Imaginary Worlds

Anyone who knows anything about magic could tell you that no peasant's daughter, however magical, could create gold. It's a complicated trick that requires years of practice. I'd learned to do it only a few months before Wendell fired me. But if Wendell knew anything about magic, none of us would have been in this situation. Before you could say, "Alakazam!", the girl had been taken from her home and thrown in the dungeons with mounds of straw that she had to turn to gold by morning if she didn't want to lose her head.

Now, I'd have been happy to let Wendell learn his lesson by letting the girl fail, but with the girl's life on the line, I had to do something. So just after sunset, I came to the castle, cut a path through the magical defenses those idiot boys had set up--my grandmother's blind cat could have done better--and spirited myself into the dungeon where the girl was being held.

I could tell at a glance that the girl had a spark of magic in her--she was a golden-haired beauty--and could also tell that she'd never done more than parlor tricks in her life. Having magic gives you beauty, using magic--well, it makes you look like me. Fifty-seven years as a court magician shows up on your face. It should have given me the respect my wisdom deserves, but people don't respect wisdom these days. The girl took one look at my face and screamed.

To be fair, that may have been partly because I'd shown up without warning. Once I explained how I'd come in and how I planned to help her out of her predicament, she turned friendly. I took a ring of hers as payment--an out-of-work magician needs to eat (I can't make food out of nothing)--and got to work. I was finished before the sun rose.

My good deed done, I left the dungeon, and hoped the girl would be home by the end of the day. But fifty-seven years at court should have taught me that monarchs never do the decent thing. By noon, I'd learned that King Wendell had declared the girl would only keep her head if she spun another room full of straw into gold.

Another night, the same story--straw comes, girl cries, I show up, take my payment, and do the work that should have been mine this whole time. I spent the whole night hopping mad over the king's idiocy.

The story ended the same way this time, too. Girl thanks me, I go home--and the king demands another room full of gold. This time, though, he sweetened the deal. He must have figured having that much magic in the bloodline wouldn't be a bad thing. If she did this deed tonight, he'd never make her spin straw again--he knew enough about magic to know that feats like this only come in threes--and, as a reward, she could marry the king's only son.

Well, I definitely had to show up for that. It would serve the king right if his son were forced to marry a common girl. And, well, you don't serve at court for fifty-seven years without getting a taste for well-wrought political revenge. A curse on the royal line would have been beneath me, but now I had the chance to demand payment. For my third and final performance, I didn't ask for a gold trinket off the girl--I demanded her firstborn child. The heir to the throne, the continuation of the royal line, would be in my power, and I could bring him back to make his claim on the throne whenever it suited me. You have to admit it was clever.

The girl agreed--what else was she supposed to do?--I spun the gold, the prince married her, and a year later--a newborn prince.

I showed up for my payment, the girl cried, the baby cried--and my revenge was looking a lot more complicated than it had at first. I'm a court magician, not a nursemaid. Besides, what I really wanted wasn't the child--it was recognition. Every magician wants to make a name for himself. Wendell had replaced me, erased me and my accomplishments from the court. I wanted him to know just who had truly been the wonder-worker. I wanted acknowledgement that I was a first-rate magician.

So I told the girl she'd be released from her bargain if someone could tell her my name. I figured Wendell would take a look at me, solve the mystery, and recognize my worth. I would have my satisfaction, and everything would be over.

It took them three days to remember my name! And even then, they only knew it because I practically spoon-fed it to an eavesdropping servant girl. I know that court magician names seem complicated to laymen, but by professional standards, Rumpelstiltskin is not a difficult name!

They did remember my story, though, and they weren't too pleased by my political plot, so I had to do some fancy maneuvering to magic myself out of there before I got a blade through my neck. Made it nice and fiery, too--a dramatic exit worthy of a master magician.

Heart of Stone

Suddenly, you find yourself standing in the sunlit gardens of a royal palace, surrounded by millions of roses. On the edge of a nearby fountain sits Beauty, your youngest sister, wearing the same silk dress she wore when she left home this morning. Her eyes are red from crying, but her smile is luminous as she laughs and cries for joy. She clings to a handsome, dark-haired man who wears clothes fit for a prince, and who murmurs words of gratitude and devotion in her ear.

This, then, is what you've been brought here to see. Beauty returned to the palace, despite your best efforts, and her foolish Beast has become a clever, handsome prince. She will have beauty, riches, jewels, palaces, fine servants, a charming husband, devoted love--everything you wanted to claim for yourself, everything she doesn't deserve, while you have nothing, nothing, nothing...

You rush forward in a rage, not thinking, not knowing what you will do but knowing that you must do something, anything to destroy this universe that has come together so wrong. Push your sister in the fountain, tear that beautiful dress, leave a scar on that face that's always been unbearably, unjustly perfect--

A tall woman appears between you and Beauty. She wears silver-bright armor, and a cloak and headdress of green feathers. She twitches her hand, and you fall facedown on the ground, your limbs soft and nerveless. The next moment, they are stiff as boards, stiff as stone. Before your unblinking eyes, your entire body turns smooth and white.

After the transformation washes over you, something stands you upright. Your legs hold you, but you can't move, can't blink, can't breathe.

The woman--fairy, warrior, queen--looks you in the eye, so you can see the triumphant glitter in hers. With a wave of her hand, a shimmering ellipse, like a falling curtain of water, appears in front of you, reflecting the white marble statue you've become. You are a woman, graceful and elegant, in a flowing dress, holding a marble urn--perfect Grecian beauty, lovelier than your sister ever was. The fairy gives a subtle smirk, as if she hears the thought, mocks you with it--your wish at last fulfilled in the most horrifying way.

"As punishment for your wickedness," the fairy says, "you will serve as a statue in these gardens until you fully repent. You will retain your awareness and reason, but the curse will only be broken when a man falls in love with you."

The harsh glitter in her eyes tells you that she fully believes this will never take place.

You are nearly blind with rage, but you can do nothing. You can't move, cry, scream, fight, beg or plead. You've spent your life feeling powerless, but that is nothing compared to this complete imprisonment.

Beauty tries to plead for you, but the fairy won't hear it.

"She does not wish for your help," the fairy says, and you hate, hate, hate that the fairy knows this. "She has a lesson she must learn--and she will take a long time learning it."

With another wave of her hand, the fairy, Beauty, and her prince disappear. You are left alone, nothing but stone--helpless, hopeless, heartless.

-

You remain in the garden, always still, always aware. Suns and moons rise and set in an endless progression. Your stone body is weathered by sun, snow, sleet, wind, storms, hail, and rain. Millions upon millions of roses bud, bloom, and wither.

In early years, Beauty often speaks to you, begging you to soften your heart, offering her forgiveness and asking you to grant yours. If you were not stone, you would scream at her. What have you to forgive the perfect, generous Beauty? What do you have to repent from that could ever be worth a punishment like this? Something in Beauty seems to sense your rage, because her visits become shorter, fewer, and eventually, stop altogether. She might linger at your side once every five years or so, but she almost never speaks, never makes you look her in the eye.

Before your stone eyes, Beauty and her prince grow old together, raise a healthy family of children, grandchildren, great-grandchildren. Some of them hear your story, but most of them don't care. You are not someone to love, not warm and living like their mother. You are nothing but a stone statue, and have been nothing else as long as they remember.

Beauty, with her fairy heritage, long outlives her husband, but even she, with her more-than-half-human heart, eventually goes gray, withers, and dies. On the day of the funeral, as you watch black-clad crowds stream through the rose gardens on the way to mourn their queen, something inside you cracks, and a feeling wells up that might be grief. You spent your life measuring yourself against this woman, always coming up short, always hating her for it, and now she is gone. Without her, who are you?

That pert, beautiful, too-sweet child you plotted against seems like someone from a million lifetimes ago. You have seen her as a woman, wife, mother, grandmother, queen. She got love, wealth, power, belonging--what does that matter to either of you now? She has moved beyond all that. She enjoyed life's goodness, and there is plenty left for those she leaves behind.

Why did you begrudge her this? Why did you try to seize it for yourself? You see the proof before you--love is not limited. It does not take all goodness to itself, but grows, and grows, and grows.

The sister of the queen could have had a wealthy husband of her own. Even the servant of the queen could walk through these gardens instead of standing endlessly in one place. Beauty wanted to share it, and you, in your greed and pride, wanted nothing of it unless you could deprive her of her share.

Stone cannot cry. Stone cannot throw flowers on the grave. Stone cannot pray or beg forgiveness. But you--whatever scrap is left of your soul--can grieve what you were and wish for the chance to be better.