PRINCESS BEAST (3 page)

"I know," Rune pats Beauty's back.  "It's so moving."

Beauty dabs her eyes and says, "Go on, dear, and tell me more."

 "Well, Hans said: “Forgive me, I was overcome my the meauty of your foice sufficient to forget my manners.  I'm Hans the Hedgehog.”  The morning flew by under the black oak with Hans playing his pipes and me singing his songs.  He asked if I'd come again the next day, and I said I would.  And because I was forbidden to go, it seemed all the more exciting.  I'm sorry, Mom, but that's the truth."

Beauty knits her brow.  "I want you to be honest with me, but I do wish you could have been truthful sooner."

"Creechy, I was too confused. I didn't know who I was or what I thought.  I wondered about my place in the universe; what is my destiny?  During those weeks Hans and I met, I was happy one minute and sad the next.  I was shy and bold, nervous and calm, sleepless and tired."

Rune clasps her hands over her heart. "His songs were amazing.  All the mixed up feelings I couldn't express, he had already written, like: Lonely Only Me; Wind In My Ears And Snow In My Soul; Hedgehog Fog; These Spines Are Fine; Curl Up In A Ball And The World Can't Hurt You.  Finally, I had a friend, someone who really understood me; someone my own age to talk to."

She has developed a flair for the dramatic, Beauty thinks.  The niggling suspicion that Runyon's personality traits are emerging worries her, but she quickly dismisses the thought. No child of the cowardly Runyon would bite a beast and bloody a prince. "Has Hans told you that he loves you?" Beauty asks.

"Not in those words, but in many ways," Rune whines.  "We were a duet.  Hans said I was smart as a whip and cute as a button, that my smile was beguiling and my voice angelic.  He kissed my forehead and cheek many times. He said one day we’d tour Grimm Land and perform for peasants and royals alike.  I was so excited imagining the wondrous places beyond this cave I would finally see for myself as Han’s wife.  Would he say those things if he didn't love me?" 

"There are degrees of love," Beauty replies.

 "A month ago, Hans went to three kingdoms to see if any were in need of musicians.  I missed him so much that I couldn't even sing.  I felt as if I'd fallen from a tree and knocked the wind out of my lungs."  Rune heaves a sigh and hangs her head.

"When Hans came back, he didn't want me around as much.  He said I was a distraction from his work on new songs and that he'd pin a red flag on the oak when he was ready to practice.  Every morning, I'd wake and think,
Today is the day I'll see a red flag on the black oak
.   Each day, my hopes were dashed.  The first week, I stayed well back from the tree.  The second week I went closer and crept up below the branches to see if he was writing in the treetop; he wasn't.  Two days ago, I decided to stay until nightfall; I just needed to see him, but he didn't come home.  The same thing happened last night.  Then tonight . . .”  Rune's voice cracks and tears well around her hazel orbs.

“ . . . I was hiding behind a mulberry bush when Hans rode in on a spotted mare.  I wanted to run to him, but I waited, thinking that any minute he'd pin a red flag to the tree.  The minutes turned into an hour with Hans watching the south road and me watching Hans.  It was awful.  If I didn't talk to him, I'd die.  So, I took a deep breath and was about to step out when I heard the clatter of wheels.  A carriage drawn by four white horses appeared on the south road and came to a stop alongside the oak.  Hans hurried to the carriage door, opened it, and a princess stepped out." 

Rune snuffles and wipes her nose with the back of her hand.  "Mama, I felt so strange when I saw her.  I've never seen a real human girl, just pictures in books.  It seemed that I knew her, and that she knew me.  I wanted to call to her or sing.  I felt she would recognize my voice and answer.  For a moment, I didn't know which one I wanted to run to more, Hans or the princess.  That doesn't make sense, does it?" 

Beauty's skin prickles with apprehension and she shakes her head.

"Creechy, Hans held onto her white hand like it was a baby dove, and he said:
Darling Princess Greta, I knew you would come
.   She smiled, a forced smile, Mom.  She could barely contain her disgust; she fairly shook with it.  Then Hans said
: For your obedience to your father and because of your pure heart, I can now shed this beastly exterior, this form I loath, and become Prince Hans once more
."  Rune moans and sounds three glottal clicks.

Beauty's mind reels, remembering the very moment, many years ago, when she was the maiden facing a beast.  She hugs Rune tight.  "Tell me the rest."

"Oh, Mommy,” Rune whispers, her pupils contracting to pin points.  "He grabbed his hedgehog skin at the waist, pulled it over his head, and dropped it to the ground.  I thought I was going to vomit.  Underneath, his top half was as human as his bottom half.  He grew about three feet, and his chest and arms filled with muscles.  The hair on his head was black as a crow and his eyes were blue as Lake Leda.  Princess Greta sure changed in a hurry.  She curled around him like Celia the Snake on a May pole, and she said:
Dearest Hans, let us leave at once for my father's palace.  The bans will be announced, and we can marry on Christmas day and live happily ever after in your kingdom
.  Then Hans kissed her."  Rune sniffles and clicks.

"I should have known that at your age . . .” Beauty trails off
.  Why didn't I foresee this?  I pushed it to the back of my brain, that's why!  Not wanting to think about what would happen when my daughter grew old enough to feel the stirrings of desire; that one day she may want to become a mother and with all the complications involving the beast spell . .
.  "What happened next?"

"I dashed out from behind the bush and confronted Hans.  I was really mad!  I picked up his skin and told him to put it back on, to get his bagpipes and let's hit the road.  He looked at me as if I was something smelly he'd stepped in.  Then he just turned, took Greta’s arm in his and started walking toward the carriage. 

"I couldn't stand it.  I hated Princess Greta.  I snatched the gold crown off her head and tore the satin gown from her body." 

Rune's voice carries a vindictiveness that makes Beauty wince.  She can well imagine how bewildered and frightened Greta must have been, and she is ashamed of Rune's behavior.

"Greta fainted on the spot," Rune grumbles.  "The coachman leapt from his seat and covered her with his cloak.  As he was putting her inside the carriage, Hans screwed up his face and snarled at me
: Go away, Rune.  Because I have cared deeply for you, I'll forgive you, but I never want to lay eyes on you again
." 

Beauty hears Rune's fangs grinding together.

"I wasn't about to leave without giving him something to remember me by.  I slapped him across that stupid false face.  Not any harder than when I play tag with Bobby the Badger.  Human skin is really fragile.  He bled a lot.  I felt bad, so I picked up the dress and held it to his face.  He pushed me and flung the dress in my face. Then he grabbed the crown and his hedgehog skin and threw those at me too!  I grabbed them and ran away shrieking mad.  Oh, Mommy, I'm so stupid.  I still love him.  Somewhere inside is my Hans. Maybe if I changed too, he'd love me again. But how can I change into a human princess?” Rune sputters and collapses into a crying jag.

Beauty realizes no one can more precisely sympathize or offer better advice than she can.  However, she also knows this kind of despair needs time and a clear head, neither of which either of them have at this late hour.  Beauty does what she believes is best:  she rocks her daughter until she falls asleep, and then carries her, gently as beastly possible, to bed.

 

* * *

 

 

Chapter Three

The Swan's Nest

 

A solitary wolverine, his belly full of a night's feeding on mole and rabbit, waddles towards his den.  Stags lower their heads against birch trucks and rub velvet from their antlers in preparation for today's mating battles.  Red squirrels rip open pinecones and stuff their cheeks with pine nuts to sock away for winter.  A chevron of geese fly over Cozy Cave honking their way south.  Although Beauty is sleeping heavily, her beast ears twitch in response. Pulled into a half-sleep, she believes her injured arm is honking.  She rolls to her back, and remembering last night's events, she snaps upright.  Ignoring the painful bite, Beauty listens for Rune, who is usually up with the birds, but all is quiet in Cozy Cave.

Beauty pads through the dim chamber and stokes the ashes with a pile of twigs.  In the burst of light she can see that her right forearm has swollen considerably.  Though a beast's bite is rarely fatal to another beast, Beauty decides to brew wild thyme tea as a precaution.  As she fills a pot with water, she ruminates on Hans the Hedgehog. 

I'd like to pay him a visit and teach him a lesson about trifling with a girl's affections. He knew Rune was infatuated and did nothing to discourage her.  He even encouraged her with compliments to keep her beautiful voice for his songs, to keep her fawning devotion, to feed his ego.  He used her.
  Beauty's hackles rise.  She pours herself a cup of tea and sits at the oak stump table.  

I'll prepare a special breakfast . . . quail eggs and scones . . . set the table with the linen cloth.  No, better not fuss too much or Rune will feel worse. 

Beauty rises and begins scrambling the eggs and mixing the batter. 
When Rune wakes, she'll be glad I'm here.  She'll look at my swollen arm and feel terrible and try to make it up to me by being sweet and helpful.  I'll have my loving little companion with me again.

She pauses the rolling pin, and if her cheeks were visible rather than hair-covered, they'd be shamed pink. 
A good mother doesn't make use of her daughter's pain, she makes it end.  But how?
Beauty wonders, cutting the circle of dough into four pieces.  She places the scone-laden griddle over the fire and tiptoes to Rune's hollow.   She calls softly, "Rune?"  Getting no response, she steps inside and finds Rune's bed is empty.  Beauty doesn't bother to search the cave further.   Her sinking heart tells her Rune is elsewhere. 

She bolts to her bedroom to retrieve the magic mirror she'd dropped in haste last night.  The mirror is not on the floor.  Beauty lifts the straw mattress and flings it over her head.  An image of herself frantically searching for the mirror once, long ago, forms in Beauty's brain.  She'd spent half an hour futility combing the bushes lining the castle road; Blockhead had stolen the mirror before she'd even left the stable.  "Rune's got it!"

Beauty tries not to panic as she bounds from the cave.
 Rune doesn't know the mirror is magic; she won't try to use it.  Even if she does, she won't speak in rhyme. Where has she gone?  Think--where does she go when she's upset? 

Beauty breaks into a gallop down the path leading to Lake Leda.  She's thinking it's inappropriate that the morning is this beautiful, that the sun is shining through half-naked branches and lighting up the brilliant leaves scattered beneath her feet, that the air is so sharp with pine and peat she can taste them in her panting mouth. 

When Lake Leda at last comes into view Beauty bellows, "Rune!"  Rune is nowhere in sight.  She calls out three more times with no response and is about to head for Vagary Vale when she sees a flash beyond a stand of cattails.  She wades through the tails, passes a floating hedgehog pelt and a pink satin gown, and finds a moss-coated boulder upon which rests her magic mirror.  She lifts the mirror to her face and speaks:

"Quickly now, before I swoon,

Show me the whereabouts of my daughter, Rune."

The mirror's surface fills with blue, and into the blue flies a magnificent white swan, carrying Rune on his back.  Beauty feels as if the ground has been snatched from under her feet.  She steadies herself against the boulder and grips the mirror tightly. 

"Please, I beg you, to make matters clearer,

 Show me what's happened since Rune took this mirror."

The glass reveals Rune sneaking out of Beauty's bedroom in the hour before dawn, the princess's gown tied around her shoulders and the gold crown on her head.   Hans' pelt is held in one hand and the magic mirror in the other.  Beauty stares intently as the mirror shows Rune meandering down the pathway, arriving at Lake Leda, and climbing onto the boulder, where she waits for sunrise. As soon as the sun appears, Beauty's massive body quakes with impatience and dread as she sees Rune's precious face mugging in the mirror.  Then, Rune began to sing:

 

"All the stars caught in this mirror,

tell me why Hans didn't hold me dearer.

I confess, I love him still,

not his figure, nor his quills,

his soul and spirit I adore,

surely they're the same as before.

He never wants to see me again,

but might we meet in a faraway glen?

Might I have a different face

that would invite Hans' embrace?"

 

Icy fear slithers over Beauty's ribs.  She's afraid to keep watching, terrified of the secret about to be revealed.  She bites her lip and blood flows from beneath her fangs as her beloved daughter beheld her true visage.  Within the mirror, Rune's coarse, copper colored fur disappears, and underneath is skin like apple blossoms; the gold crown sets upon lustrous, wheat blond curls framing her oval face and tumbling over her shoulders; her bulging hazel orbs recede to resemble the eyes of a fawn, fringed with thick black lashes; her purple cauliflower nose shrinks to a diminutive, finely sculpted nose; her great gash of a mouth and three rows of fangs set in bright blue gums become a cherubic mouth with teeth like strings of pearls and full, cherry pink lips.

Beauty wants to scream, but can only gulp the air.  Her worst fear is now a reality.  Not only is Rune Prince Runyon's daughter, she is a fairy tale beauty of the first degree.

 

* * *

 

"Beauty's found the mirror," Elora mumbles into her pillow. She sits up, and squints in the light flashing from her crystal ball.  Croesus is sprawled at the foot of the bed, his legs twitching in dream pursuit of a fat woodchuck.

They had both been out until 5:00AM visiting Grimm cider mills with the Devil and his dirty brother, turning the cider hard.  After fermenting 700 barrels, they stopped in a Grimm graveyard and sampled their work under a harvest moon.  When enchantress and dog staggered into the Deco Palace, her crystal ball was flashing.  She watched Rune sing into the magic mirror's gleaming oval.  And as her uncharmed face was revealed, Elora narrowed her silver-flecked eyes and stared inscrutably into the crystal ball.  Then, the swan flew into view and she hissed with contempt.  (Elora has held a grudge since, as a novice enchantress, ages ago, she stumbled into a swan's nest, and the furious bird got the best of her; she still has a red, hour glass scar on her hip.)  And when Rune dropped the mirror and climbed onto the swan's back, Elora curled her blackberry lips and cursed, "Bricklebrit."  

Her mood is not improved this afternoon.  She aims her index finger at Croesus and zaps up a bugle beside the dog's ear.  She puffs out her cheeks and the horn blasts reveille.  Croesus wakes with a startled yelp and tumbles off the bed. 

Elora conjures up a glass of clamato juice with a raw egg and floats the crystal ball across the spacious bedroom into her lap.

 

* * *

 

Beauty's legs grow rubbery.  She drops to her bottom among the cattails and numbly watches the drama unfold within the mirror.  Rune rips the satin from her shoulders; the pelt tumbles off the boulder and the crown plunks into the water.  She gapes at the vision in the glass, and the vision gapes in return.  As she places a hairy hand on her hairy cheek, the vision places a smooth hand on her rosy cheek.  So engrossed is Rune that she doesn't notice the graceful landing of an enormous white swan.

The swan paddles silently to the moss-covered boulder and cranes his long, elegant neck over Rune's shoulder.  He looks at Rune, looks at her reflection and tsk-tsks.  Startled, Rune whips her head to the right, her mouth snapping. But the swan anticipates her and glides backward to a safe distance.

"That is your true reflection, the beauty you are to become," the swan says matter of factly.  Rune regards the image in the mirror again and shakes her head in disbelief. 
Could it be true? How could it be true? Mother is a beast like me, my father a princely beast . . .

"I'm not one whit surprised.  One as terribly ugly as you are must be truly beautiful on the inside.  No doubt you have suffered greatly on account of your ugliness," the swan says. 

"Go away, you stupid bird."

"Listen to the story I have to tell, for it is a good one and every word is true.  My mother said I was born big and ugly unlike the other pretty ducklings in her brood."

"You do realize that you're not a duck," Rune snorts and returns her gaze to the mirror, making faces to see if the image mimics her.  "Could this be a trick of the moonlight?  Or is the mirror enchanted?  Can this human girl face be mine?"

The swan nips Rune's elbow, which, because of her thick hair, is only a mild irritation.  She turns a glare on the swan and issues a warning growl.  

The swan briskly ruffles his feathers.  "If you want to be a beauty both inside and out, then you must learn to be quiet and listen."

"Why should I listen to you?" Rune yells.  "I'm the one who is suffering!  I'm the one whose life is a mess!  What do you know of suffering?" 

"If you don't want to make things worse and end up in the gutter, you will listen to my story." 

Rune twists her mouth and bites the corner of her lip.  "All right, tell me your tale, I've nothing better to do."

The swan settles his feathers. "To make certain I was a duckling, my mother took me to the water.  When she saw that I was a better swimmer than my siblings, she proclaimed me her own child.  She said to the elder duck of the clan:
He is not handsome, but has a good character and is a good swimmer.  Besides, he's a drake and it doesn't matter so much what he looks like."

"That doesn't make sense,” Rune says.  "What does being a male have to do . . . "

The swan silences her with a hiss.  "When I was young in the hen yard, I was bitten, and made fun by the other ducklings.  Poor little duckling.  How I grieved over my ugliness.  My own brothers and sisters quacked:
If only the cat would get you, you ugly thing!
 I hadn't a single friend.  Even my mother finally said:
I wish you were far away
."

"Creechy, your own mother said that?" 

"Precisely the point, but I'll get to that later.  I did as she wished and went far away to a great swamp where wild ducks lived.  They said I was ugly, but that was no concern of theirs as long as I didn't try to marry into their family."

"Oh," Rune whispers.

Looking in the mirror, Beauty knows Rune is remembering Princess Greta's willingness to marry Hans' after his transformation. 
I loved the Beast as he was,
Beauty thinks.
  Wait and see, Greta, what ugly things Hans' transformation bring.

"You know so little of the ways of the wide world," the swan says.  "I stayed in the swamp, keeping to myself, then two ganders flew into the water.  They swam up to me and said:
You are so ugly that we like you.  Do you want to migrate with us?  Not far from here there is a marsh where some beautiful wild geese live.  They are all lovely maidens and you are so ugly that you may seek your fortune among them.  Come along.
"

Rune scratches her head in bewilderment.

"Then bang, bang!" the swan trumpets.  "Hunters shot the ganders; the swamp was surrounded by them and their dogs.  My first chance at finding happiness gone, poor little duckling."

"Couldn't you have flown to the marsh on your own?" Rune asks.

The swan hisses, louder than the last time.  "A dog charged toward me, his teeth bared and I prepared for death.  When he was almost upon me, he turned and ran away.  I thanked God I was so ugly that even the dog didn't want to bite me."

"The dog was trained to fetch the kill," Rune murmurs from the corner of her mouth. 

"I flew out of the swamp and found a little hut where lived an old woman, a cat, and a hen.  The old woman's sight was failing, so she thought I was a grown duck who would lay eggs.  I was allowed to stay three weeks on probation.  Naturally, by the end of those three weeks, I had not laid a single egg."

Rune giggles and the swan nods indulgently.  "Ah, your laughter is like tiny bells, a sound only a true beauty can produce."

"What happened next?"  Rune asks.

"I grew depressed. The hen told me it was because I had nothing to do, and why didn't I lay eggs or purr.  I told her she did not understand me."