Parallels
I just realised the other day - there's something awfully familiar about a story I've been reading. See if you can guess which one it is.
An innocent orphaned maiden with a meaningful last name has her normal life stolen from her when she experiences a terrible, life-changing event of massive destructive power. She falls into a coma, and awakens to a world like and yet unlike her own, where strange creatures and powers have taken a personal interest in her.
She learns that her house destroyed a famous wicked witch, who had terrified the people of the surrounding lands, and is set upon a path to a strange, distant castle rumoured to be owned by a Power no-one has seen in years. Personally, she just wants to go home, back to her loving guardians.
On her travels, she gradually meets and is accompanied/assisted by many entities, including:
- a man who used to be a lumberjack, is not entirely normally human, and who is searching for his heart;
- a being who, given his background, is something of a king amongst the cruder and more vicious societies, yet has too many worries of his own to reliably be looking out for the maiden's best interests over his own;
- an entity which has literally lost its thinking capacity, and is little more than a motile golem; and
- a dark-haired being of lesser intelligence but fierce loyalty, whom the maiden first meets even before she is swept away into this strange new world.
Reaching her destination, she finds that the intelligence ruling the castle is not all it seems. However, after some interrogation, it seems likely that she will see her companions with a heart, a mind, and perhaps genuine courage, and be finally reunited with those who raised her.
Now - name that story. :)
An innocent orphaned maiden with a meaningful last name has her normal life stolen from her when she experiences a terrible, life-changing event of massive destructive power. She falls into a coma, and awakens to a world like and yet unlike her own, where strange creatures and powers have taken a personal interest in her.
She learns that her house destroyed a famous wicked witch, who had terrified the people of the surrounding lands, and is set upon a path to a strange, distant castle rumoured to be owned by a Power no-one has seen in years. Personally, she just wants to go home, back to her loving guardians.
On her travels, she gradually meets and is accompanied/assisted by many entities, including:
- a man who used to be a lumberjack, is not entirely normally human, and who is searching for his heart;
- a being who, given his background, is something of a king amongst the cruder and more vicious societies, yet has too many worries of his own to reliably be looking out for the maiden's best interests over his own;
- an entity which has literally lost its thinking capacity, and is little more than a motile golem; and
- a dark-haired being of lesser intelligence but fierce loyalty, whom the maiden first meets even before she is swept away into this strange new world.
Reaching her destination, she finds that the intelligence ruling the castle is not all it seems. However, after some interrogation, it seems likely that she will see her companions with a heart, a mind, and perhaps genuine courage, and be finally reunited with those who raised her.
Now - name that story. :)