Disclaimer: I do not own the story of Sleeping Beauty. However, I do own this fic and the character, nameless as she may be.
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For a hundred years she has slept, and for a hundred years I have watched over her.
Do not think I did so out of kindness or concern. Over a century ago, I was a very spoiled, foolish girl and I finally crossed the wrong person. My godmother always warned me to be kind to the elderly and the poor because it could easily be a fairy or an enchantress in disguise. Of course, I scoffed at this and at my dear but not quite right in the head godmother and went about my usual activities of being snide and rude to those beneath me.
Had I known then what I know now…who am I fooling? I would not have believed it even from the lips of a sadder, older, and wiser me.
I know that the evil fairy cursed Aurora with death when she would prick her finger on the spinning needle. I know that the intervention of a kind fairy changed the curse so that she would sleep. Would that someone as kind had intervened with me… but alas, my curse is immortality. There will be no husband for me, as I will inevitably outlive him. No children because it would pain me to watch them die as I watched my family all around me die. It matters little now. I have not been outside this castle in one hundred years. I control the briars all around it – quite a useless gift, but one needed if I am to continue guarding the castle and the sleeping princess.
I could run away… but to what? My family is gone, their descendents strangers to me. Here I am around others like myself, who do not age as time passes. They have a small bit of hope, though, as they will wake when she does, and though I am careful to keep all intruders out, I am not all powerful and it has been foretold that the curse will be lifted with true love's kiss…
I watch over her and I hate her more and more each day. She seems so serene, beautiful golden hair spread out on her pillowcase, the faintest of smiles touching her lips. Though she sleeps deeply, I think she too knows that one day she will awaken to the sight of her prince and will begin to live again. What reason do I have to be so jealous? I may not age, and be the same young woman I was all those years go to everyone else, but when I look into the looking glass, all I see is a skeleton. Truthfully, that sight is one that is not as ghastly as it was early on – a slowly rotting corpse. The fairy, for all her wickedness, has a sense of humor. A horrid one.
What have I to live for? Nothing, absolutely nothing.
So I sit here beside the beautiful young Aurora, alternately bathed in light or darkness depending on whether it is day or night. I weep for the foolish arrogance of youth that put me here and mourn for all that might have been had I learned to treat others more kindly early on in life.