The tales Barrayarans told each other included the following: * Folk tales featured the Baba Yaga, who ate bad children, traveled in a magic flying mortar, and who at least once ground her enemies’ bones in said mortar. * Another tale told of a mutant who could not be killed, because he hid his heart in a box on a secret island far from his fortress. * There were old tales where the count gave an unsuitable suitor three impossible tasks. * Folk tales generally ended with the Count’s daughter getting married; the Princess’s mother always died young. * Vorthalia the Bold and the Thicket of Thorns. * Vorthalia the Bold and the search for Emperor Xian Vorbarra’s lost scepter * Vorthalia the Loyal. * Witch’s name-day gift, aka Witch’s christening gift.