Bedtime Stories for the Faithful

Daughter of Mortius

 Long ago, before the tales of Frankenstein, the thought of the supernatural was no more than fantasy. But every wish did breathe life into a story. Nonsense, it seems like, but let us tell a tale of how a wish did breathe life.

It was a dark and stormy night on the night before All Hallow's Eve. Raindrops dripped onto the crinkling leaves and bare-branched trees. There came a knock at old Mortius's door. He opened it to see the mortician, Fraser.

"I come on behalf of your letter, Mortius," he chuckled. His hat was as tall as his hair was long. It dragged in the mud behind him.

"Fraser, my old friend," Mortius greeted, tired but relieved to see the undertaker. "Come in, come in, I have a proposition for you."

Mortius let Fraser in and sat him in his study. There was a hot cup of tea waiting for him. "What is it that you need, old Morty," Fraser chuckled as he sipped his drink.

Mortius stared out the window, hiding himself against the wall as if he was afraid someone might see him. "You know for years I've tried to have a child, but now it would appear my wife and I are too old, for she has passed on."

"Sorry to hear," Fraser apologized with a sympathetic grin.

"I need your skillset and magic, old friend," Mortius sat down across from him.

"Not entirely magic but belief," Fraser swooned and laughed.

"Yes," Mortius agreed and moved on. "I want a child, a daughter, someone to love and cherish."

Fraser sipped his tea. "You want me to find such a creature?"

"I want you...to make one, yes."

Fraser set his drink down on the table. The smile on his face steadily grew. "You really do need my skills."

"Can you do it?" Mortius asked, desperate.

"Anything for the sake of a laugh," he said and rose from his seat. "Follow me and bring an umbrella."

Mortius grabbed an umbrella and followed Fraser to his carriage. Out of the trunk, Fraser pulled a large chest and dragged it inside. He brought it to Mortius's laboratory. In the chest were tools and bones. Fraser dug through the bones and arranged them on a table just so.

"Bring me as much flour and water as you can find, and some sugar while you're at it," Fraser instructed Mortius.

Mortius brought him a gigantic sack of flour and a bucket of water. Fraser mixed them together and made a fine paste which he coated the bones in. He molded the material into the shape of a little girl.

"Now bring me some blankets and some yarn."

Mortius gave him such things, and Fraser sat in an old chair sewing the blankets, blue and white, into skin for the girl, and a green tablecloth into a dress to clothe her. He dressed the dough girl accordingly. Then he used the black and red yarn to make her hair.

By the time Fraser was done putting her together, it was All Hallow's Eve. He dug in his chest for one more ingredient.

"The spark, she must have a spark," he sang and got out a jar with a little light inside.

"And then she'll be alive?" Mortius asked.

"Alive as the dead," he teased. He stood beside the lifeless girl and kissed the jar. He opened it up and poured the light on her hair. Little sparks grew from her body, turning to bolts of lightning that shook the room.

Fraser stood quite still in the chaos while Mortius ran to his soon to be child and grasped her hand, holding it tight until the lightning ceased. When all was still Mortius opened his eyes and stared at the face of his daughter. She was as still as the dead.