Once upon a time – isn't that how all your fairy stories begin these days? A wave of a magic wand, a click of the ruby heels, a tumble down an unsuspected rabbit hole into a land of fantasies. A place built from nothing more than forgotten dreams and wishful thinking. It's a dangerous place, that land of stories. A place where silliness abounds, rolling in like the fog from the fjord on a summer's eve, muddling the mind, dampening the senses. A place where you can forget yourself, waste away to nothing, a bundle of quivering bones and blood vessels. Cocooned inside your head so long as the hallucinations hold. You forget just where it was that fine line between reality and lies blurs. There's no hope for you if you cross it. Once you sweep your toes across that boundary, thinking to be the first to explore the depths of that rabbit hole, to dance your way into oblivion in those devilish shoes, to dare attempt sorcery, you'll forget who you really are.
You'll enter a world where strictly only the good are beautiful, the bad hideous, and an armor bedecked prince astride a gleaming steed is the only one who can save the day. Or a huntsman perhaps, though even they tend to be princes in disguise. Where damsels sing from towers, and birds swoop down to peck up lentils scattered in the ash.
Where love conquers all evils.
Well, there is some truth to that one, actually. I was once told of a man who came to this world in the garb of a mortal. He lived for thirty three years and died, killed by the very people he came to save. His friends scattered, one betrayed him, leaving him to suffer the mob, murdered by strangers. For God so love the world…
He didn't stay dead, though. No. Death could not hold him. Because of his love, his sacrifice, he defeated Death, conquered the grave. He rose, alive. Evil no longer grasps the keys of Hell in his cold, gnarled fingers.
But that is a story, if the truth can be called such a thing, for another time. For time is something we don't have of abundance. We never do. A story has remained locked away in my heart all these years, a story we swore never to tell, never to speak of even among ourselves. Five of the six of us are dead now, angels of light. I don't begrudge them, leaving me here to walk alone, leaving this withered hag to hobble and shuffle her way home. What lies beyond is far greater than anything found in this world. In my narrow mind I think they deserve it more than I ever have.
The grandchildren are sweet though.
Soon, I know, I will be gone too. As the years flitter by, my hair thins to snowy white, my hands web, my voice crackles, and I know. Call it premonitions of the elderly.
Yet the story, the tale, the truth if you will, has become more and more stark, like blood spattered on freshly blanketed snow. I can not say it is a pleasant one, all posies and sunshine like the once-upon-a-times-happily-ever-afters so popular these days, the ones you so enjoy. I'd never dream of telling it to a child. It's certainly not one your mothers would approve of.
No, once upon a time is no place to start. T' would mislead you, make you think this is something it's not. It's full of pain and sorrow, treachery and fear, war and death…so much death.
But it's also of faith and hope, courage and no small amount of luck - or pluck. Funny how often the two appear side by side, running hand in hand with stupidity.
And love – true love.
I've heard of some telling of it, a fraction, a sliver of the truth. With added embellishments and wishful thinking that makes me cringe. Perhaps you've heard of it. I believe it goes fancifully as East of the Sun, West of the Moon. They've captured some aspects; the bear, the prince, the enchantment, the wind, the trolls. As for the rest, the happy ending, you'll have to decide for yourself, trust an old woman's less than eloquent ramblings have you. Or move right on your way, traipsed along down your path.
I am crazy after all.
Shall we begin?
Many years ago, in a poor kingdom far to the north, there lived a troubled queen and the sister she loved more than anything in the world…
