Week 10 Storytelling: Regret

(The Wife Who Lied)

One day a woman was in her village, but she was not satisfied with how her husband was treating her. He was gone for long hours hunting and she would get lonely. So, she thought of a way to fix her situation. She could not see things getting any better, so she went to her original tribe. 

She told them, "My husband has abused me physically and verbally." 

The men of the tribe then went to go find her husband's tribe. They traveled for a long time through the snow. Men were getting sick. They finally made it to the tribe though. They found only women there. The men killed every single woman to send a message to the woman's husband. When the husband's tribe got back and found all of the women slaughtered, they geared up to go find the perpetrators. 

The husband's tribe traveled back to his wife's native tribe. The lined the front of the wife's camp in the morning until the whole camp woke and saw the husband's tribe. 

The husband said, "Why did you kill all of our women?" 

The wife's tribe's leader responds, "Because this woman's husband abused her."

The husband replied, "I am her husband. This is not true. Do you see any physical marks on her that show I hurt her?" 

The wife's tribe checked her body and found no trace of abuse. 

Her tribe's leader says to her, "You lied!" 

The wife cowers in fear. 

The leader frustrated asks the husband what he wants. The husband responds, "I want her gone from both tribe's. She must fend for herself now in everything. "

Both tribe's send her into the wilderness. The woman was never seen again. 

Now, the tribe's stayed together that night and enjoyed one another's company at a huge bonfire. They danced and prayed to their spirits for healing. They started eating and the husband sees something. He looks in the woods and sees his ex-wife staring at the bonfire. The husband could not find forgiveness in his heart. The whole camp went to sleep. 

The next morning they woke they saw a totem pole that sends the message "I am sorry, and I know I deserve this sentence after what I've done. Please just never forget me. I am on my own now."

The camp knew this had to be a supernatural power because no one could lift, much less, make a totem pole in one night. So, they did remember the husband's ex-wife as a message to never act in the manner she did. 

Author's Note: The Wife Who Lied I wrote in third person narration to give more detail and description to the story. My main goal was to make the story's ending not so gruesome. 

In the original, the wife goes to her native tribe's camp and lies to them about how she is being treated. Her tribe then goes and kills all of her past tribe's women. Next, they kill everyone else at her old camp. Her native tribe finds out she lied though after all of that and kills her. 

In my story, the woman goes to her native tribe and she lies differently. She says her husband is treating poorly. So, her native tribe then goes and kills all of the women in her past tribe. Her husband's tribe then goes to attack his wife's native tribe where it is discovered that he did not abuse her in front of the whole tribe. The wife then is exiled from each tribe. Supernatural powers help her and she makes a totem pole that both tribes wake up to one morning. The message on the pole serves as a reminder of how not to act within the tribe. The story then ends. 

Bibliography: The Wife Who Lied, Eskimo Folk-Tales by Knad Rasmussen (1921)