Once upon a time

Once upon a time in a far country there lived a gargantuan girl and her trusty scorpion. They lived together under the roots of an enormous elm tree just an ell or 2 into the forest at the end of a winding trail of pebbles & nutshells. The girl we shall call Glendenning. Her scorpion's name is Grim. The elm has various names in many languages, but the greenest of these is Galbion, so we'll go with that.

One day, as she was dusting the scorpion's customary lair--a dark moist cavity at about eye-level, far back in the darkest corner of their abode, she thought of a song, and began to sing: dusting is dusty dumb and dirty. Dusting is not derring do. Daily dusting causes worry, caustic dregs and warty, too... The scorpion, Grim, regarded her with a sidewise glance and subtly waved its stinger along with the tune.

Green aisles of ferny fern and mossy moss were beckoning the pair away from homely tasks and down a misty lane into the depths of the mysterious wood. The larder was nearly bare and Grim had pretty well cleaned out all the edible denizens of the loam and leaf cover surrounding Galbion's roots and right out to the drip line. Glendenning enjoyed eating, and so they set off to seek their fortunes and a bit of grub.