way down the dirty cobbled path. The children of the village, the one who were still healthy anyway, were going about their chores. They peeked curiously at this fine stranger and he waved joviously at them. A few of the braver ones trailed after him, utterly enamoured. He halted and crouched down to their level, engaging them in conversation. Soon more of the children had come out from their various hiding spots and listened with fascination as he entertained them with a tale of a sleeping princess and a forest of thorns. Soon enough, he stood again and bid the children farewell, continuing his trek to the where council met.
When this stranger stepped boldly through the door, the council was quieted. Who was this arrogant peacock of a stranger to interrupt their villages’s private affairs? As the stranger explained himself and proclaimed that he could rid the village of their plague, the mayor laughed, humourlessly. It was impossible, he said. How could one man combat a veritable army of vermin when they couldn’t after several fortnight’s worth of planning? When the stranger adamantly proclaimed that he could deed preform this task, the mayor made him a deal. If he could accomplish this feat in three days, they would pay him handsomely and make him a member of their council to boot! The stranger thanked them heartily and left, whistling gaily. Once he had disappeared from view, the mayor scoffed. He would never be rid of the rats in a year, no less three days.
The very next day, the stranger returned with his shiny boots and feathered cap and wooden flute. To the entire village’s amazement, he began to play bit no sound could he heard. Then there was a rumbling and, pouting forth was an ocean of rats! They streamed from every respectable homestead and sprawling field in torrents and waves. The villagers screamed and trembled but the stranger was unflinching and simply turned heel and left, taking the foul vermin with him. Naught but a few hours later, he returned, the rats were nowhere to be found. When he returned to the council room, however, the mayor, once again, laughed in his face at the thought of him being paid for his deeds! The stranger did not show his anger, he simply tipped his hat in farewell.
That night, while the good folk slept, peaceful for the first time in months, a haunting melody seemed to emanate from every corner of the village, filling the minds and souls of the people and tugging at the hearts of the children, calling out to them. They, like the rats, poured from every corner of the village and flocked to the stranger and his pipe. With whoops and cheers, they gathered at the threshold of the village, beginning to make their way out. It was a parade of joyful children. Even the children ill with pox had regained their strength and the spots and coughs had faded into distant memory. The parade of children walked a long distance with the stranger but they never tired. Soon the stranger was leading up a mountain and at the peak of the mountain lay a cave, with golden light pouring forth from the entrance. I know naught what the children saw at the end of the cave but what the children saw made them shout for joy and all of them, even the youngest child with the crippled leg ran forth into the tunnel which promptly sealed itself afterwards.
As for the villagers, they awoke, never to know the glorious fate of their children.
The children never did return. As for what I know, they are still there.