Long ago, there was a princess.
She was an effervescent youth, gifted and cunning. Everything she aspired to was attained
with ease. Science, mathematics, music, glory. Everything.
Except for one.
He was tall, with hair like crow feathers. She dreamed of him, when she could sleep at all.
All she wanted was to be in his heart, but he was proud and cruel.
It was misfortune, to be caught in such a web. Each year she tried something new, reinvented
herself, to be radiant, passionate. Others noticed, oh yes. He remained callous,
outrageously indifferent.
It was a pain, a thorn. She grew bitter. Careless to her friends, her duties, her health.
She withdrew to a convent in the mountains, to wait for him to choose someone else. He never
did.
Old books tell of those who live in the deep woods, who trade in dreams.
Of the forgotten arts of forgotten cultures, myths.
Of the doors that open to those who can see nothing else...
The passion rekindled with a bout of giddy hope. "This is what the world is", she thought. "Despair is simply a lack of will, and my will is a fire. I will set to him a flame that will last forever."
It was hard, beyond anything she had attempted before, but when the labor was finished, she looked at the finished formula and laughed at its simplicity. Why, a child could have thought of this. "What a stupid world this is. Why did I waste so many years..."
When the princess returned, everything was as it was.
She was a queen now...
...and she had found love.
Sweet love...
Years passed... or did they?
He wasn't sure.
It was a dream, perhaps.
She looked different, why hadn't he noticed before?
Troubles arose in the land, but they didn't care. What did it matter? Just dreams, sure to
pass in the morning.
Many events, many faces. They found it tiresome. The others grew exasperated and left them
alone. Such a relief, finally to be alone.
They went down the stairs together, to find somewhere where they could be truly alone.
Their love grew deeper and deeper.
Like the sea.
Like the dark sea.
Suddenly, he was gone. He crumbled like ash at her touch. A heap of loam. She screamed and
wept.
Time passed.
...what?
Where was she?
A... tomb?
She tore cobwebs from her hair. Horror.
What! What had happened here?
It took time to find her way out of the maze, so long. But she never felt hunger or thirst.
Only dread. Only sorrow.
At last she found the castle... what there was of it.
Halls filled knee-high with dust. Frescoes long since caked away with mildew.
Daylight streamed through holes in the roof.
There was nothing here but stones. Even the wooden doors had rotted away.
Outside... sand. A golden sea of sand. The castle was nearly buried, nothing else broke the
skyline.
She heard a clatter.
Looking behind, she saw something cowering behind the pillar, in the dust. Something dark
and small.
Seasons passed, in that empty wilderness. Forest, mountain, heather, ice. She had nothing
for her time but to wander, searching, unaged, heavy with shame, ghosted by fever dreams,
until whatever sustained her emptied itself. She could feel it coming.
And with her, matching her footsteps, a lost kitten.
A frail, crooked, spider-shaped thing with ghost-eyes.
That called her, "Mother".
