Beithir - Celtic Dragons

WARNING - This book contains mature themes. Sensitive readers may find some content upsetting. Ages 18 and up to read only. Cover from CANVA AI.
Every kid has read them, or had them read to them.
Fairy Tales, those legends and myths that evoked our imagination, captured our hopes and fears.
Hope that no matter what evil witches, dragons or other obstacles we face, we can overcome and have a happily ever after. In the Disney versions.
The Originals weren't made to package and sell a new age of romanticism to a youth who could grow up without the pallor of War and Poverty.
Those stories were a warning, passed down from generation to generation. A chance to get away from the mundane is usually the start.
Marina was a Princess in a thriving Kingdom, lost in daydreams and adventures until she rescues a handsome, drowning prince. Cue heartache at not having something she wants.
What is a Princess to do?
Naturally, she sacrifices her entire life to a Sea Witch for a chance to prove her love to the man she saved.
And then she kills herself.
That's how The Little Mermaid went.
If only I had been that lucky.
Which brings us to the other end of the spectrum.
Rumpelstiltskin.
What a mouthful.
Even reading it is a pain.
The King comes by and tells a poor family pay taxes or you die.
Struggling to survive and facing execution from an idiot King, the millers daughter makes a deal with a little Demon - her firstborn for gold.
What's a poor peasant woman to do?
NATURALLY she agrees.
For some reason, that idiot woman who made two impossible promises was saved by guessing the weirdest, most singular name in the world in a loophole to her contract.
If not for copy and paste, that name wouldn't be around.
Not a princess - not a peasant. I was a cashier.
You'd think that would make me closer to the unnamed Queen. No one knew my name even though I had a name badge.
What's a cashier to do when she goes up against an Evil Witch and her Son?
I died.
Unnaturally.