Briar Rose
Well, I finally finished the story! Still not sure what the title should be. I'm currently favoring The Briar or A Memory of Roses.
I'm not sure how I feel about it yet... I was really pleased with a few days ago, but just like with my poem, I've spent too much time with it. Plus I'm tired and not really able to give it my full attention. But I'll post it here and see what you all think... ^^
I cannot remember the first time I heard the story of Briar Rose. The tale is so familiar that at times I feel it was in my soul from the moment of my birth. Scenes and images from it-- the grand banquet hall, the christening and the curse, the splendid palace swallowed up by the forest and forgotten by time, and most of all the lost princess who slept inside it-- were imparted to me from the cradle. I can barely recall a New Year's I did not spend listening to my grandmother tell the story as she did her spinning, the golden wheel whirling into a haze before my eyes. Her stories were told simply to entertain an eager child, but even then I sensed a core of truth in them, and felt that beneath the veneer of childish fancy there lay history.
Gazing out across the high, forested hills of my homeland, it was easy to believe such a treasure lay lost among them. Many had believed it before me, believed enough to set out in search of the place, but few had returned, and none had ever set eyes on the castle. Yet, full of childish confidence, I had little doubt that one day I would find it, and lift the curse upon it.
As soon as I was old enough I set out after it, and I was joined in my search by other young boys eager to find the lost kingdom they had heard so much about. Together we spent most of our childhoods looking for that fabled place, but despite my ambition, and the faithfulness of my friends, our endless searchings yielded nothing.
Many years passed, and my companions grew tired of such a fruitless quest. After so many failures even I lost the hopeful spark that had once colored each journey. And besides, we were no longer children, but young men, and life had conjured a legion of new pleasures and responsibilities for us. As we grew stronger our fathers grew weaker, and suddenly we were relied upon to share the burden of planting and harvesting in earnest. There were apprenticeships to be completed, and livelihoods to be made, and many of us had sweethearts now, sweethearts far too pretty and needful of our attention to be abandoned day after to day while we played adventurer.
And so as we set out together that mild summer morning, not even I wondered about the outcome of our expedition.
After so many years I cannot remember the exact reason for our travel. In the wake of our discovery the errand was forgotten, and beneath the weight of what followed, its imprint has faded to nothing but a shadow. But whatever our destination, it was a happy one-- a wedding, perhaps, or a fair-- and our journey welcome. Our path took us through forest, onto a common road that we had all walked countless times before. And yet that day I was strangely intuned to my surroundings, aware of every bird call and sudden breeze. Some faint anxiety had woken in me, as though I knew the fate that lay in store for us.
We caught the scent of it first, the perfume of a hundred thousand roses sweeping toward us like an opium cloud. How it came I cannot understand, for the air was still around us, as though holding its breath in expectation. For a moment we were stunned by the smell, our minds foggy with the power of it. But then it lifted, and our eyes grew clear again, and it was then that we beheld the castle.
Looking back it almost seems as if the place chose to reveal itself to us, moving from whatever veil it lurked behind and suddenly planting itself in our way. The great tor lay nearly invisible beneath a blanket of vines and thorns, and waves of blood-red roses covered it still further. We could have passed it a thousand times as children and thought it only some ancient tree, lost to parasites, and if that day our eyes had not been opened to it, we would never have understood what we saw. And yet, in that moment, the bones that lay beneath the greenness were revealed to us, and we knew at once that we had found a palace.
The forest was still and silent, and in the quiet the sudden racing of our hearts sounded loud as war drums. I could feel my hair standing on end, cold goosebumps of excitement and fear running up my back and over my scalp. This was the moment I had dreamed of almost from infancy, that I had planned out and worked for and treasured the thought of nearly my whole life. In my joy and wonderment I nearly forgot how to breath.
We moved as one, suddenly possessed by the lost zeal of countless childhood quests, battering our way bare-handed through the underbrush, tearing like madmen at roots and vines until our arms and fingers bled. Still we worked, stopping only when we had made a way inside. But though we had fought together, in the face of such a great unknown my companions faltered, and only I was brave enough to pass through the brambles and into the castle. And so alone I went, pushing my way into the tunnel until all was green and thorns, and my companions were lost from sight.
It was a moment before my eyes adjusted to the darkness, and even then there was little to see. The passageway was small, and so consumed by vegetation that I could barely glimpse the floor through the undergrowth. In some places the vines grew so thick that I had to claw through them, and soon my already ragged clothes were nothing but holes and my hair a mad nest of leaves and scarlet petals. But eventually nature's hold grew weaker, and I began at last to see the marvels of the palace. On one side of my path stood graceful stone arches, which once would have looked out on the castle courtyard, but were now so choked with brambles that only trickles of light broke through. On the other side fading murals lay hidden behind curtains of clinging ivy. Weeds grew up through the broken floor, but faint patterns still glimmered on the tiles, and I tried to imagine how they must have looked when the palace was in its grandeur.
As I progressed through the empty corridors the ravages of nature grew less violent, and at last I could walk without grasping for footholds and squeezing through creeping vines. But I had left the arched hallway behind, and the already weak light grew so dim that soon I was feeling my way along in almost complete darkness. The quiet now was palpable, and my footsteps rang like cannon fire against the stones, loosing riots of dust. The air was heavy with the smell of dirt and must and warm sap, and most of all the smell of roses, and so deep into the shut-up castle it hung as thick as smoke, enveloping me in a suffocating mist of sweetness until I was almost was reeling from lack of air. The niggle of unease I had felt before became a throbbing that filled my whole body, making me hurry passed empty chambers and shadowed doorways that in daylight I might have been brave enough to explore, but in darkness I could barely stand to look at. But I pushed on, drawn forward by an irresistible current. Despite the darkness and the emptiness and the dead quiet, I felt some weak flicker of life hiding within the castle, and I could not leave without finding it.
I was never sure how long I walked before I came upon the banquet hall. One moment I was stumbling through yet another shadowy hall, and the next I had emerged into a chamber so vast that I could barely comprehend it. The ceiling seemed to rise for miles, disappearing into border-less acres of dark space. A few threadbare pennants still hung from the rafters, fluttering softly. Around me the walls were an ocean of vines, and the afternoon light struggled in through the last visible windows, their pale beams dappling across the floor and lighting up a thousand red and white roses. So far the only roses I had seen were a deep, lustrous red, and for a moment I wondered at there being white ones here. But then understanding dawned, and I saw that they were not flowers at all, but bones.
The anxiousness that had dogged me through the castle turned to horror as I took in my surroundings. The weathered skeletons of courtiers lay across tables and benches, still dressed in moth-eaten finery. Pages and serving maids were sprawled across the floor, and soldiers in corroded armor sat slumped against the walls. There was even a band of court musicians, draped one over another like sleeping children, horns and lutes still grasped in their dead hands. And at the end of the room, in two golden thrones, sat a lady and her lord. Their heads were bowed, their jeweled bones twinkling in the darkness, all but buried under tendrils and blossoms.
It was then I knew that I had been wrong. This was truly a dead place, and no life hid within it. Dread filled my heart as I thought of the princess, and I let out a cry that echoed terribly in the empty shadows of the banquet hall. Then I ran from the room, blind with panic and heedless of my surroundings. I wanted light, and space, and clean air, air that did not smother, that did not reek of must and death and roses. I wanted the dreams of my childhood again, and to forget that such a monstrous place existed. But my running only took me farther into the palace, and when at last I stopped, it was to find myself utterly lost.
Once I had calmed enough to think, I began to try and find my way back out. But in the gloom every empty doorway and twisting hall looked the same, and I felt despair rise in me again. Unsure of what to do, I chose a path, and hoped that fate would be kinder to me than it had been so far.
I wandered aimlessly. So deep into the castle, the faint light that had marked my path before dwindled to a pale wisp, marooning me in darkness. I moved almost by instinct, struggling to make out my surroundings, barely able to put one foot in front of the other without tripping over some unseen obstacle. Despite my efforts, I was as blind as I had been just a moment before.
And so it was without even realizing it that I took my first steps into the Princess's bedroom. It was the size of the room that first caught my attention. I glanced up, and straining in the dimness, saw a great stone fireplace, leaves and creeping tendrils spilling over the grate and trailing across the floor. In the shadows lay the hulking shapes of rotted furniture, their sides seething with vines, and in the middle of room, hidden beneath ivy and roses, stood an ancient, cobweb-strewn canopy bed.
At the sight of it, an almost childish excitement sprung up inside me. But then the memory of the great hall returned, and fear replaced any hopeful thrill. I froze, and for a moment considered turning back, leaving the room and the bed unexplored. But I knew I could not leave, no matter what might be waiting for me behind the canopy. And so I moved fearfully toward the bed, and with a trembling hand pulled back the curtain.
Inside lay a beautiful young girl. Her skin was pale as moonlight against her white gown and the white bedclothes, her yellow hair almost silver with dust. She could have been made of marble she was so still, with nothing but the gentle rise of her breast to prove she lived. I could barely breathe, afraid that at the faintest breath she would crumble into dust. But her skin was warm, and soft and solid to the touch, and her pulse flickered in my hand like a butterfly's wing. A kiss would wake her, the stories had said, and so I pressed my lips against her smooth brow, her pale cheek, and at last, the softness of her mouth.
For a long moment she did not move, and my fear returned in a sickening wave. But then she stirred, a cloud of golden dust rising up around her. Blinking in the dim light, she woke, and slowly her gaze fell on me. She smiled a little, a drowsy, wondering smile, her eyes still dark with sleep. Then they caught sight of the room and went wide, and the smile vanished in a moment.
She rose and slowly crossed the room. Her steps were hesitant, her movements groping and unsteady as a sleepwalker's. Her eyes grew wide as saucers, roaming over the creepers and cracked stones, the sea of roses, the broken remains of furniture that lay in mouldering heaps around her. Then she turned to me at last, speaking in a strange, dancing tongue that I could not understand. I saw the confusion on her face, and the fear in her eyes and it made my blood run cold. She moved to the door, and I ran to stop her. Her eyes were questioning. How could I tell her what had happened? I gazed at her helplessly for a moment, but she stepped passed me and into the hall. I heard her gasp at the ruins around her, and she moved through the vines and cobwebs with an urgent speed, her face growing more lost and afraid the more she saw.
Despite the darkness, and changes that had come to it, she still knew her way around the palace, and together we traveled back the way I had come. This time I could make out more of my surroundings, and the sight of such ruin pained me, not for my own sake, but for hers. The princess's eyes had grown soft with sadness and fear, and though her steps were surer now, she still walked with the air of someone half-stunned, and there were times when she stopped completely, overwhelmed by the world she had woken to.
When at last we reached the great hall, my dread returned. If only I could have spoken to her, somehow prepared her for the blow that was to come. Even through my silence she sensed the enormity of what awaited her, and as we stood before the doors she reached for my hand. Then, trembling, she stepped into the room. For a moment she was still, unsure what to make of the scene before her, but then her face grew very white, and her fingers tightened painfully around mine as she gazed in grave disbelief at what had once been her home. Then she let out the most pitiful, heart breaking wail I have ever heard and sank to the floor, sobbing words I did not know, but had little trouble understanding. She lay there for a long time, until at last I took her arm and helped her to her feet. I touched her gently, wanting to comfort her, but she hid her face in her hands and would not speak. I did not know what to do, or where to take her, but I knew that neither she nor I could stay in that wasted place any longer. And so in silence, I led her out through the overgrown corridors, and empty chambers and finally out into the forest beyond. There, almost forgotten, waited my companions.
By then her face was tear-streaked and pale, and she followed behind me like a captive, lost and spiritless and silent. I felt ashamed to have brought her, ashamed of the way my friends gawked at her, too thoughtless to turn away despite her tears, despite the way she hid her face, despite her noble rank, ashamed to think that I had fancied myself her savior. I was no savior. I was her doom. At least asleep in that forsaken castle she could dream. But here, exiled to a land so changed from her own, she would only find the horrid, inescapable landscape of wakefulness.
In my shame and despair I fled the others, and I cannot remember now whether they followed me or not. I could only see her, and myself beside her, and even if they had come I would not have known.
I had nowhere else to take her, and so I brought her home, careful to hide her from the prying eyes of my neighbors. My mother was stunned by our appearance, and was moved almost to disbelief by the tale of how I found the princess, but she was kind, and tried to welcome this, sad, strange girl into our home. She dressed her in a new gown, and washed the dust from her long, golden hair, but the princess could not be comforted, and wept into her hands like a child. We spoke to her, and tried to teach her our language, but she understood nothing. She would only sit by the fire, silent as death, and stare and stare at my mother's spinning wheel as if it were the Devil himself.
I should have seen then that it was hopeless. She was too beautiful, too sorrowful, too alien to ever be happy here. She belonged to a world that no longer existed, and she could never belong anywhere else. Within a few days she was gone, slipping away into the night. From that day to this, I have never seen her again.
Months I looked for her. It was the searching of my childhood again, but now I was alone, and with no clue as to my goal. I traveled high and low, but found no sign of her, and no word of her ever came. Once I returned to the old castle, thinking I might find her there. In the time since I had left, the briar had consumed it completely, and the opening I had come through was lost in an ocean leaves and creepers. Gone too were the roses, leaving behind only dry, dead petals, and a memory of their fragrance. Any spark of life I had felt that day was gone, and I fled, certain the castle had become nothing but a tomb. She was lost to me, lost as that ruined palace had become, and no amount of searching could ever bring her back.
Often I think of her, and wonder where she has gone, whether she still lives. Sometimes I fear that a creature so fragile and so lost could never have survived for long. At night I dream of her, remembering the moment she woke. I can see her face, the smile that blossomed there in that brief, brief second before she knew what had befallen her. Oh, that I could have spared her the pain that came after. But I can only think of her, and wish her peace.
She has my prayers and my heart, wherever she may be.
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