The Boy Who Left Home to Learn Fear
A young man who felt no fear at all, three nights alone in a haunted castle, and the bucket of little fish that finally taught him to shudder
Page 1
Once there was a father who had two sons. The elder was clever and careful, and people spoke well of him. The younger could learn nothing at all, and whenever there was dangerous or dreadful work to be done, he was the one who did it, because he said plainly that he did not know what fear was. His father was ashamed of this. Whenever the wind howled at the chimney, or a traveler told a ghost story by the fire, the younger son only shrugged and said he wished something would make him shudder, just once, so he would know what everybody else was talking about. His father thought and thought about how such a strange, fearless boy could ever be taught anything useful, and at last he remembered the sexton down at the church, who was said to know how to frighten anyone in the world.
Page 2
The father arranged a test. He told his son that the church bell had to be rung at midnight, and that he would surely learn what fear was if he climbed the dark tower alone. What the boy didn't know was that his father had asked the church sexton to dress in a white sheet and stand on the stairs to frighten him. The boy climbed up with his lantern, calm as ever, and rang the bell. Coming back down, he found a silent white shape blocking the stairs. 'Speak, or go your way,' he said. The shape said nothing and only stood there. The boy, annoyed rather than afraid, gave it a shove, and it went tumbling down several steps before scrambling up and bolting into the night, badly shaken but unhurt. When his father heard what had happened, he was mortified. He gave his son fifty gold coins and told him to go out into the world, for he could no longer bear to have such a son at home.
Page 3
The boy set off down the road, telling everyone he met that he only wished he could learn to shudder. One evening a traveler walked beside him and, hearing this, led him to a lonely crossroads where seven men hung from a gallows, swaying gently in the night wind. 'Sit here until midnight,' the traveler said, 'and you will surely learn fear,' and then he went on his way. The boy built a small fire at the foot of the gallows to keep warm and sat down to wait. As the night grew colder the wind swung the seven figures to and fro, and sparks from his fire caught at the hem of their clothes. Not wanting to see their clothes spoiled, the boy climbed up, untied them one by one, and set them carefully by the fire to warm. But they did not move, and their clothes only caught again. Losing patience, he said if they would not take care of themselves he would simply have to hang them back up — and he did, then walked on, still waiting to feel afraid.
Page 4
Still unafraid, the boy came at last to a town and stopped at an inn for the night. Sitting by the fire, he said aloud, as he always did, that he wished something would teach him to shudder. The other travelers at the table fell quiet and looked at each other. One of them said there was a way, if he truly meant it: not far off stood an old haunted castle, full of treasure, which no one had ever managed to guard for three nights running. Many brave men had gone in and never come out again. The king had promised his own daughter in marriage, and the whole treasure besides, to anyone who could survive three nights inside it. The boy's eyes lit up at once. This, he thought, sounded exactly like the sort of thing that might finally teach him fear, and he resolved then and there to go to the king the very next morning and ask for his chance.
Page 5
The next morning the boy went straight to the king and said he wished to spend three nights in the haunted castle, exactly as the proclamation promised. The king studied him closely and warned that better men than he had tried and never been seen again, but the boy only said that he was not afraid of anything, and that was rather the whole problem. Seeing he could not be talked out of it, the king agreed, and the boy asked for just three things to be carried in with him: a good fire, a turner's lathe, and a cutting-board with a sharp knife. The princess, who had watched silently from beside her father's throne, looked at the plain, calm young man in front of her and hoped, more than she had hoped for any of the others, that he might actually come out again. That evening the boy walked up to the castle gate with his three requested things and went inside alone, and the great doors were shut behind him.
Page 6
Inside, the castle was vast, cold and silent, full of dust and cobwebs. The boy found the great hall, built his fire exactly where he'd asked, and set out his lathe and his cutting-board with its knife, then sat down to warm himself. Toward midnight he heard a scrabbling noise, and two enormous black cats crept out of the dark, eyes glowing, asking to warm themselves at his fire too. He let them come close — and then more cats came, and great black dogs besides, all of them dragging heavy iron chains that glowed dull red as if just pulled from a forge, snarling and crowding around him and his fire. The boy showed no fear at all. He stood his ground, pushed back hard against the snapping, growling pack, and drove every last one of them howling back into the darkness they'd come from, until the hall was quiet again. Then, tired out, he lay down on a strange bed standing against the wall — and the bed at once began rolling and flying wildly around the whole room by itself. The boy simply let it carry him, and in time it stopped, and he slept soundly until morning.
Page 7
The next morning the king sent a servant to see if the boy was still alive, and was amazed to find him sitting calmly by his fire, perfectly fine, and still complaining that he hadn't learned fear yet. That night the boy built his fire again, this time in the long gallery upstairs, and settled in to wait. Partway through the night, half of a dead man came tumbling down the chimney and landed with a thump. 'That's no use to me,' the boy said, 'I want the other half too' — and a moment later the second half came down as well. He fitted the two halves together by the fire, and at once a strange, glowing shape rose up and challenged him to a game of ninepins. The boy agreed cheerfully, turned a few uneven pieces smooth on his lathe so the game would be fair, and played on calmly late into the night, enjoying himself rather than fearing any of it, until the game ended and the strange shape melted back into the shadows.
Page 8
On the third night the boy built his fire in the castle's old banqueting room, under a long table once set for grand feasts and now thick with dust. Before midnight six men came in carrying a coffin between them and set it down without a word before vanishing again. Thinking it must hold some poor cold relative, the boy lifted the lid, found a still, silent man inside, and carried him to the fire to warm him up properly, rubbing his hands and feet as he would for anyone chilled through. The man stirred, opened his eyes — and lunged at the boy, gripping him tightly and struggling hard to overpower him. But the boy was strong and steady, and he wrestled the man firmly back into the coffin, hammered the lid shut tight, and had it carried down to the river and set adrift. 'Go find your rest somewhere else,' he said, watching it float away, 'for you'll get none here.' And with that done, he still had not learned to shudder.
Page 9
Just as the boy settled by his fire again, an old man with a long white beard down past his waist stepped out of the shadows and said that now, finally, he would have to fight for his life. The boy said he was ready for that too, and the two of them wrestled hard across the stone floor until the boy, strong and steady as ever, threw the old man down and held him there. Beaten, the old man begged to be let up and said he would show the boy something worth far more than a fight. He led him down into the castle's deepest cellar, where three great chests stood full of gold and silver. 'One part is for the poor,' the old man said, 'one part is for the king, and the last part is yours alone.' As he said it, the long curse on the castle lifted at last, and the old man simply faded away into the dark, leaving the boy alone with the fire's ordinary, quiet warmth and the treasure glittering beside him.
Page 10
When the three nights were over, the king came himself, certain he would find nothing but a cold, empty hall — and instead found the boy sitting cheerfully by his fire, alive and well, with the castle's old curse broken and its treasure recovered. True to his word, the king gave one part of the gold to the poor, one part kept for himself, and the rest to the boy, and the boy married the princess just as he had promised. He was happier than he had ever been, and yet, even now, he still sighed that he had never once learned to shudder. His new wife decided to cure him of it herself. One night, while he slept soundly in their own bedchamber, she had a servant quietly pour a bucket of cold water full of little fish straight over him in his bed. He woke with a start as the small fish flapped and flicked against his skin, and at last, for the very first time in his life, he truly shuddered. 'Oh, what is this feeling, dear wife?' he cried. 'Now, at last, I know what it is to be afraid!'
About this story
- Audience: kids (ages 6–12)
Read Wonder Tales on your phone
Wonder Tales is available on Android. Get Wonder Tales on Google Play.