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Ronan's Revenge
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I can\'t remember where I first found this story! I have, however, tweaked it a bit for my own telling.
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\\ufeffSTORY TRANSCRIPT
Far up north there was a land wrapped in a perpetual winter - nothing but snow and ice. The people in that land struggled to find food and warmth because the sea was barren and the animals of the land hid in deep caves. As a result, the people were cold and hungry and in a family, one more child can often prove to be one child too many.
So it was with one such family - a mother, a father and three children. During a particularly cold stretch, the two parents got together and discussed which child they should get rid of. After much discussion, they decided that their oldest daughter, Ronan, the one who asked too many questions, who had too many opinions... that\'s the one who should go.
So the father went to the cliffs at the edge of the barren sea and made a deal with the skies.
The next day, Ronan\\u2019s parents sent her to the cliffs on the edge of the barren sea and told her to collect firewood. Ronan was surprised. There was no firewood to be found on the cliffs, but it would give her a break from the tedium of her household chores and her parent\'s bickering, so she went.
Now when she got there, she saw far out to sea, there was a boat. It was, even from a distance, a most remarkable boat. The sails were white, and it was lined with furs, and best of all, there was a smell of hot, fresh food. And on the boat was a man. He was tall and strong and looked like his skin had soaked in the sun. The man waved to Ronan. He asked her if she wanted to travel to a land where there was sun and warmth and food. Ronan didn\\u2019t think twice. She waved the man ashore, and she got on the boat.
But no sooner had the man left the shore than he raised his arms to the sky where they turned from limbs to mightily wings. Instead of resting on a bed of fur, she was clinging to sharp, hard talons. A powerful albatross swept to the sky carrying Ronan with him.
They flew to the cliffs on the far side of the land where he dropped her into a nest full of screaming chicks.
Ronan realised immediately what her parents had done. So from the nest, she began to cry and wail, begging her parents to bring her back.
After a whole year, the parents finally accepted that they couldn\'t manage without Ronan, so her father got in his boat and sailed across the long, barren ocean to the cliffs where he rescued Ronan from the Albatrosses nest.
But it didn\\u2019t take long for the Albatross to realise that Ronan was gone. He swept across the ocean until he found the small boat. He cursed Ronan\\u2019s father for breaking the deal: "You told me if I...'