One day, as he was nearing to the tower, the Prince was halted by the realisation that there was someone else near his princess' tower. It was the old witch, come to visit her captive and laugh at her fate. The Prince stopped before he was within sight and hid. Suddenly he heard the witch call:
"Ugly Child, let down your hair,
So I may climb that raven stair."
As she finished her chant, a ream of hair came tumbling from the tower. The Prince watched as the witch climbed up and rejoiced that he had finally found the mysterious stair. He waited with princely patience for the witch to finish her tormenting of the girl. Once she had left he went to the tower and called:
"Ugly Child, let down your hair,
So I may climb that raven stair."
The shadowy silk cascaded down the walls. As he reached up to her hair, he felt the softness of it under his fingers and his heart beat faster as he thought of She that the hair belonged to.
The princess was frightened when she first saw him for she had never seen a man before, but she was even more beautiful than he imagined and he rid her of her fear with kindness and gentleness. He told her that he loved her and asked her if she would be his wife. The princess decided that she would since she liked the prince much more than the witch. She was not so sure what being his wife meant but he told her that he would find a way to get her away from the tower and then that they would live happily ever after and this pleased her very much. Then the Prince realised that he had spent many hours with his Princess and he should go if he did not want to get caught by the wicked witch. He kissed her sweet rose lips in farewell and climbed down the charcoal velvet to where his horse waited below.
The Princess watches her Prince ride away into the sunset, still feeling the pressure of his lips against hers.
The flickering darkness of the tower seemed like a nightmare after the sunlit day she had spent with Prince Enthralling. This is not life thought Shian. Indeed it seemed so for how could a night of shadows and flickering light and darkness compare to a day bright with Him. Unknowingly, her mother spread the darkness of her heart within the tower making it an unwelcome place to be. Shian pressed her hand to the wall as if to reassure her of its reality. She saw the stone of these walls as both safety and confinement. In trying to protect Shian, the Witch Queen had built her a cage which did not permit her to fly. Yet Shian yearned to fly. She wondered why the same yearning did not fill her mother for it seemed like such a natural desire and for the first time wondered if her father had stolen it from her mother. For it seemed that he had certainly stolen much of her heart and soul. Looking at her mother standing by the window and gazing out into the depths of darkness she imagined the cage that her father had wrought for the confinement of her soul. A cold silver filigree with garnet roses. And like the roses she had played with as a child, these also had thorns. So the bird of her soul could press itself against the bars of its cage as much as it desired and all it would get for its efforts was the spilling of its blood.
As much as she loved her mother and feared for her, she would not give herself freely to the cage that awaited her with the Witch Queen.
"Mother… mother, what to you see?" asked Shian attempting to gain the courage to tell her mother about the Prince.
Her mother turned at the sound of her voice and looked surprised to see her standing there. She had been thinking of her young girl and yet now looking upon her she saw the face of one who was almost a woman. It filled her with fear and foreboding.
"There is nothing but darkness…" she answered.
The pessimistic gloom of her mother caused a fire to burn in her belly.
"No," she answered causing the Witch Queen to pause in the act of walking away. Her mother remained completely still.
"All is not darkness. I know you speak of more than the fact that it is night. You think life is void of light, but you are wrong. There is much to be gained from life but you are too bitter to see. What about love? Is love not light…"
The Witch Queen froze Shian's lips with the venom in her eyes.
"You speak to me of … love…" she hissed, "What do you know of love! You are a fool! Have you learnt nothing. Love. Is. Darkness. It pretends to be light and beautiful but it causes wounds that rip and tear your soul to pieces. Of all the darkness in the world, it is love that is the most sadistic. How can you stand there and tell me that love is light. Look at what love has caused. Look at the consequences of Love."
Shian had involuntarily stepped back against the stone at the acid in her mother's voice. She looked with fear upon the golden fires of madness that burned in her mother's eyes. The urge to run from the witch the darkness had caused to surface was overpowering. But Shian fought it. If she ran, the madness would take over her mother and then it would come looking for her. She could run, but even if she went away with the Prince to his palace, it would find her. Did it not find her mother and seep through her love for her Prince to destroy her. The sickly golden glints in Moriana's eyes would come for her too.
"You are wrong. Sorrow and Death have made your eyes blind. My eyes are not so deceived," said Shian, stepping forward and away from the wall. Stepping away from safety.
The bottom of her black dress swept up faint, almost unnoticeable golden dust from the floor as the Witch Queen neared Shian.
The Princess was startled from her dreaming by the sound of a harsh voice calling for her to let down her hair. She threw her precious hair out of the window and the Witch climbed up. She noticed that the witch took much longer to climb to the top and was much heavier than her Prince.
Her long, pale fingers caressed Shian's cheeks in an almost loving way. Shian eyes widened at the sudden pain of Moriana's grip but she did not cry out as her claws cut into her cheek and jaw.
"How you repay me, girl," whispered the Witch, "I plucked you from the weaving of a story that would destroy you and you repay me by calling me deceived. Think you that the world is bright and beautiful. Think you we live in a dream of happiness. There is nothing but darkness in the world. There is emptiness and Story. Both are dark but Story is worse for it pretends it is light. And so I have tried to hide you from story. I could not offer you anything, but I could let you know the true nature of the world you live in. Think you that I am deceived. Look at your life, girl. It is empty and dark. Yet still, you are no Princess and there is dark hope in that for if one beauty can escape the grip of Story then who knows what may come after. Yet I fear I have failed for the world grows darker."
Moriana let her hand fall from Shian's face. She looked into her child's eyes, searching for darkness, for betrayal. For Story. She searched but did not see the golden glow pushing Shian to the ending it desired.
"My life is not empty and dark, Mother. Love lights my life," she declared boldly.
When the Witch alighted, the Princess frowned at her and asked her why she was so much slower and heavier than the Prince. "Oh! You wicked child," cried the Witch. "What is this I hear? I thought I had hidden you safely from the whole world, and in spite of it you have managed to deceive me."
"Love? The Love of a Prince? You betray me. You betray yourself. But there is still a chance… Your beauty calls it but perhaps there is still a chance…"
Before Shian could figure out what the Witch Queen meant, Moriana had grabbed hold of her hair and was dragging her to the kitchen.
Shian shouted and tried to loosen the Witch's grasp on her hair but it was as if some magical force had given her a sudden strength and she could not make her let go. She watched through a stream of dark silk as her mother brought a knife out. Shian froze.
"Mama… please what are you doing! Mama, please… please put the knife away. Oh please!" she sobbed.
…In her wrath she seized the Princess' beautiful hair, wound it round and round her left hand, and then grasping a pair of scissors in her right…
In her madness, the Witch Queen slashed the knife at the silky darkness in her hands.
…snip snap, off it came, and the beautiful plaits lay on the ground.
"If you are not beautiful, then he will not try to cage you and steal away your soul," muttered the Witch as the strands of beauty fell to the floor around Shian.
"You betrayed me, but I will still save you. I will stop you from turning into a witch. He cannot have you if he cannot find you. It shall not destroy you with its golden lies," said the witch to the sobbing girl as she pulled her to the tower dungeon.
…And she was so unmerciful that she took the Princess into a wilderness…
The girl cried at the pain of the Witch's hold on her arm, at the loss of her beautiful hair, at the madness of her mother. Blinded by tears and golden light she did not try to fight the witch as she locked her in the dungeon.
"Mother! Think of what you do! I'm your daughter. Why are you doing this to me? Can you not let me be happy?"
But the Witch was deaf to her pleas. Surrounded by the thorny tendrils of golden light that ripped her to shreds she lived only in darkness.