The Strange Violin

Many people said that if fairy tales were real, they must have happened in Germany. In fact, Germany really did have a Fairy-Tale Road, and the scenery along it was breathtakingly beautiful, as lovely as something from a fairy tale.

The scenery south of Vienna was beautiful too, though not quite as enchanting as the Fairy-Tale Road.

Yet some said that many fairy tales had actually taken place here. The train's first stop was Giant Dog Town, once home to the wandmaker Gregorovitch. To the west of the town lay a forest, and Gregorovitch often went into the mountains to look for wood suitable for making wands.

No one knew how Giant Dog Town had gotten its name, but there was a legend that an exceptionally sturdy castle had once stood nearby. A wizard skilled in Dark magic had rescued a princess, but the king had no intention of giving his daughter to him in marriage.

The king had assumed that with the castle's strong defenses, there was nothing the Dark wizard could do, even if he knew Dark magic.

It was not until the army of the dead arrived that he realized how wrong he had been. Worse still, no "White wizard" came along to meddle.

At the time, anti-wizard sentiment ran high. Helga Hufflepuff, Salazar Slytherin, Rowena Ravenclaw, and Godric Gryffindor had all once been tied to stakes.

Who would be bored enough to save Muggles who, whipped into a frenzy by religious fanaticism, screamed for wizards to be burned to death?

That castle had long since been razed to the ground. Perhaps a few ruined walls still testified to the truth of that legend. As for whether the Dark wizard who had seized the princess by force lived happily ever after, no one knew.

Giant Dog Town