Prologue:

Eternal sleep wasn't nearly as bad as it sounded. No one is self-aware when they sleep – Princess Elspeth had no idea how long she had lain within that deserted castle. She only knew dream after dream after dream – with the occasional nightmare mixed in, of course.

That was the only drawback of eternal sleep. Nightmares are infinitely more terrifying when there's no waking up from them. Elspeth just had to press on until the nightmare faded away into something more pleasant. She couldn't just wake up, sweating and panting, when the monsters of the darkest recesses of her imagination finally caught up to her and did their worst. She had to endure, let them tear her apart completely, until her mind couldn't bear it anymore and forced the demons to become angels.

Fortunately, nightmares were few and far between. For the most part, Elspeth knew only pleasant dreams. She got married at least a hundred times during her eternal sleep – never to someone whose face was clearly defined. The groom's features were always blurry. Still, Elspeth was always certain of two things: firstly, that he was a prince; secondly, that he was astonishingly handsome.

Sometimes memories crept into her dreams. She dreamt that she was a child again, and that her mother was telling her fairy tales before bed. "Would you like to hear about the frog prince?" her mother would ask. "Or perhaps the princess in the tower?"

"Are these stories real?" young Elspeth would ask. "I want them to be real!"

A shadow would cross her mother's face as she replied, "No, Elspeth. None of these fairy tales are true."

"So there are no witches?"

"No witches."

"No curses?"

"No curses."

"But princesses are real."

"Well, you are real, so I suppose princesses must be real, too!" her mother would exclaim in mock surprise as Elspeth dissolved into a fit of giggles.

That memory would fade to be replaced by another dream – or nightmare. She would dream that she was back in the palace classroom as her tutor drilled her on history, natural science, mathematics, geography, ancient languages, and countless other subjects for which she had no aptitude. Ancient languages had always been her forte, but most other subjects, in her own words, "drained her soul."

Sometimes, she dreamt that she suddenly acquired a genius for mathematics, and she flummoxed her poor tutor by devising new equations beyond his comprehension. Very often, she dreamt that she failed exam after exam. Failing was no issue – after all, she was a princess – but she hated to see the disappointment on her tutor's face. Such dreams of failure were more painful that one might expect.

On occasion, she dreamt of her future as queen of the realm. She saw herself leading the army into battle against the superstitious nations of the south. She saw herself arbitrating disputes with infallible wisdom and penetrating insight. In very few dreams did she fail or even struggle as a ruler. Her imagined future was one of prosperity and spectacular success.

She would have enjoyed sleeping eternally. It was not such a terrible fate. Yet it was not her fate, after all. In the middle of a rather ordinary dream, she suddenly felt an unaccustomed pressure against her lips. This was not the sort of kiss that occurred during her wedding dreams; this was much more real. And when her eyes opened and she found herself face to face with a dark-haired young man, she realized just how real it was – and just how unreal her eternal sleep had been.