Once, long ago, there were two girls playing on a beach. Their names were Amelia and Opal and they were best friends. The girls were playing with eagle and whale bones that covered the shoreline. This area was very dangerous and strange unexplained events were known to happen here. Out of the sky, a huge eagle flew across the ocean. Opal playfully yelled that she wanted an eagle as her husband. Ameila joined in and said she wanted a whale as her husband.

Amelia looked up and saw the eagle coming in her direction. All of a sudden, he dove under her legs and carried her up to his nest on a cliff. Amelia was completely trapped.




Opal was abducted next. She was so stunned by Amelia's abduction that she did not even see the whale coming. The whale swam to Opal and threw her on on his back. He put a spell on her ears and eyes so she would be able to see and hear underwater. He took her all the way down to the bottom of the sea where he tied a rope to her leg so she could not escape. Like Amelia, Opal was trapped.

The eagle went out every day to hunt for food for himself and Amelia. Amelia noticed the eagle shed a lot of feathers each day. She got an idea to gather as many feathers as she could to form a rope. One day, when the eagle was off hunting, she measured the length of the feathers and saw that it reached the ground. She carefully tied the feathers to a rock and made her way down. When she reached the ground she saw an old wooden boat. She got in the boat and paddled her way home. She never saw the eagle again.

Days later, when the eagle was searching for Amelia, he was shot by a hunter. His body fell into the sea, and floated twenty feet above Opal's head. Weeks later, the eagle's bones washed up on the shore.

Unlike Amelia, Opal did not have an easy escape. Luckily, two men on the beach saw Opal  being taken by the large whale. They quickly started building a boat that would outswim the whale. They soon realized they could not build a boat fast enough. Just when the two men were about to give up, a beautiful white dove briefly landed on their boat and then flew away. The men had heard of magical white birds before that bring good luck. The men decided to test their boat one last time to see if  the bird had some effect on it. Once they got the boat out onto the water they realized the boat could outswim a fish! They went quickly in the direction where they had last seen the whale.

Meanwhile, Opal had been trying to loosen the rope that was tied to her leg. After a couple days of chewing and twisting the rope, she had finally freed herself! The whale left her alone for an hour to hunt every day. She waited till the whale left and then frantically swam up from the depths of the sea. She was overwhelmed with joy when she was able to see  the sky again. She heard men calling out to her and she swam to them. The men took her in their boat and paddled away quickly.

Unfortunately, the whale returned seconds after Opal escaped. He followed her voice and found the boat she was on. The furious whale began attacking the boat. He smashed into it as hard as he could. The men were rowing as quickly as their arms could push. Opal threw her jacket in the water to distract the whale. The whale fell for this trick and was briefly distracted, but he caught up with them once again. The boat was begining to fill with water and pieces of wood were breaking off. In the few seconds that she had, Opal regretted wishing for a whale as her husband. She realized she brought this situation on herself and it wouldn't be fair if the two men that tried to save her, died. When the boat broke in half Opal yelled to the whale, "Don't kill the men. Take me instead. This is my fault."

The whale agreed and kept Opal at the bottom of the sea with him forever.

***

"So I hope everyone learned the lesson in my final story. Be careful what you wish for. Don't make wishes lightly because you never know who is listening! We are able to learn the lessons of Opal and Amelia.  Unfortuantly Opal had a more tragic ending than Amelia. Amelia and Opal made mistakes similar to other stories I have told tonight. For exmpale, Ithica, from the Swan-Maidens story, died as a result of not trusting her sons. In the story of the Fox Woman, Cloud, lost the only person who would take care of him because of his ignorance and ungratefulness. In the story of Sedna, both Sedna and her father die because of their terrible actions and selfishenss. I hope you have learned important lessons from all of these people. We can learn a lot from their mistakes."

Author's Note: I stuck to the same story line but I made some big changes to the end of the story. First, I gave the two girls names. It is important to know that the girl's brought the situation on themselves by wishing to be marry wild animals. In my story, the two men that saw Opal's abduction attempted to save her but were unsuccesful.  In the original story, Opal was saved by her two brothers. Opal's brothers built a boat three different times before it was sturdy enough. I wanted to provide more of an explanation as to how the men got their boat to go so fast. I added the magical, white dove that gave the boat the speed it needed. In the original story, Opal happens to be wearing three coats that she throws in the water to distract the whale. The distraction takes up so much time that they are able to get ashore. I thought one jacket seemed more realistic. At the end of the orignial story the whale turns into whale bone when he reaches the shore. I made Opal stay with the whale to reinforce the idea of being careful what you wish for.

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Bibliography:
Book Title: Tales of North American Indians
Author: Stith Thompson
Story Title: The Whale and Eagle Husbands
Year Published: 1929
Web Addres: Sacred Texts

Image Information:
Whale. Websource: Killer Whale facts
Eagle. Websource: Flicker.com

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