The Tales of Beedle the Bard Read online

  He resolved at once to take a wife, and that she would be a wife superior to all others. She would possess astounding beauty, exciting envy and desire in every man who beheld her; she would spring from magical lineage, so that their offspring would inherit outstanding magical gifts; and she would have wealth at least equal to his own, so that his comfortable existence would be assured, in spite of additions to his household.

  It might have taken the warlock fifty years to find such a woman, yet it so happened that the very day after he decided to seek her, a maiden answering his every wish arrived in the neighbourhood to visit her kinsfolk.

  She was a witch of prodigious skill and possessed of much gold. Her beauty was such that it tugged at the heart of every man who set eyes on her; of every man, that is, except one. The warlock’s heart felt nothing at all. Nevertheless, she was the prize he sought, so he began to pay her court.

  All who noticed the warlock’s change in manners were amazed, and told the maiden that she had succeeded where a hundred had failed.

  The young woman herself was both fascinated and repelled by the warlock’s attentions. She sensed the coldness that lay behind the warmth of his flattery, and had never met a man so strange and remote. Her kinsfolk, however, deemed theirs a most suitable match and, eager to promote it, accepted the warlock’s invitation to a great feast in the maiden’s honour.

  The table was laden with silver and gold bearing the finest wines and most sumptuous foods. Minstrels strummed on silk-stringed lutes and sang of a love their master had never felt. The maiden sat upon a throne beside the warlock, who spake low, employing words of tenderness he had stolen from the poets, without any idea of their true meaning.

  The maiden listened, puzzled, and finally replied, “You speak well, Warlock, and I would be delighted by your attentions, if only I thought you had a heart!”

  The warlock smiled, and told her that she need not fear on that score. Bidding her to follow, he led her from the feast, and down to the locked dungeon where he kept his greatest treasure.

  Here, in an enchanted crystal casket, was the warlock’s beating heart.

  Long since disconnected from eyes, ears and fingers, it had never fallen prey to beauty, or to a musical voice, to the feel of silken skin. The maiden was terrified by the sight of it, for the heart was shrunken and covered in long black hair.

  “Oh, what have you done?” she lamented. “Put it back where it belongs, I beseech you!”

  Seeing that this was necessary to please her, the warlock drew his wand, unlocked the crystal casket, sliced open his own breast and replaced the hairy heart in the empty cavity it had once occupied.

  “Now you are healed and will know true love!” cried the maiden, and she embraced him.

  The touch of her soft white arms, the sound of her breath in his ear, the scent of her heavy gold hair: all pierced the newly awakened heart like spears. But it had grown strange during its long exile, blind and savage in the darkness to which it had been condemned, and its appetites had grown powerful and perverse.

  The guests at the feast had noticed the absence of their host and the maiden. At first untroubled, they grew anxious as the hours passed, and finally began to search the castle.

  They found the dungeon at last, and a most dreadful sight awaited them there.

  The maiden lay dead upon the floor, her breast cut open, and beside her crouched the mad warlock, holding in one bloody hand a great, smooth, shining scarlet heart, which he licked and stroked, vowing to exchange it for his own.

  In his other hand, he held his wand, trying to coax from his own chest the shrivelled, hairy heart. But the hairy heart was stronger than he was, and refused to relinquish its hold upon his senses or to return to the coffin in which it had been locked for so long.

  Before the horror-struck eyes of his guests, the warlock cast aside his wand, and seized a silver dagger. Vowing never to be mastered by his own heart, he hacked it from his chest.

  For one moment, the warlock knelt triumphant, with a heart clutched in each hand; then he fell across the maiden’s body, and died.

  PROFESSOR DUMBLEDORE’S NOTES

  As we have already seen, Beedle’s first two tales attracted criticism of their themes of generos-ity, tolerance and love. “The Warlock’s Hairy Heart”, however, does not appear to have been modified or much criticised in the hundreds of years since it was first written; the story as I eventually read it in the original runes was almost exactly that which my mother had told me. That said, “The Warlock’s Hairy Heart” is by far the most gruesome of Beedle’s offerings, and many parents do not share it with their children until they think they are old enough not to suffer nightmares.[8]

  Why, then, the survival of this grisly tale? I would argue that “The Warlock’s Hairy Heart” has survived intact through the centuries because it speaks to the dark depths in all of us.

  It addresses one of the greatest, and least acknowledged, temptations of magic: the quest for invulnerability.

  Of course, such a quest is nothing more or less than a foolish fantasy. No man or woman alive, magical or not, has ever escaped some form of injury, whether physical, mental or emotional. To hurt is as human as to breathe. Nevertheless, we wizards seem particularly prone to the idea that we can bend the nature of existence to our will. The young warlock[9] in this story, for instance, decides that falling in love would adversely affect his comfort and security. He sees love as a humiliation, a weakness, a drain on a person’s emotional and material resources.

  Of course, the centuries-old trade in love potions shows that our fictional wizard is hardly alone in seeking to control the unpredictable course of love. The search for a true love potion[10] continues to this day, but no such elixir has yet been created, and leading potioneers doubt that it is possible.

  The hero in this tale, however, is not even interested in a simulacrum of love that he can create or destroy at will. He wants to remain forever uninfected by what he regards as a kind of sickness, and therefore performs a piece of Dark Magic that would not be possible outside a storybook: he locks away his own heart.

  The resemblance of this action to the creation of a Horcrux has been noted by many writers.

  Although Beedle’s hero is not seeking to avoid death, he is dividing what was clearly not meant to be divided – body and heart, rather than soul – and in doing so, he is falling foul of the first of Adalbert Waffling’s Fundamental Laws of Magic:

  Tamper with the deepest mysteries – the source of life, the essence of self – only if prepared for consequences of the most extreme and dangerous kind.

  And sure enough, in seeking to become super-human this foolhardy young man renders himself inhuman. The heart he has locked away slowly shrivels and grows hair, symbolising his own descent to beasthood. He is finally reduced to a violent animal who takes what he wants by force, and he dies in a futile attempt to regain what is now for ever beyond his reach – a human heart.

  Though somewhat dated, the expression “to have a hairy heart” has passed into everyday wizarding language to describe a cold or unfeeling witch or wizard. My maiden aunt, Honoria, always alleged that she called off her engagement to a wizard in the Improper Use of Magic Office because she discovered in time that “he had a hairy heart”. (It was rumoured, however, that she actually discovered him in the act of fondling some Horklumps,[11] which she found deeply shocking.) More recently, the self-help book The Hairy Heart: A Guide to Wizards Who Won’t Commi[12]t has topped bestseller lists.

  BABBITTY RABITTY AND HER CACKLING STUMP

  A long time ago, in a far-off land, there lived a foolish king who decided that he alone should have the power of magic.

  He therefore commanded the head of his army to form a Brigade of Witch-Hunters, and issued them with a pack of ferocious black hounds. At the same time, the King caused proclamations to be read in every village and town across the land:

  “Wanted by the King, an Instructor in Magic.”

  No tr
ue witch or wizard dared volunteer for the post, for they were all in hiding from the Brigade of Witch-Hunters.

  However, a cunning charlatan with no magical power saw a chance of enriching himself, and arrived at the palace, claiming to be a wizard of enormous skill. The charlatan performed a few simple tricks, which convinced the foolish King of his magical powers, and was immediately appointed Grand Sorcerer in Chief, the King’s Private Magic Master.

  The charlatan bade the King give him a large sack of gold, so that he might purchase wands and other magical necessities. He also requested several large rubies, to be used in the casting of curative charms, and a silver chalice or two, for Babbitty Rabbitty and her Cackling Stump the storing and maturing of potions. All these things the foolish King supplied.

  The charlatan stowed the treasure safely in his own house and returned to the palace grounds.

  He did not know that he was being watched by an old woman who lived in a hovel on the edge of the grounds. Her name was Babbitty, and she was the washerwoman who kept the palace linens soft, fragrant and white. Peeping from behind her drying sheets, Babbitty saw the charlatan snap two twigs from one of the King’s trees and disappear into the palace.

  The charlatan gave one of the twigs to the King and assured him that it was a wand of tremendous power.

  “It will only work, however,” said the charlatan, “when you are worthy of it.”

  Every morning the charlatan and the foolish King walked out into the palace grounds, where they waved their wands and shouted nonsense at the sky. The charlatan was careful to perform more tricks, so that the King remained convinced of his Grand Sorcerer’s skill, and of the power of the wands that had cost so much gold.

  One morning, as the charlatan and the foolish King were twirling their twigs, and hopping in circles, and chanting meaningless rhymes, a loud cackling reached the King’s ears. Babbitty the washerwoman was watching the King and the charlatan from the window of her tiny cottage, and was laughing so hard she soon sank out of sight, too weak to stand.

  “I must look most undignified, to make the old washerwoman laugh so!” said the King. He ceased his hopping and twig twirling, and Babbitty Rabbitty and her Cackling Stump frowned. “I grow weary of practice! When shall I be ready to perform real spells in front of my subjects, Sorcerer?”

  The charlatan tried to soothe his pupil, assuring him that he would soon be capable of astonishing feats of magic, but Babbitty’s cackling had stung the foolish King more than the charlatan knew.

  “Tomorrow,” said the King, “we shall invite our court to watch their King perform magic!”

  The charlatan saw that the time had come to take his treasure and flee.

  “Alas, Your Majesty, it is impossible! I had forgotten to tell Your Majesty that I must set out on a long journey tomorrow –”

  “If you leave this palace without my permission, Sorcerer, my Brigade of Witch-Hunters will hunt you down with their hounds! Tomorrow morning you will assist me to perform magic for the benefit of my lords and ladies, and if anybody laughs at me, I shall have you beheaded!”

  The King stormed back to the palace, leaving the charlatan alone and afraid. Not all his cunning could save him now, for he could not run away, nor could he help the King with magic that neither of them knew.

  Seeking a vent for his fear and his anger, the charlatan approached the window of Babbitty the washerwoman. Peering inside, he saw the little old lady sitting at her table, polishing a wand. In a corner behind her, the King’s sheets were washing themselves in a wooden tub.

  The charlatan understood at once that Babbitty was a true witch, and that she who had given him his awful problem could also solve it.

  “Crone!” roared the charlatan. “Your cackling has cost me dear! If you fail to help me, I shall denounce you as a witch, and it will be you who is torn apart by the King’s hounds!”

  Old Babbitty smiled at the charlatan and assured him that she would do everything in her power to help.

  The charlatan instructed her to conceal herself inside a bush while the King gave his magical display, and to perform the King’s spells for him, without his knowledge. Babbitty agreed to the plan but asked one question.

  “What, sir, if the King attempts a spell Babbitty cannot perform?”

  The charlatan scoffed.

  “Your magic is more than equal to that fool’s imagination,” he assured her, and he retired to the castle, well pleased with his own cleverness.

  The following morning all the lords and ladies of the kingdom assembled in the palace grounds. The King climbed on to a stage in front of them, with the charlatan by his side.

  “I shall firstly make this lady’s hat disappear!” cried the King, pointing his twig at a noble-woman.

  From inside a bush nearby, Babbitty pointed her wand at the hat and caused it to vanish. Great was the astonishment and admiration of the crowd, and loud their applause for the jubilant King.

  “Next, I shall make that horse fly!” cried the King, pointing his twig at his own steed.

  From inside the bush, Babbitty pointed her wand at the horse and it rose high into the air.

  The crowd was still more thrilled and amazed, and they roared their appreciation of their magical King.

  “And now,” said the King, looking all around for an idea; and the Captain of his Brigade of Witch-Hunters ran forwards.

  “Your Majesty,” said the Captain, “this very morning, Sabre died of eating a poisonous toadstool! Bring him back to life, Your Majesty, with your wand!”

  And the Captain heaved on to the stage the lifeless body of the largest of the witch-hunting hounds.

  The foolish King brandished his twig and pointed it at the dead dog. But inside the bush, Babbitty smiled, and did not trouble to lift her wand, for no magic can raise the dead.

  When the dog did not stir, the crowd began first to whisper, and then to laugh. They suspected that the King’s first two feats had been mere tricks after all.

  “Why doesn’t it work?” the King screamed at the charlatan, who bethought himself of the only ruse left to him.

  “There, Your Majesty, there!” he shouted, pointing at the bush where Babbitty sat concealed. “I see her plain, a wicked witch who is blocking your magic with her own evil spells! Seize her, somebody, seize her!”

  Babbitty fled from the bush, and the Brigade of Witch-Hunters set off in pursuit, unleashing their hounds, who bayed for Babbitty’s blood.

  But as she reached a low hedge, the little witch vanished from sight, and when the King, the charlatan and all the courtiers gained the other side, they found the pack of witch-hunting hounds barking and scrabbling around a bent and aged tree.

  “She has turned herself into a tree!” screamed the charlatan and, dreading lest Babbitty turn back into a woman and denounce him, he added,

  “Cut her down, Your Majesty, that is the way to treat evil witches!”

  An axe was brought at once, and the old tree was felled to loud cheers from the courtiers and the charlatan.

  However, as they were making ready to return to the palace, the sound of loud cackling stopped them in their tracks.

  “Fools!” cried Babbitty’s voice from the stump they had left behind.

  “No witch or wizard can be killed by being cut in half! Take the axe, if you do not believe me, and cut the Grand Sorcerer in two!”

  The Captain of the Brigade of Witch-Hunters was eager to make the experiment, but as he raised the axe the charlatan fell to his knees, screaming for mercy and confessing all his wickedness. As he was dragged away to the dungeons, the tree stump cackled more loudly than ever.

  “By cutting a witch in half, you have unleashed a dreadful curse upon your kingdom!” it told the petrified King. “Henceforth, every stroke of harm that you inflict upon my fellow witches and