Little Red Cinderella and the Three Beanstalks

Previously...

“However... forgive me for saying so, but you are a lady, and not even a Shield-Maiden at that, at least as far as I can tell. I believe your word is good, but I am not so sure the Prince will see it the same way. If, perhaps, you were an enchantress or a good fairy or some such, he might be more inclined to listen to your tale; but as it is, I am not sure how well you will be able to convince him.”

I heaved a theatric sigh. “Men. Why does a woman need to be a threat before she can be taken seriously? That’s alright, I’m not entirely alone in my meager, apparently helpless ladyness.” I motioned with my hand at the bushes behind me, and with some grunts and and mutterings, nine male heads appeared above them. The Knight took a sudden step back in surprise. “I’ve gathered some other concerned parties to aid in this Quest. Sometimes a lone Prince just isn’t enough.”

Jack, Ezu, and the Dwarves came forward. The Knight awkwardly bowed to them, still a little rattled at their unexpected appearance.

“You are a cunning young lady,” he said, looking at me in a new light. “I all but walked into an ambush. I’m not entirely sure how I feel about you.”

“I’ve been having that effect on people more and more lately,” I replied. “I’m sorry for the deceit, I was rather expecting you to be a member of Royalty, and if there’s anything I learned from hitchhiking to the Mid West Music Fest with my brother last summer against my parent’s backs, it’s that guys won’t offer you a ride if you’ve got another dude with you.”

“Rikki, you’re doing that thing again; where you just completely stop making any semblance of sense at all,” Ezu said. I ignored him.

“So, can you bring us to the Prince?” I asked the Knight, hopefully. He thought about it for a long moment, his gaze sliding across the ten of us; eight of which looked as if they’d just swallowed something sour. Then he nodded, and slipped the jewel into the saddle bag on his horse.

“Yes, I can. I can’t guarantee you’ll get what you want, but I will do my best.”

*******************************************************************************

We had to go back the way the Knight had come. It meant trekking through twisted undergrowth and overgrown animals trails down the steep side of the mountain, stumbling, cursing, and on my part at least, trying not to trip and bring the entire party down with me.

It was too treacherous for the knight to ride his horse, instead leading it by the reigns beside him. He had however politely offered me a stead upon his stead, to spare me the indignities of walking myself. It was a kind gesture, but I suspected he offered more out of the fact that I was a lady and he had good breeding than anything. And not being an actual lady, except in title I suppose, I declined, insisting on trudging down the mountain side on my own two feet, as sore and blistered as they were. The Knight tried to hide his discomfort at the string of muttered curses and complaints that fell from my grumbling lips, obviously unused to the sort of vile phrases I was using being uttered so sourly from a member of the gentler sex.

The Dwarves on the other hand seemed a little cheered by my foul mouth and bad attitude. I suspect having to live with a prim and proper Princess had meant they had been obliged to give up some of their more unseemly habits in return for her company. My vulgarity was, I'm sure, a relief in contrast.

Ezu was not only used to my unladylike behavior, but effectively out-performing me. Some of the words that came from his mouth every time he snagged his pants on some brush or was poked in the eye by a stray twig were enough to color even the Dwarves' ears.

“You never mentioned your name, by the way,” I said to the Knight finally, in an attempt to drown out the particular curse Ezu had begun to shout—one I knew all too well from his frequent use of it, and thoroughly disapproved of.

“Oh, I suppose I didn't,” the Knight replied. “I am Roland, former Knight of His Majesty's Royal Guard. And now, I'm... well, just a traveler, I suppose,” he said, looking slightly crestfallen at the realization.

“My name is Rikki. And this is Ezu, and Jack,” I replied, motioning to the boys.

“Sir Jack,” Jack added, pointedly.

“Sir Jack, and Sir Ezu, please forgive me,” I amended, laying on the sarcasm good and thick. “And these are the Seven Dwarves. Being a traveler isn't so bad,” I said, fighting my way past a clingy thorn bush. “I've been traveling ever since... well, for quite a while now, and while not having a real roof over your head gets old pretty fast; always being on the move, meeting new people and visiting new places, never knowing where the road will spit you out and never know when you're going to have to so sprinting back to it with an angry mob hot on your heels... well, there's never a dull moment.”

“Except for the hours upon hours of trudging, hot and tired and thirsty, through deserted, monotonous, never-ending forests, praying for nothing more than to end the day with somewhere dry to sleep and some soft bark to chew on to ward off the hunger pains” Ezu cut in.

“Don't listen to him, it isn't that bad,” I half-whispered to the Knight.

“Yes it is,” Jack said. “And a lot more dangerous.”

“They just have no sense of adventure.”

“Well, I don't think I'll be a traveler for long. Just until I find somewhere to live, where I can work, and hopefully start a family. Though I've been a soldier for so long, I don't know if I know how to be anything else.”

“Well, if everyone comes out of this alive and with all their limbs still attached, you'll have to get used to the life of a rich man, Sir Roland,” I said.

“Me? Why me?” he asked, perplexed.

“Because you're helping us. And we make sure the people who help us get helped in return.”

“So what will we get in turn?” one of the Dwarves piped up. Hagen, I think it was.

“Um... money? Power? Jewels? You're Snow White's friends, aren't you? Once she's queen, you guys will get whatever you want!”

“Rikki,” Jack hissed, “You can't just go around promising riches to people like that!”

I responded by elbowing him in the gut.

“Keep in mind, her idea of 'helping' me was dragging me along to get mixed up in this insane quest,” Ezu added.

“The only reason you're here is because your debt to a bunch of bloodthirsty giants almost got the both of us killed, so quit your whining,” I snapped back.

Roland gave a short, sudden laugh. “You speak to him like a man—or his mother! Who exactly are you?”

“She's the most wicked witch of them all,” Ezu said, waggling his fingers for emphasis. “And the spell she casts most often is the one that sucks people into her mad schemes—and then enchants them to actually like it!”

“He's just saying that because he can't accept that fact that he enjoys being in the presence of my sparkling and effervescent personality.”

“Well, you'll have your hands full trying to convince the Prince of your plan. He's a proud man, and doesn't like taking unnecessary risks. Convincing him your plan of action is worth attempting over his own will not be an easy task. I can vouch for you to a certain degree, but to be absolutely honest, despite your kindness to me, I am not entirely convinced either that your plan is the right one. At least, what I've heard of it thus far. You... you do have more than just what you told me, right?”

“Uh...” I faltered, but just for a moment. “Sure, yeah, totally. A lot more. There's a whole mess of plans, and back up plans. I've done this like twice before, I know what I'm doing.”

“Rikki,” Ezu hissed in my ear. “We are completely unprepared; we have no knowledge of the Queen's territory, we have no guarantee we'll get any help from the Prince, and even if we do, the Queen or witch or whatever is probably going to have magic, and a lot of it. It didn't go so well for us the last time we tried to fight someone with magic, and that was only one old lady.”

“We'll make a plan once we get the Prince on board,” I whispered back. “It's not like we have much of a choice, besides give up, go home, and let the world be enslaved!”

Ezu sighed. “And how many more times do we have to do this?”

“Too many,” Jack replied.

“As many times as it takes,” I said grimly.

We traveled north, or mostly north, as we meandered through the dense forest, for almost an hour before we came out at the base of the mountains and stood at the edge of a long, hilly valley. I was starting to feel bad about making Roland travel all the way back this way, after he had spent so long getting to where he had stumbled across us.

“The Prince's encampment is about another two hours that way,” the Knight said, pointing out over the hills.

“Two hours?” I moaned. I knew by this point my feet should be impervious to hours upon hours of walking, but I was a complainer at heart.

“It would be half that on horseback,” Roland said.

“We need horses,” Jack said, his tone leaving no room for argument.

“We can barely feed ourselves, how would we be able to take care of horses too?” Ezu pointed out.

Jack and Ezu spent the next forty-five minutes arguing about the pros and cons of having horses. Meanwhile, I started chatting up the Dwarves, in hopes of finding out something, anything, that might help in the coming battle that I was sure we were heading towards.

“So, you're... Konrad?” I guessed, addressing the second tallest of the Dwarves.

“I'm Roland,” he replied a little sourly, peering up at me with half squinted eyes.

“Oh, two Rolands, that's going to be...” I searched for a word, “...Confusing.”

“And that's my problem how?” he grunted.

“I... okay then, good point,” I conceded, not wanting to get into it with an admittedly short but very muscular miner. “So you were living with Snow White for quite a while, yeah?”

“Almost a year,” Roland 2 said.

“What can you tell me about her? Anything we might need to know?”

Roland 2 thought about it. “Well, she was a sweet girl an' all, and cleaned and cooked like a dream, which was real nice...”

“But?” I asked, raising an eyebrow.

“But... she weren't too smart, that one. Pretty as a rose, but about as dumb as a bag of rocks.”

“That's... not very encouraging,” I said, my heart sinking a little. So far none of the royalty I had met so far were terribly clever, but if Snow White was dumb even by fairy tale standards, we might be in for more of a challenge than we had thought. Hopefully she would remain unconscious for most of the rescue.

“You know that evil woman, that Witch Queen, came to the house two times while we were working in the mines before she finally got Snow for good? With a comb and a corset, both of which knocked the girl right out, and she kept letting the woman back in! 'Don't let a soul in the house while we're gone, Snow! The Queen wants you dead, so stay inside and stay quiet, Snow!' So what does she do? She goes and lets the first person she sees waltz right inside and poison her, that's what. 'Oh, but she seemed to sweet and innocent! How can a kind old lady be evil?', she says. A damn bleeding heart, that girl. Good for a princess, not so good for a fugitive.”

I bit my lip, not in the least bit enheartened by Roland 2’s account. o be perfectly honest, I was beginning to wonder by we even had to bother saving these princesses at all. It hardly seemed worth it, I was sure there were plenty more deserving folks out there who needed to be rescued.

First of all, that annoyingly moral little voice in my head scolded me silently, it’s your fault that anybody needs to be rescued in the first place. You were the one who messed up all the stories, you were the one who set a terrible chain of events in motions because you just had to go and kill Rumplestiltskin. And second of all, as ditzy as they may be, that doesn’t make these princesses any less deserving than anyone else. You’re not always the sharpest crayon in the box yourself.

“Yeah, yeah, I get it,” I grumbled undr my breath.

“What was that?” Roland 2 asked, glancing suspiciously up at me.

“Uh, nothing, nothing at all. Ahem, as I was saying, okay, so Snow White is a little...” I swept my hand over the top of my head and made a whooshing noise. “What can you tell me about the Evil Queen? What’s her deal?”

Roland 2 shuddered. “She’s not someone you want to cross. She’s got herself some powerful dark magic. The old queen, Snow’s mother, died, you see, years and years ago before the princess was even born. In a carriage accident, so the story goes, and the good King had to cut the unborn Snow White out of her dying mother’s womb. The child was cursed from birth, you see. A babe born from a dead woman’s gut is cursed to face the most grievous ills in life. And so she did,” he frowned, sadly. As frustrating as a life with a princess must have been, the dwarves certainly seemed to have grown rather fond of her anyways. “The King married the Sorceress many years later, believing that Snow White needed a mother’s love. Snow said that her step mother seemed kindly enough at first, loving, even; but then the King fell ill. He grew sicker and sicker with every passing day, and no doctor in the land could tell what ailed him. Soon he grew so weak that he was forced to retire to his chambers completely to be nursed day and night, and the Queen acted as regent in his stead.
It was then, according to Snow, that she began to notice something was amiss.

"The Queen was not a kind and gentle ruler as her father had been. She regularly turned away citizens seeking her help or advice, and began raising taxes and building up their army. She used the Royal Treasury as her own personal funds, spending outlandish amounts of money on fine things for herself; jewelry and silk gowns and paints and creams. When Snow, just a child as she was, questioned what little she knew of the Queen’s actions, she at first bought the child gifts as well, hoping to placate her. But that did not settle Snow’s suspicions for long, and they only grew stronger as the Queen’s behavior began to grow more erratic.

"She became outright hostile, discharging all female servants who were young or pretty from the castle. She ordered her royal baths to be filled with milk and honey three times a day for her to bathe in--and insisted that she could only be washed by old, blind spinsters. She drained the coffers funding her army and purchasing lavish gifts, and raised the land’s taxes even higher, sending out soldiers to forcibly collect anything of value from peasants who had nothing more to give.
Snow grew quite unsettled by the Queen’s strange behavior, and attempted to speak to her father.
She had not been allowed to see him for many weeks, as it was feared she might catch whatever was ailing him. But she managed to creep in one night with the aid of some friendly servants who knew not the dangers of sickness. But she only found her father so ill, he could hardly recognize her. She told him what little she knew and understood, however, speaking passionately and earnestly. As she recounted the Queen’s despotic rule, the King seemed to grow stronger, fueled by the injustices being committed against his beloved people. When she finished her tale, the King knew who she was and was sitting upright in her bed, and took her by the hands and told her he would have all put right once again.

"The next morning, the King was dead.
The doctors said the illness grew too strong for him to fight, but the people talked when no soldiers were around to hear them. Poor Snow, bless her sweet heart, did not suspect her step mother of foul play. A poor ruler she knew she was, but she could not imagine that she might be a murderess as well.

"After the King’s death, the Queen took complete control of the land, and soon revealed her true self in all her madness. She would not allow any common person to look upon her face, and anyone who held a station of less than that of a lord or lady would have their eyes put out if they accidentally glanced upon her face.

"One day, while being taken through the town in her litter by her servants, she came upon a small wedding taking place between a young soldier and a merchant’s daughter. The girl was a pretty thing, with hair the color of copper and a lovely smile. The Queen demanded to be taken amongst the precession, and halted the wedding, standing before the bride and groom, her face veiled as it always was in public. She asked the groom why he loved his bride. He told her because of her beauty and goodness. The Queen then asked him if he would still love her if only for her goodness. The groom said he would, but the queen did not believe him. She said that beauty was the most important virtue of a woman, and that his bride was not beautiful at all. She told him that she would make him she was she saw when she looked upon the bride’s face. Then she ordered her guards to hold the bride down while the Queen herself used a dagger to scar the poor young girl’s face beyond recognition.

"It was after that that the Queen began ordering the mutilation of all the young and pretty girls in the land. It started slow, at first, with only the ladies of the court being forced to undergo the grotesque transformation. But at the Queen’s power grew, so did her influence. And soon no one was spared her madness.

"It was then Snow said she noticed the Queen’s use of black magic, though it is very likely she had already been dabbling in it for some time before that. She simply didn’t feel the need to hide it any longer.

"Snow had been but a child until then, but now the Queen’s eye finally fell upon her. She had been neglectful of Snow, which allowed the child to escape her notice. But finally the queen say the young lady she was becoming, and the extraordinary beauty Snow White possessed, and it threw the Queen into a rage.”

“I know what happens after that,” I said, grimacing. “The huntsman, finding you dwarves, the apple, the glass coffin.”

“And you three think you’ll be the ones to set this all right?” Roland 2 asked, sounding more than a little skeptical.

“This isn’t our first rodeo, buddy,” I said.

“What?”

“We’ve got some experience in the area,” I amended. “We’ve rescued a princess or two from certain doom. And besides, we have to at least try.”

“I don’t know why it’s your problem,” Roland 2 grunted. “You three don’t seem like anybody special in particular. I’ve sure never heard of you. Why’s it your job to get involved in this mess?”

I sighed. “That’s a good question. I wish I had an answer for you. Somebody’s got to do it, though, and so here we are.”

Roland 2 shook his head. “Bunch a loonies is what you are. But still, I suppose I’m glad someone came along. There isn’t much seven dwarves can do on their own, but with a Prince’s army behind them? We might stand a chance of rescuing Snow after all.”

“I certainly hope so, Roland 2.”

“What did you call me?”

“Nothing. Come on, let’s go see how close we are to the encampment.”

According to Roland 1, it was only over the next hill, and in just a few short minutes, the task of convincing a Prince to go to war with a Sorceress would be ours.