Once upon a time there was a little Mudwomp.  A nice little guy, 
but who would transform into a Dread Grisrat under the influence 
of the Full Moon, and go berserk, killing and maiming 
indiscriminately.  This always made him very sad afterwards, 
when he saw what he had done.

Someone suggested that perhaps the little Mudwomp had a curse 
upon him, and that he go see the Witch who lived in the 
haunted house just outside town, who was good at curses, and be 
cured of it.  It sounded like a good idea, but he kept putting it 
off and putting it off until one day after the Full Moon had 
passed he found that he had murdered, slaughtered, torn, rent, 
slain and tortured to death every person (I take the liberty of 
considering Blists, Dorqueloobs, Mudworps and Erpies as persons) 
he knew in the town, and was now entirely by himself.  So, 
broken-hearted, he decided to go to the Witch to see what kind 
of cure she might be able to offer for his problem.

She was a Witch all right, but not old, nor ugly.  Instead 
voluptuous and sensuous, a beautiful blue-haired temptress 
and obvious trouble for any man who came along, perhaps a bit of 
a Wicked Witch.  But of course Mudwomps are not men, and he was 
not especially affected by her beauty.  She was a bit miffed
about that, but listened to his problem.

Indeed, she said, there is a cure.  But there would be a price: 
he must stay with her and serve her faithfully.  That was all 
right with our little Mudwomp, since there was no one left in 
town anyway and he was feeling lonely.  So they agreed to do it.

She brewed up a brew: heart of Water, eye of Stone, wing of Slug, 
tooth of Clam, over which she chanted ritual words from the Braf-
Lycorthyp, the Holy Book of Mud.  The little Mudwomp was 
hallucinating like crazy from the herbs she had given him.  The 
magic went to work.

"Dissolve the curse that lies upon this being's brow," the witch 
cried out to the local gods, "make him free of his sorrow!"  And 
whaddya know, he changed into a tall handsome godlike Prince.

Who was horny and hit it right off with the Witch and they lost 
themselves in passion for most of a month, not noticing when the 
moon rose in the sky--until it was Full Moon.

Suddenly the handsome Prince transformed into an Especially Dread 
Gisrat, berserker incarnate, bit the Witch's tit, and ran off 
down the road howling madly.  When he came to the great city of 
Rasparanez he crushed and cracked heads, he bent and broke backs, 
he wreaked havoc and slew and slew and slew.  Until he had wiped 
out that whole city of 3 million inhabitants.  Whew!

But the cure HAD been effective: for now whenever he changed back 
to his proper form (whatever that was), he no longer felt sorry 
at all for what he had done.

3R