Enter a valley in the meadows of a world apart from our own, where lies a kingdom once ruled by a loving king and queen. Their son, however, the new monarch, has grown to be spoiled and crude. Ruling now, he is a selfish, unrealistic king who demands his dutiful court to give him anything he wants the moment he wants it. He is big and bulbous from many feasts, pale from little sun, and quite ugly. He has no skills. He does not ride steeds, he does not fence or train. He only sits and consumes, demands more gold, more entertainment. With small, evil, beady eyes, he looks upon everything offered (or not) with greed and lust. His fat fingers reach for every leg of mutton and pastry his kitchen staff provide, keeping his tempers at bay. He wears only the shiniest golden robes by day and finest silk gowns by night. He has many women of varying ages who he forces into bed, as his need is never-ending. He is, in all senses, a tyrannical ruler, a terrible royal, and an even worse man.

   However, he knows nothing else. No thought of morality or generosity, and nor do the workers of the palace. When their king was a small child, the maids and men of the court pampered and sheltered him more than any royalty had been yet. Not his mother, his father, or his sister who died of an illness at the tender age of two had been treated in such a way. Because of this, the king has never known a life in which he does not get what he wants, and neither do his sorry servants.

   Strangely, though, what he wants isn't the usual. It's not just diamonds and gems, but the world, everything there is to take. He wants the stars to spell his name but for the sun to never set. He wants to be known as the greatest ruler in all the land, though he really doesn't do anything of substance. No, he only demands everything be done for him. Think for me, act for me, clean my shoes, feed me, paint the sky for me, bring me the finest China, the prettiest maids. Worse, even, our despised king goes back on his word, confusing his court, demanding more and more gifts of loyalty that the court struggles, but succeeds, to always supply.

   Sometimes, when he's bored, he beheads and tortures the people of his court and kingdom for fun, but nobody ever mentions it for fear of being next.

   Now, on this day, we reflect back on what he's asked for in years previous. Ridiculous, unmanageable things, met with a tantrum if not provided. The court is smart, though, and always finds a way. For example, when he wanted the sky darkened permanently, they kept him inside (not a difficult feat) and wrapped blankets 'round the windows, poking holes in the fabric to replicate the stars. When he wanted eternal sun, they shone lanterns all around the palace in such masses so that it was always bright.

   Yes, his servants and caretakers have quick wit and are skilled in catering to his every whim, even lying to him about the quality of gems, jewels, and gold because he doesn't know any different - he's simply too stupid (never a formal education, of course, he was too stubborn and impatient to be taught, and no teacher would dare scold him when he misbehaved).

   As you can imagine, because he's so selfish and ignorant, he neglects his subjects and never serves them well. All the kingdom's gold and that which was dug from the woods outside the valley goes into granting his wishes, buying and building him more and more, ever trying to satisfy his greed. His people, in turn, are suffering. They have no clean water, no food, and no proper shelter. They once did, under a respected monarchy, but of course, nothing about this gluttonous ruler is respectable.

   Here and now, back in said palace, forgetting his starving people in the town streets, the king begins demanding things that the court can't trick: his name in the stars, eternal youth, multiples of the same woman for him to bed... The court is at a loss, and, frankly, exhausted after three decades of serving him on their own, so they buckle their bootstraps and set out of the valley and into the woods.

   There's a legend that this wood is magic, due in part to a grand sorcerer who lives in a little cobblestone hut beyond a sea of purple mushrooms. The court, knowing this legend, seek to call on him for his help, and instead find the rumored evil, conniving, bitter witch of the woods. She is no sorcerer, but she has great power indeed, and though they are terrified by her sharp gaze and clear loathing of their intrusion, she pads down the cobblestone steps in black leather boots and entertains them with a listen.

   Pleading, they ask for her help, for use of her powers to satisfy their needy king.

   The witch cackles and turns them away. "Why would I help grant the wishes of such a lusty, irresponsible man? Be gone with you."

   She shoos them off, threatening sparks at her fingertips, but the leader of the court, captain of the guard, holds strong. He offers her anything she wants, even total control of the kingdom once the king dies. The king hasn't a son, he's too restless to settle down with one poor woman, and his selfish and gluttonous nature have made him sterile, so there is nobody to inherit the tattered remains of his kingdom and extravagant golden palace. The court will do anything to please the king, as they don't want to lose their heads, but they do still twiddle their fingers, waiting for the king to die, hoping to finally be rid of him and his ridiculous demands. Sadly, he is in good health (for the most part) and going nowhere.

   The pain in the captain's eyes intrigues the witch, and she's amused by how much he truly hates the king despite his unwavering loyalty. With a cocked brow, she then agrees to help them on strange terms - they must give her the two most beautiful children their wives next bear - and follows them back to the kingdom.

   She is introduced to the king as a "wish granter" and "helper,” pleasing him in concept and concealing her true terrifying power. When the witch meets the king, she grimaces at the grease on his brow and in the folds of his neck, but he's too vain to notice and continues pawing through an endless tray of sweets. When he does look up and into her face, he scrunches up his flat nose and waves her away.

   Surprisingly, he does not want to bed her, as she is ugly and strange with shiny purple skin and coiling turquoise worms for hair. Beautiful to some but terribly ugly to most, though she couldn't give two frog warts about it personally.

   All the same, the king asks his maids to clean her up and make her presentable, and though she scalds their hands with hot water when they try to touch her, she does agree to cast a beautifying spell on herself. The powerful witch returns to the king more lovely than their first meeting, but her colors are still strange - purple abalone skin, ocean waves in her hair. The king isn't satisfied, but thankfully, the captain tells the king that she needn't be beautiful, only compliant. "She will serve you better than we can," he tells him. With this, the king grunts his approval.

   Immediately, the witch regrets offering her service, but all the same, the days go by, and she grants the king his wishes, everything he wants. However, her magic is limited. She can only make things appear as something else. She can make the sky appear to spell the king's name, but the stars themselves are still stuck in place millions of miles away beyond the veil of her magic. She can duplicate the woman the king wants to bed, but only in appearance, as the women are all servants, maids, and slaves, present in every sense when the king is sweaty and heavy and grunting over them. She can't make the king young or loved, but she can change the appearance of the wrinkles by his eyes and sloppy mouth, and she can tell him how much everyone adores him, casting a spell on her eyes to sparkle with honesty.

   As she serves him, her magic holds up as long as needed, but it does make her gravely weak, and after a series of weeks, she has to take it all back. Fortunately, the king bores easily and, as we've established, is incredibly stupid, so he doesn't realize everything has gone back to the way it was. He is entertained easily, little tricks and spells the witch and court cook up together.

   This compliance lasts for a number of months, but as anyone would, the witch grows impatient. She hates men in general but loathes this one especially. He's misogynistic and terrible and crude and useless, and as the witch grows to despise him wholeheartedly, the court and servants begging her to stay every time she threatens to turn them all into pigs to match their king and leave them all to snort through the mug, she realizes she's had enough.

   So, one day, she takes the king into the kingdom town on a "day trip," which is very exciting and new for him, as he rarely leaves the castle, and using all her strength, the last of her magic, casts the kingdom as a beautiful, flourishing city. Women are plump and pregnant, men strong and strapping. Little children cross the square with rosy cheeks and golden curls, chasing rings of silver. The sky is perfectly blue, dogs are yipping happily, and everything is wonderful.

   The witch says nothing for a moment, the king lounging lazily in his chariot in the center of town, looking greedily at his successful kingdom. Across the way, a pretty lady with a round rump and pink lips leans down to pick a flower from a garden and add it to her basket, cleavage peeking at the king as he stares on, and when she catches him, she waves and giggles. The king drools a bit, waggling his thick fingers back, but before he can order the chariot over to take her for his collection, the witch steps in.

   She leans into his fat ear and ghosts a ghoulish breath, "You've done all of this, have you not? Your kingdom thrives because of your grace! You are the best king in all the land!"

   He chuckles merrily, fat in his cheeks and neck bubbling with the weight of him.

   "You are a magnificent ruler," the witch says, "and though I am not as powerful as you, I do have my magic." He bristles, so she compliments him again. "As do you! You are magical too. But I am a witch, I have true magic, whereas yours is the magic of success and thriving. Your magic has made this kingdom a great one."

   A slimy smile - back in good graces. The witch feigns a grin and swoops 'round his chariot, tones of blue and purple robes brushing the mirage of the town square's spotless stone streets. The sun dances in sparkles on her cheeks, fire in her eyes, and she regards him again. "But I must tell you, dear king. I can only do so much with my magic. I can make things appear beautiful, healthy, perfect. The truth lies underneath."

    The king is perplexed, small, button-black eyes blinking stupidly at her.

   "With a wave of my hand," the witch explains, grinning devilishly now, letting the façade fall, magic in her face melting away, features resuming their strange, terrifying beauty, "I can make you see the truth."
And before the king can even blink again, she raises both arms, cloak draping down her form, dark thread glittering in the sunlight. She sweeps her hands through the air, and on command, the town's mirage shimmers away - all is revealed.

 

   Where once there were bubbling fountains and roses, crippled old men lay in rags, begging for gold. The beautiful, round women are stripped of all plushness and left thin, hungry bones with hollow faces and dead eyes. They have no children, no hope, and no future. Their husbands are sick and wounded from fighting for scraps, and all dogs, cats, and mice have been eaten. Butchers in dark corners raise their rusty cleavers, desperate for something to chop, seemingly not too far from cannibalism. The square itself is filthy and terrible, brown muck filling the cracks of cobblestone which have no doubt been pried from their spots and used as crude, blunt weapons in a fight between two crazed, starving men. Blue skies turn grey and smoggy, every flower and plant wilts, and all good spirit and happiness turns to misery and despair. The place is horrible and rancid, sick people in the streets coughing up blood, crumbling houses.

   The king's greasy mouth falls open in shock and horror, so confused, so terribly upset in thinking that this is the truth, this is his kingdom. The witch confirms it.

   "This!" she shouts, growing tall and strong and colorful as her magic comes back to her. "This is what you rule! These are your people! Sick and wounded and starving! No future, no happiness! Your greed has caused these people misery, and all that your dutiful court has given you has been a ruse!" She's unstoppable, never such whiskey in her mouth, flames in her eyes. "They commanded me to fool you, trick you into thinking the stars bend at your whim, that you could lay with the same woman again and again! Those women were servants, peasants! No better now as they've been stained with your filth than these women here! Look! Look, your majesty, look with your greedy eyes, your disgusting selfishness! This is the world you've created!"

   It's so much for the king; he's so frightened, that he goes pale and begins to tremble, unable to speak. His wide eyes dart around the gruesome scene, thick fingers gripping protectively at his silk blanket. It doesn't help, though, as townspeople begin to come towards the chariot, free of magic now, free to approach.

   The witch continues to preach, swelling with power, watching the king shiver as the humanoid husks creep forward, "People! This is your king! He is the one who sucked you dry of all your gold, who poisoned your water and killed your children! He has been too afraid and small to see you for what you are, but I have shown him the light! Thank him now, kingdom, thank him for all he's done for you! Show him how you thrive!"

   And the people, who loathe the king for failing them, swarm him in a dirty, smelly mob. They claw at his chariot and golden robes and pinch the fat in his neck and arms, they moan and yell and plead and say, You did this, you did this to us. They charge him, and he's too fat and stupid to leave, so he only sits, screaming, tears pooling in his newly opened eyes, as the people he's ruined give him what he's owed. They tear him apart, steal his clothes, cut his skin with their yellowed claws and kill him with blunt rocks and sheer terror. When they're finished, there's nothing but a bloody, naked corpse in a striped chariot, sagging into the streets with the weight of a fallen dictator, the weight of all he's done.

   After the townspeople’s intense but long overdue insanity subsides, and the king's death is spread to the court and the rest of the kingdom, the witch takes over the palace in the valley like promised. 

   The first thing she does is give all the gold and jewels back to the people, dismantling the king's palace and selling the expensive materials and decorations to earn back only a portion of what the town is owed. Little by little, she helps the town grow and flourish. She cleans the water and streets and people themselves, as well as forces the community to band together to build new homes and buy food and blankets and cast iron pots. She does her best, all that she can, but she does not use her magic. There is nothing for her to change, to trick, to appear to solve. This is a real problem that must be solved by real solutions, real hands. And luckily, the witch is smart and inspirational and generous and helps the people, truly, not keeping one bit of the king's gold for herself. She returns the gold to inspire them to invest in their future, to start anew.

   The people listen. It takes a while, and it's hard work, but the town comes back to life. Without a tyrant monarch, the sick are healed, the women eat enough to get and stay pregnant, and the men regain their strength and go hunting in the witch's woods for meat once again. All is well.

   As for the witch, she returns to her cottage in the woods and tells the kingdom not to bother her again. 
She says she is tired of all this and just wants to go home. The people, especially the court, don't want her to leave, of course, and beg her to stay and reign over the new kingdom she's brought back from the ashes, but she refuses.

   "To rule this once broken land is not my fate," she says, "but that of one of your own. Wait a few years and live in peace with no monarch, let your kingdom restore itself. Then, when you need guidance once again, you will find the lad or lass within your town who will become the new ruler. Make sure that whoever they are, they are not blind with greed, make sure they know where they come from and what happens when their pleasure becomes priority. Remind them what it means to lead, to help their people thrive. They will rule, reign well, and your kingdom will fall back into balance. There is no place for me now, nor will there be in the future. I leave you now to heal. Farewell, little town, little quiet village. And bless you all."

   She leaves them with a whoosh of her black cape, empty and dumbstruck. The witch of the woods, who had once been rumored as vile and cruel, has just saved them from serious misery and asked for nothing in return. The only thing she takes from the kingdom is a small silver clasp, carved like a sleeping dragon, that a servant girl gave her, one of the young girls the king had consistently raped. The witch treasures that silver clasp more than any thanks from anyone else, more than pride or the comforting embrace of doing a good deed, and wears it proudly on all her cloaks. She lives out the rest of her 300 years happily beside the village, known from then on as The Good Witch.