The little peasant girl.

Long long ago, lived a little peasant girl.  The little girl lost her parents and was taken in by one of the village families.  The family wasn't that nice to the little girl, since she was the oldest she was often forced to watch the families little children, feed them and clean up after them.  Many times the Master of the house would call the little girl terrible names like "You wrenched little ogre" or say mean things to her like "Your descendants are dirty ugly trolls and you will never be anything more then a slave girl".  Anytime the family's children did wrong the girl would be blamed and punished.  The little girl hated living with the family, but was thankful she wasn't sleeping in the muddy stables out back, this was something the family's grandmama reminded her of almost daily.

The little girl often cried and prayed for the death shadow to come and take her away, the way he did with her mother, but he never did come.

One day, the little girl was outside cleaning the muddy stables, praying her prayer to the death shadow, when she saw something twinkling in the corner.  She dropped her broom and went towards the sparkling small lights, as she got closer she saw it was a pixie stuck in the mud.  The little girl felt sorry for the pixie, no one should be stuck in this horrible place she thought, and carefully freed the pixie.  The pixie spun around in happy little circles and danced around the little girl.  "Thank you thank you" whispered the pixie.  "I am magical and can share some magic with you" the pixie said to the little girl. "A NEW FAMILY" the little girl exciting told the pixie, "It's what I want the most" whisper the little girl.  The pixie frowned, and replied "I can not do such big magic, I am just a little creature with little magic", and then the pixie had an idea "I can make your family bigger!"... "NOOOOOO" cried the girl, "Please no, I can't take more mean people in this family, I just can't", but it was too late the pixie had waved her little hands and poofed - disappeared.

Sure enough the little girls family had grown, she now had an Aunt, and Uncle and some cousins.  These family members were nothing like the the Master, Lady, or Grandmama... They were kind, nice, and caring.

Even though the little girl still had to endure many years of abuse from the family, she had a safe place to go, and be happy at, people who loved her and made her feel like she was somebody.

--Last night my Aunt Ellen died, she was a special lady and I loved/love her.  Even though I hadn't seen her in years, she held/holds a very special place in my heart, she made my life a little better and she she made me a little better, to her I wasn't her foster niece, I was just her niece.