Beyond the Woods: Fairy Tales Retold

by Paula Guran

  I rinse and rinse, and turn off the hissing water, dry myself and step out into the bedroom. There I dress in clean clothes, several layers, Gore-Tex the outermost. I stuff my ski-cap and gloves in my jacket pockets, my pistol to show my father that my tale is true. I go into my office, never used, and take from the filing drawers my identifications, my discharge papers—all I have left of my life before this, all I have left of myself.

  Out on the blood-smeared couch, my wife-girl lies unconscious or asleep, indecent in the last position I forced on her. She’s not frightened any more, at least, not for the moment. I throw the ruined ruffled thing, the wedding-dress, to one side, and spread a blanket over her, covering all but her face. I didn’t have to do any of what I did. I might have treated her gently; I might have made a proper marriage with her; we might have been king and queen together, dignified and kind to each other, ruling our peoples together, the three giant dogs at our backs. We could have stopped the war; we could have sorted out this country; we could have done anything. Remember her fragrance, when it was just that light bottle-perfume? Remember her face, unmarked and laughing, just an hour or so ago as she married you?

  I stand up, away from what I did to her. The fur-slump in the corner rises and becomes the starving gray, the white bull-baiter, the dragon-dog with its flame-coat flickering around it, its eyes fireworking out of its golden mask face.

  “I want you to do one last thing for me.” I pull on my ski-cap. The dogs whirl their eyes and spill their odours on me.

  I bend and put the pink Bic in the princess’s hand. Her whole body gives a start, making me jump, but she doesn’t wake up.

  I pull on my gloves, heart thumping. “Send me to my family’s country,” I say to the dogs. “I don’t care which one of you.”

  Whichever dog does it, it’s extremely strong, but it uses none of that strength to hurt me.

  The whole country’s below me, the war there, the mountains there, the city flying away back there. I see for an instant how the dogs travel so fast: the instants themselves adjust around them, make way for them, squashing down, stretching out, whichever way is needed for the shape and mission of the dog.

  Then I am stumbling in the snow, staggering alongside a wall of snowy rocks. Above me, against the snow-blown sky, the faint lines of Flatnose Peak on the south side, and Great Rain on the north, curve down to meet and become the pass through to my home.

  The magic goes out of things with a snap like a passing bullet’s. No giant dog warms or scents the air. No brilliant eye lights up the mountainside. My spine and gut are empty of the thrill of power, of danger. I’m here where I used to imagine myself when we were under fire with everything burning and bleeding around me, everyone dying. Snow blows like knife-slashes across my face; the rocky path veers off into the blizzard ahead; the wind is tricky and bent on upending me, tumbling me down the slope. It’s dangerous, but not the wild, will-of-God kind of dangerous that war is; all I have to do to survive here is give my whole mind and body to the walking. I remember this walking; I embrace it. The war, the city, the princess, all the technology and money I had, the people I knew—these all become things I once dreamed, as I fight my frozen way up the rocks, and through the weather.

  “I should like to meet them,” she says to me in the dream, in my dream of last night when she loved me. She sits hugging her knees, unsmiling, perhaps too tired to be playful or pretend anything.

  “I have talked too much of myself,” I apologize.

  “It’s natural,” she says steadily to me, “to miss your homeland.”

  I edge around the last narrow section of the path. There are the goats, penned into their cave; they jostle and cry out at the sight of a person, at the smells of the outside world on me, of soap and new clothing.

  In the wall next to the pen, the window-shutter slides aside from a face, from a shout. The door smacks open and my mother runs out, ahead of my stumbling father; my brothers and sisters overtake them. My grandfather comes to the doorway; the littler sisters catch me around the waist and my parents throw themselves on me, weeping, laughing. We all stagger and fall. The soft snow catches us. The goats bray and thrash in their pen with the excitement.

  “You should have sent word!” my mother shouts over all the questions, holding me tight by the cheeks. ‘I would have prepared such a feast!’

  “I didn’t know I was coming,” I shout back. “Until the very last moment. There wasn’t time to let you know.”

  “Come! Come inside, for tea and bread at least!”

  Laughing, they haul me up. “How you’ve all grown!” I punch my littlest brother on the arm. He returns the punch to my thigh and I pretend to stagger. “I think you broke the bone!” And they laugh as if I’m the funniest man in the world.

  We tumble into the house. “Wait,” I say to Grandfather, as he goes to close the door.

  I look out into the storm, to the south and west. Which dog will the princess send? The gray one, I think; I hope she doesn’t waste the gold on tearing me limb from limb. And when will he come? How long do I have? She might lie hours yet insensible.

  “Shut that door! Let’s warm the place up again!” Every sound behind me is new again, but reminds me of the thousand times I’ve heard it before: the dragging of the bench to the table, the soft rattle of boiling water into a tea-bowl, the chatter of children.

  “You will have seen some things, my son,” says my father too heartily—he’s in awe of me, coming from the world as I do. He doesn’t know me any more. “Sit down and tell us them.”

  “Not all, though, not all.” My mother puts her hands over the ears of the nearest sister, who shakes her off annoyed. “Only what is suitable for women and girl-folk.”

  So I sit, and sip the tea and soak the bread of home, and begin my story.

  Margo Lanagan has published five collections of short fiction (White Time, Black Juice, Red Spikes, Yellowcake, and Cracklescape) and two novels, Tender Morsels and The Brides of Rollrock Island. She has won four World Fantasy Awards. Zeroes, the first novel of a young adult trilogy co-written with Scott Westerfeld and Deborah Biancotti, was published last fall; the second of the series will be published this fall. Lanagan lives in Sydney, Australia.

  Peter Christen Asbjørnsen and Jørgen Moe collected “Tatterhood”—a tale of a beautiful twin and an ugly twin—in Norway. Although similar stories are rare elsewhere, they are common in Norway and Iceland. Shveta Thakrar sets her version in the much warmer climate and far more exotic setting of ancient India. In the original story the happy ending includes the “ugly” sister’s transformation into a traditionally beautiful woman. Thakrar’s conclusion differs in a way that adds even more depth to this tale of familial bonds and human relationships.

  Lavanya and Deepika

  Shveta Thakrar

  Once upon a time, in a land radiant with stars and redolent of sandalwood, where peacocks breakfasted on dreams salty with the residue of slumber, a rani mourned. On the surface, the rani had everything: a kingdom to care for, fine jewels to wear in her long black hair, silken saris threaded through with silver and gold, and a garden of roses and jasmine to rival that of Lord Indra in his celestial realm. When she rode atop her warrior elephant, her subjects bowed before her in awe and love. But one thing remained out of reach—an heir. She longed for a small, smiling face to call her own.

  Gulabi Rani consulted midwives, healers schooled in the art of Ayurveda, and magicians. Knowing better than to refuse a monarch, they plied her with charms and salves, medications and horoscopes. She ate the roots and leaves of the shatavari plant as they recommended and drank creamy buttermilk while fastidiously avoiding the color black. Yet her belly stayed flat. At last the healers admitted that, without a husband, there was no hope.

  But the rani did not want a husband. Nor did she suffer from a lack of hope. After dismissing the healers and her servants both, she readied a place in the garden. If no one else could help her, she would find the answer herself. Surr
ounded by her beloved roses, garnet and pink and ivory, Gulabi meditated for weeks on end.

  One morning, before even the rooster had crowed, Gulabi opened her eyes and arose. She stretched, allowing the blood to flood back through her stiff body, and strolled down, down, down to the banks of the Sarasvati, whose holy waters flowed clear and bright like liquid diamond.

  As she had known he would be, a figure waited there, a yaksha from a neighboring forest. He wore a dhoti around his midsection, and a black-and-red turban wound about his head. “Namaste, rani,” he said. “I have heard your calls of distress.”

  Gulabi placed her palms together in greeting. “Namashkaar. I am honored by your presence.”

  The nature spirit uncapped an amethyst bottle in the shape of a lotus and beckoned her to come closer. Bending over the bottle, Gulabi inhaled deeply. The fragrance was wonderful, as though all the gardens of the world had been crushed into the crystal blossom. She sighed and reached for it.

  “If you wish for a child, you must rub this oil over your womb,” the yaksha said, holding the lotus glass aloft. “Use only so much as is necessary to coat the surface and not a drop more.”

  Willing as the rani might have been, she was also wise. “Ah, but nothing comes without a price. What is yours?”

  A grin peered from beneath the yaksha’s mustache. “What is it you offer?”

  The rani brought forth from the folds of her sari a container of turmeric, an anklet of ruby-encrusted gold, and a single fire-orange rose from her garden. The yaksha studied each of them in turn.

  “Would you give me all your roses?” he asked. “Would you give me your garden?”

  Gulabi trembled at the thought. The garden where she strolled when seeking solace? The garden filled with the roses for which she was named?

  Yet what good were her roses when she had no one to share them with? She bowed her head. “Yes.”

  “Patience,” said the yaksha, amused. “You are too eager in your dealings. But I see your heart is pure and your desire true.”

  Gulabi thought many things but shrewdly held her tongue.

  “I will accept your gifts,” continued the yaksha, “and give you one of my own.” A pair of blue-and-white chappals appeared in Gulabi’s hand. They were just large enough for a baby’s fragile feet. “You must save these shoes for your child. I ask nothing else.”

  “Why?” The question leaped from the rani’s lips. How she yearned to say yes, to accept the yaksha’s bargain, but she had to know her child would not live to rue her choice.

  “Enough. I grow weary.” The yaksha sealed the bottle. “Yes or no?”

  “Yes,” Gulabi said, extending her empty hand. “Give me the oil.”

  Resting on a mirrored cushion in the company of her ladies-in-waiting, the rani lovingly kneaded the oil into her belly. She sang songs to the child to come as she did, ballads of trouble and triumph. Each circle of her fingers tingled with pleasure, each note rang of delight, as if the oil were seeping into her veins and filling her with its flowery essence. The air in her sun-soaked chamber smelled like a butterfly’s paradise.

  When she was finished, half the bottle remained. Gulabi was a practical woman with no use for waste. She considered the yaksha’s words from this angle and that but concluded a second massage could only magnify her joy. So she performed one.

  Soon after sunset, amidst the throes of birthing, Gulabi screamed. In response, the baby emerged.

  A gasp escaped the midwife as she received the infant. A moment later, Gulabi, too, gaped at the washed and swaddled baby laid in her arms. It was a girl, which did not surprise her, but the girl was red! Not the red of a newborn taking her first breath, not the scarlet of spilled blood, but a rich, dark crimson, as though she had leached the hue from Gulabi’s favorite roses. Under the flickering lamplight, the baby’s face gleamed, fresh and dewy like petals, and her hair shone greener than grass.

  Gulabi ran a tentative finger along the girl’s tender arm. Something pricked her, and she jerked back in pain. “My child has thorns! My child is crimson!” Her heart ached, but she could not deny the truth. “My child . . . my child is a rose.”

  She did not know what to think but that the yaksha had tricked her.

  Her ladies-in-waiting, although curious, kept to the corners while Gulabi gazed down at the tiny girl. The baby did not cry, simply returning her mother’s stare with inquisitive eyes. Deep brown eyes, Gulabi was pleased to see, like her own. Her pulse quieted as her heart opened. Perhaps there had been no trick, after all.

  “Bring the chappals,” she commanded, and her personal attendant ran to do so. Once the sandals were at hand, Gulabi reached into the blanket and placed the right chappal on the baby’s right foot. The toes were minuscule, miraculous, with nails like seashells.

  When she moved to put the left chappal on, the baby shrieked, her face screwing up and her eyes squeezing out tears. “Sister,” she insisted. “Sister, sister!”

  The rani paused, confused. Whatever could her daughter mean?

  As if to answer, the contractions commenced once more, and another girl joined the first, this one with fine skin the brown of tilled earth, thickly lashed cinnamon eyes, and a cap of fluffy black hair. The midwife sighed with relief as she handed the charming child to Gulabi.

  The brown baby caught sight of the rose baby and smiled. “Sister,” she said.

  Beaming, the rose girl pointed to the brown girl’s right foot, and beaming in turn, Gulabi placed the second chappal there. She would have to commission matches for each girl, but for now, this would do.

  The time came for Gulabi Rani to name her precious daughters. “Lavanya for grace and Deepika for light,” she proclaimed, her voice fierce yet fond. “Let no one say otherwise.” She cuddled her daughters, rose and brown, grace and light, close. Together, they began to explore the ways of the world.

  The sisters grew up, always together, always playing, as twins are wont to do. Few in the palace were fond of Lavanya, with her garnet-tinted skin and hair like spring leaves, fearing her to be a demon or some other foul spawn. Those who dared lay a hand on her bare flesh risked the cruel prick of thorns hungry for blood. A much-beloved perfume drifted from the girl, captivating those who smelled it, but also enchanting bees and beetles, aphids and earwigs, and many other things the courtiers found less than desirable. Though the kingdom treasured its rani, it could not love her crimson daughter.

  The ladies-in-waiting and nurses did their best to avoid the odd girl, going so far as to lock her away in her rooms on the rare occasions they found her alone. Out of sight was out of mind, they said, and a good thing, too. For Deepika, however, they had endless treats and trinkets, offers to brush and braid her hair, and pleas for her to sing, as hers was the sweet voice of the nightingale.

  But the sisters refused to be separated even a moment. The strange story of their birth, the chappals that kept pace with their growing feet, their interest in nature and stories—these things bound them to each other more securely than any rope.

  Lavanya did not mind the isolation so much. Indeed, she quite liked her peculiar skin, for butterflies spoke to her as they would to no other, in the soft, luscious language of nectar, and she could pluck her thorns as she needed them. Why should she be lonely, when she had Deepika for a companion?

  Deepika adored her rose sister in the way the moon adores the sun, finding favors and festivities to mean little when they went unshared. Everything she received, she divided in two; it was the way of things. What use were playmates who did not understand this?

  And so they lived for years, learning their lessons, watching their mother the rani rule, and advancing their arts. Lavanya wandered the grounds, gossiping with the roses and evading the petulant gardeners. Yet when she played the bansuri, a flute carved of bamboo, both the plants and their caretakers paused to listen. Deepika took up archery and embroidery. Her arm was strong and her aim true, and her nimble fingers animated the fine needlework images until the fa
bric thrummed with their tales.

  One evening, over a banquet of roasted fowl and spiced vegetables, Gulabi entertained a rani and a raja from another kingdom. They sat in the marble dining chamber discussing matters of politics and economy as Deepika ate her fill of the birds she had hunted, and Lavanya sipped at water from a golden cup. She also ran her fingers through a small dish of rich black soil, a delicious dessert to her earlier meal of sunlight.

  But Lavanya could not enjoy it. She did not like the visitors, the knowing way they smiled at Deepika, the boisterousness with which they talked and laughed. It rankled her, though she could not say why.

  She looked at Deepika, who scooped thick saffron curd with the spoon of her hand. Her lips parted, then pursed as the raja spoke.

  “So you see, Gulabi Rani,” he said, his teeth tearing into a fleshy leg of pheasant, “clearly it is in the best interests of all to join our children in marriage.”

  The words, uttered so casually, so naturally, brought the entire court to silence. Lavanya reached for Deepika’s hand just as it found hers. A scratchy sensation stole over her body, the familiar feel of eyes that assessed and quickly dismissed her in favor of her sister.

  Of course it would be Deepika. The visitors wanted her for their son as though she were a bauble to be bought and sold. Lavanya glared at them, and the thorns in her arms bristled. How dare they?

  “Yes, Deepika would be a fine match for our Vibhas,” the visiting rani agreed, ignoring, or perhaps enjoying, the hush that blanketed the hall. “Such a beautiful girl. She would, of course, have to give up the hunting.”