Dear Storyteller (OUAF 2019)

[desertvixen]

So I really love this challenge. It gives me a chance to step outside the sort of thing I normally write, and it gives me the opportunity to get some nice ghost encounter stories and/or a mythology fix.

General: Try not to make everything too dark - some darkness in the progress of the story is fine, but don't end it that way. Bittersweet or slightly creepy "do I want to turn on the lights before I go up" is always good.

I also love crossovers. If you want to smash a few of the prompts together, I would be A-OK with that. I'd also be cool with you dragging in characters from other fandoms (Nancy Drew and the Hardy Boys investigate the Ocean-Born Mary house or encounter "Room for One More"? Go for it.)

If you want more about my writing likes/dislikes, check out the "dear Yuletide writer" tag. My general writing preferences are here.

I'm good with sexual activity that fits with the characters and situation.  Please no extreme violence/gore/cruelty to animals.

 

Ocean-Born Mary (Ghost Story) 

Ocean-Born Mary

House's Current Owner (Ocean-Born Mary)

Don Pedro (Ocean-Born Mary)

I'd be interested in how Mary and Don Pedro meet up again, when he marries her.

But I'd also be interested in how Don Pedro's mother reacts when she about her little namesake. Or maybe she urges her son to go find her.

But I'd also also be interested in a story where people move into Ocean-Born Mary's house and interact with the ghosts... especially if they do the research to find out about the story.

I'd love to see Mary and Don Pedro interact. Perhaps there is a picture of the rare silk dress she is married in - or perhaps there is enough held back to marry Don Pedro in?

The version of the story told in C.B. Colby's Strangely Enough invokes the possibility that Ocean-Born Mary still haunts the place - you can roll with this.  It was my first introduction to the story, and the one that stays with me.

Or maybe a young couple decides to renovate or restore? Do they find the treasure? Does the ghost help?  Feel free to bring in Nancy Drew or Poirot or Miss Marple.

 

The Cat Who Became a Queen (Indian folk tale) 

Mother Cat (Cat Who Became A Queen)

Cat Who Becomes A Queen (Cat Who Became A Queen)

Was there something special about the mother cat and/or kitten from the start? Does the mother cat live a good (possibly enchanted) life? Does the cat-turned-queen come back to see her mother? I am also interested in how the grateful wives treat the cat afterwards.

I don’t have much to add.  I just found this story last year when I was looking for another source, and now I need it.  This one doesn't cross well with other characters/stories (unless you want to mix in more fairy tale cats).

 

Theseus and the Minotaur (Parallel Lives - Plutarch) 

Ariadne (Theseus and the Minotaur)

Seven Sacrificial Maidens (Theseus and the Minotaur)

Theseus may be the Hot Young Hero, but he's also kind of stupid and malicious (witness forgetting the black sails are up, and Medea). I'd love to see Ariadne help out the seven maidens rather than the handsome (kind of stupid) prince? Feel free to make the maidens somehow tied to the seven young men - friends/siblings/etc - but interested here in Ariadne helping the maidens out. Maybe she knows one of them?

To go along with some of the other requests, feel free to involve a cat.  I love Ariadne, but Theseus isn't really a huge prize.  I’m good with modern AUs as well – or maybe combine this with the Fall of Atlantis?

 

The Fall of Atlantis - Timaeus by Plato 

Tell me a myth of Atlantis and its royal house, in a story that might "inspire" Greek myth. Surely Atlantis had its own Cassandra, or Penelope, or Ariadne, or Demeter?

Pretty much what it says on the tin.  I asked for this the first year, and while I wrote an awesome story for it, I never got one.  I’d be down for a framing story with archaeologists or a professor lecturing…