…a day came when the Golden Bird led her beggars, hungry and footsore, to a grand Harvest Festival. A Nobleman held the festival each year in a meadow that lay between his town on one side and, on the other, the ruins of an ancient castle built by Giants.
There once was a Dancing Bear who followed after the baneful Ring in her nose.
There once was a Bear-Boy whose job it was to keep a Dancing Bear and make money from her antics.
There once was a Lively beggar-girl, dirty and heedless and gay in the face of misfortune.
“There once was …” properly begins a story about mortals because mortals have but once to act it. This story is about Immortals.
There once was a rich Merchant whose Wife delivered to him a Daughter, and then the Wife died.