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This Party Tip submitted by BizGirl - Aug 25th, 2008


    • Short Campfire Ghost Stories 4

    • The Glashtyn - A Ghost Story from the Isle of Man - By Josepha Sherman

      Go Back to Short Campfire Ghost Stories

      Once there lived a fisherman and his daughter, Nance. And a pretty young thing was she, with long, curly brown hair and eyes as blue as the sea. Nance kept their house and tended their little garden and the few chickens when her father was off at sea, and father and daughter were as happy as two people could be.
      Only one thing secretly grieved the fisherman, and that was the memory of his dear wife, who’d died when their daughter was a baby. And with that memory was the worry of leaving Nance alone when he went out to sea.
      But he must sail or there’d be no fish to catch and sell, so he said to his daughter, as he did every time he want off in his boat, “Now, you’re to be wary while I’m gone and open the door to no stranger, be he man or . . . Other.”
      Nance laughed away his fears. “Have I not grown up in this place? And don’t I know not to invite into this house any stranger, man or Other?”
      So off the fisherman sailed in his small, swift boat, promising to be back before the sun had set. And his daughter gathered the eggs from their few chickens, spun a little wool, tended the garden, then brewed herself some nice, hot tea and sat peacefully, listening to the seabirds squealing high overhead.
      But as the day moved toward night, great storm clouds came boiling up out of the west, and the girl stood up in alarm as thunder boomed and rain came torrenting down. Where was her father? Was he caught in the storm? Surely he would sail farther out, out of the wind and rain into calmer seas and wait. Just in case, she lit a lantern and placed it in their cottage’s one window so that he would see the light if he was trying to get home, and not be lost. As the storm winds screamed about the cottage, Nance tried and tried not to worry.
      A faint knock on the door woke her. “Dad?”
      Was he hurt? Too weak to open the door himself?
      “Dad!”
      Hastily, Nance flung open the door -
      But this wasn’t her father! This was the finest young man she’d ever seen, with long hair like an inky black mane and great brown eyes set in a narrow face, dark as the skin of the Gypsies she’d seen once. But he wore fisherman’s clothes and he was soaked to the skin.
      “Was there a wreck?” Nance asked in fright. “Are you hurt?”
      He shook his head.
      “What is this? Can’t you speak our tongue?”
      He gestured only that he was tired and wished to rest. Nance remembered her father’s warning about not opening the door to strangers. But all the fisher-folk knew that you must give help to anyone from a shipwreck, so she let the poor man in. He curled up in front of the fire and slept and he was still the most handsome man Nance had ever seen. But there was something so odd and foreign about him. . . .
      All at once I wish the rooster were crowing in the dawn, she thought. For nothing Otherly, nothing of strange magic, could stand the touch of daylight.
      Not sure of herself, hardly daring to breathe, Nance very, very gently brushed the stranger’s long, dark mane of hair away from his face.
      And she nearly screamed in shock. For his ears were not the rounded ears of a man but the sharply pointed ones of a horse. He was no man at all! This was a Glashtyn, a water horse who had taken on human shape. The Glashtyn enchanted humans, lured the into the sea - and drowned them!
      Just then, the Glashtyn woke and smiled at her. If she had not seen those pointed ears, Nance would surely have thought it was a mortal man’s smile. He pulled a string of lovely pearls from a pocket and laid it across her knee with a pleading look.
      “You want me to come with you?” Nance brushed the pearls from her knee. “Oh no, I’ll not take your gifts and I’ll not come with you!”
      With a shout of rage like a stallion’s scream, the Glashtyn sprang to his feet. Catching her by the arm, he dragged her from the cottage. And his form began to change, from man to great black stallion, mane and tail whipping wildly in the wind.
      “I’ll not go with you!” Nance cried.
      She screamed with all her might - and as she’d hoped, the rooster woke in surprise and began to crow. The great black stallion froze, flattening his ears against his head, sure that the dawn had come. With a snort of rage, he whirled and plunged into the sea.
      Nance raced back to the cottage and bolted the door, waiting with heart pounding until at last the storm ended. It was truly morning now - and here came her father. Nance ran to him and flung her arms about his neck as though she would never let him go.
      The Glashtyn had lost, and she was safe.

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    • Tags: halloween ghost stories short campfire
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