A creature was born in a large farmhouse to a screaming mother wrought in the pains of maternal labor. The midwife gasped at the mangled thing before her, it was a whining, kicking, deformed little monster of appalling proportions, with a face so deformed and misshapen it was hardly a face. When the mother opened her eyes to glimpse the visage of her newly born baby, she elapsed into a fit of terror and shock, screaming at the sight of the creature wrapped in her own blood and joined to her with its coiling umbilical cord. When the father entered to see his new son, fear gripped him and he ran to his shrieking wife and cut their bonds himself to free her from this monstrosity.
Out of their grief caused by this failed beast they called a priest to them to ask for his advice. The priest entered the abode in his stately robes, wearing a humble crucifix of wood round his neck and carrying a long wooden staff of unpolished applewood. The moment he saw the tiny monster, still naked, body caked with congealed blood and cradled in the bed where he was born, he immediately exploded in a fiery outrage.
"This is a changeling!" He shouted furiously. "A demon child of the blasphemous people of the hills! The elves have stolen your child while still nestled in his mother's womb and replaced him with this abomination to be nurtured by your blood! This creature will bring you shame and ill fortune if not banished back to where he came from!"
The couple wept at this news, thinking that they shall never again see their true child, cursing the Hill People, those hateful little elven demons that took their baby and gave them this monstrosity. "Oh father, what shall we do?" They asked the priest.
The Clergyman took pity on them and gave them these instructions, "There is still a way to regain your child, and that is to beat this monster until he leaves and returns your true child. However, you may only cause him harm, for when he dies before your son is brought home, the elves will not relent and will never return that which they have stolen." With that the priest left, bestowing his blessings on the farmers.
The father immediately ran over to the changeling and slapped its tiny deformed face until the cries grew louder and its cheeks began to bruise. Then they washed it and fed it the milk of goats for they wanted to preserve the creature until its kin came back with their son. The mother would not allow the changeling to partake in her milk for she could not possibly stand the prospect of holding it close to her to drink from her breast.
The father made it a little nursery in the stables, more of a cage to subdue it, positioned amidst the filth and stench of the animals that reside there. There is where the changeling is to be kept.
Seven years passed and the changeling was thrown back into his stable, crying and blubbering for mercy after a particularly nasty bout of beating. It was the first day of winter after a snowy blizzard, and he had snuck out of his stable to sit by the fire inside his parent's house.
All he wanted was to keep warm and taste some of the lovely rye bread that the farmer's wife had baked, but he was caught and was beaten mercilessly for it. They were always demanding him to return their son, always hurting him, always turning on him with venom in their words. Many times has the mother conceived and given birth to a dead child, and then he would be beaten once more, blaming him for her miscarriages.
The changeling sat hunched on his little bed of straw, pulling his rags of clothing closer, trying to keep out the bitter cold. Darkness gathered around him, and he stared at his deformed limbs resentfully. He had never even been named since they were too full of shame to name him. They addressed him simply as the "changeling", the "monster", the "abomination" and other atrocious things full of spite and hatred.
Sometimes when he was out in the fields, conversing with himself and playing with the pebbles he found there, children would throw sticks and stones at him, cursing him, making him wail. He would then run off to seek protection from his father, who would then slap him and kick him back into the stable, out of his sight and the sight of others. Women hid their children from him, and men would chase after him, shunning him away from society.
There was only one thing that the changeling loved, and that was the stories the traveling monks would teach about the Kingdom of God. When one of them calls for the villagers to listen to his words and turn to the Light, he would listen in, out of sight in some hay stack or behind a wall. The stories fascinated him, tales of God and the angels, of Jesus and his disciples, of miracles that raised the dead and healed the lame, lepers once shunned from society, now proudly walking among them after being touched by Christ's divine power.
He deeply wished that Christ would find him, and heal whatever deformity plagued his body. Yet his father had said that he was the Devil's child, a blasphemous creature that would only return to the inky blackness of Hell. Once again he found himself staring at his misshapen appendages, touching his bulky and bruised face, sadness overcoming him. The monks had said that we should seek out Christ and turn to the light. And that is what he would do.
That wintry evening that the changeling decided to leave in search for Christ was the day the farmer's wife conceived. It promised to be a healthy child and after nine months she will give birth to a beautiful baby boy, rosy and delicate and full of love.
The changeling sat huddled beneath a tree, the cruel winds howling around him, his frail distorted body half buried in the snow. Tears were falling from his mismatched eyes, his lip blue with the snow clinging onto his features. He wanted to call out for his parents to save him and keep him warm, but couldn't. He had no mother or father... There was no one in this dark wicked world who loved him. He sat and lifted a prayer to the only one who would care. And there, high up in the cloudy heavens, his prayer was heard and the angel descended and swept the changeling's soul to rejoin the Children of God. For that is what he was: a child.