Apple Farmer's Daughter: High Fantasy

The sophistry was the thing that got to her the most. She was a straightforward girl, raised by apple farmers and used to making her own way. When people teased her, she threw apples at them. If she thought they were mean, it was rotten apples. If she was truly afraid of them, she threw hard green apples that could make a grown man pause and run away. As she walked up the main aisle of the court, feeling the heavy embroidery of her skirts dragging behind her, she wished that she had thrown a rotten apple at the fortune teller who'd come by to visit and charmed and wheedled her way into the inn where she had happened to be delivering a bushel of apples to be made into tarts. Or at least, she wished that she had not allowed herself to be cozened into having her hand read by a hag that, now she had time to think on it--

Inspiration: "Sophistry"
Story Potential: High.
Notes: I like the fish-out-of-water stories, yes, I do. Maybe "heir raised in secrecy" story, but no--I think something more interesting than that, though I'm not sure what yet.

Gold Coins for Eyes: Fantasy

The bright shine of her eyes was what made him rein his horse closer to the coach. He wasn't a dishonorable man, as highwaymen went--he'd no interest in the virtue or humiliation of the passengers. He was only after their bright gold. But her eyes lured him in. in the dark of the coach they shone like gold coins themselves, so that he was tempted to reach out and pluck them out so that he could tuck them away in his pouch. It was a passing fancy, of course. He wasn't one for plucking eyes out, either. And still, he was drawn to the gold of her eyes and the way that she sat, so still, her gloved hands motionless on her lap. "Take off the gloves," he demanded, unsure--

Inspiration: "bright" "brigand"
Story Potential: Medium-high
Notes: A variation on the Midas touch/spinning-straw-into-gold story. Probably some romance in it, too, but not, I think, with him. A son, maybe, that he loves and that is kept ignorant of the girl's nature. Tragedy ensues, of course, and then redemption....