On that very day, Giselle had not stopped dancing. She and Hilarion, her best friend at the time, were dancing together as they watched the cows graze.
"It's beautiful," the young girl whispered looking up at the pale blue sky tinted with the orange color of the setting sun.
Hilarion nodded. He liked Giselle quite a bit, but the romantic stuff just didn't strike him as hard as it did her.
The girl leaned forward into an arabesque as both of them began dancing again.
Suddenly, a sapphire blue orb with a white center whizzed toward the pair out of nowhere.
"Look out!" Giselle screamed, flinging herself in front of Hilarion. When the orb began to head for her, she screamed "Hilarion, duck!" But though both of them got themselves out of the orb's reach, it abruptly changed it course and hit Giselle squarely in the chest.
Giselle uttered a muffled squeal and trembled. It felt as though liquid ice was spreading from her heart to her whole being. It was colder than any winter she had remembered.
And then it stopped.
"Giselle? Are you okay?" Hilarion asked.
She quivered again.
"Yeah, yeah, I just felt a chill…let's dance."
They started to dance again when Giselle suddenly stumbled. She gasped, placing her hand quickly on her chest.
"Giselle!" Hilarion cried.
"My…heart…" the girl gasped. "It's beating so quickly…"
From that day on, Giselle's mother forbade her to dance due to her suddenly weakened heart. It did not stop her, however.
In another kingdom, right next to the one where Giselle lived, Odette was having her own misfortunes. Unlike in Giselle's case, Queen Nieve had not intervened to stop Odette from growing up to dethrone her. Odette was a princess from another land who had many sisters, her being the oldest.
Long ago, before she or Giselle had been born, a princess named Leda had been named heir to her kingdom. It was decreed that she must marry to be eligible for the crown. A young count named Rothbart was greedy for power and courted the young princess, but she refused him for a gardener named Cygnus. The jealous Count Rothbart swore to make the lives of Leda and Cygnus miserable.
Many years later, Queen Leda and Prince Cygnus had many children, all girls. When Princess Odette was thirteen, Rothbart, who had studied black magic for the sole purpose of revenge upon Cygnus and Leda, he snuck into the garden in the form of a black owl.
"Look!" Princess Cisne exclaimed, pointing at the owl in a tree.
The other princesses joined her and gazed in wonder.
"That's not possible!" declared Princess Celadonia. "Owls only fly at night!"
"And yet," teased Princess Evelina.
A looming shadow appeared over the three of them. They all began to shudder.
Suddenly, the owl swooped from the tree branch and landed on the ground, transforming into his true form.
"A sorcerer!" Cisne squealed.
Odette and the rest of the princesses rushed toward their sisters.
"Cisne, get away from him!" Odette shouted.
But her warning came too late.
"You shall become great voiceless birds and leave this place forever!" Rothbart cackled, firing bolts of magic at them.
The daughters of Queen Leda looked at each other – and themselves – in horror. They honked in protest. Only they could understand the begs and pleas of their sisters.
With more black magic being thrown at them, they hurried to another land, as he had turned back into an owl and chased them to the border, making it clear that he would attack them if they were to return.
When Cygnus and Leda noticed that it was sunset and their daughters still hadn't returned, they grew sick with worry. It was then that Rothbart appeared before them and announced that they had been transformed into swans and would never come back.
"You should have married me, dear Leda," Rothbart said with a smirk. "Then maybe you wouldn't be crying."
"Leave, scoundrel!" Cygnus ordered, drawing his sword. Rothbart gasped and flew away.
Leda and Cygnus searched far and wide for their daughters. It was two years before they finally found them settled in a valley. Each of them cried for the seven months they spent with their transformed daughters. By the end of it, the tears of the Queen and her consort had become a beautiful, glistening blue lake. After they returned home, the princesses glided on it, and that night, the love in their parents' tears had half-lifted their curse. From sunset until dawn, the princesses would transform back into girls. They never went home for fear of Rothbart.
Three years later, Queen Nieve was growing restless. That worthless girl Giselle had not succumbed to the curse, and any minute now she might be marching through the Snow Queen's palace halls to dethrone her. Nieve had to do something!
"Eira!" she ordered. "Bring me my ice crystal!"
Eira, who had been trying to repair a broken mirror with her ice magic, dropped it and hastened to obey her queen.
Nieve slumped in her icy throne. She was having the worst luck. Not only was Giselle still dancing, but the other girl (whose name Nieve had forgotten) was probably all ready to join her.
She had been complaining in her head when she heard the clink of frozen toeshoes on the ground. Eira was back with a gleaming white diamond in her hands.
"Well done," Nieve said, taking the jewel from her servant. "Now leave me."
Eira did as she was told.
Nieve mumbled some magic words, and the diamond began to vibrate softly. She let it go. It levitated above the ground.
"Show me Giselle!" the Snow Queen commanded.
The diamond showed a beautiful meadow in which a small village sat. Giselle was dancing, though with more caution than she had been when Eira had spied on her three years ago. Something in the distance caught Nieve's eye.
"Show me the travelers nearby!" she commanded.
The diamond's focus moved away from Giselle and toward a hunting party. There were horses, and astride them were noblemen. Leading them was clearly a prince, who was carrying no bow, but a mirror, in which he admired himself.
Nieve chuckled. This was perfect! Surely a shock of seeing royalty would be too much for Giselle. She sent a blizzard toward the party.
Prince Albrecht, the leader of the hunting party, suddenly felt a chill.
"Blizzard!" screamed a nobleman. "Your highness, we must go back!"
Albrecht was stunned. This didn't feel right. It was springtime, so what was a blizzard doing here?
"I'm so sorry, Your Highness," a nobleman further away said. "The way back is blocked by the blizzard. There's no way we'll be able to see."
Albrecht was an ambitious man, and he was not about to give up. His eyes scanned the horizon.
"There!" he finally called, pointing at a patch of blue sky.
The prince and his men rode swiftly to it, winding up in Giselle's field.
Giselle gasped. Who were they?
"Excuse me, sir, but who might you be?" she asked.
The prince just gazed at her. She was beautiful. He had never believed in love at first sight, but she was starting to change his mind.
"I'm…um…"
He couldn't reveal his true name. She would know that he was in an arranged marriage already. If he could get her to love him in return, he might be able to persuade his parents to break it off. If he could win her heart.
"Loys," he finally answered.
"I'm Giselle," she replied.
"She doesn't know he is a prince?!" Nieve shrieked, lashing out at the ice crystal.
"Careful, Your Majesty!" Myrtha cautioned, getting it away from her.
"Get her image out of my sight!" the queen screamed.
Unfortunately for Nieve, Giselle wasn't coming at all close to finding out the truth about "Loys". And to her added dismay, the Snow Queen was observing love blossoming between the two. At first, it was just an annoyance, but it was clear that Giselle was physically getting stronger. It seemed that both of them genuinely loved one another, for Nieve could sense that her curse was weakening. Only true love could break an evil curse.
One night, Nieve was struck with great fear. She had been spying on Albrecht through her ice crystal. He was planning to propose to Giselle. If he did, and she accepted, than Nieve's curse would be no more and she would be dethroned.
It was time that the Snow Queen took matters into her own hands.
A tired Giselle awoke before her eyes opened. It couldn't be morning yet. Everything was way too dark behind her eyelids. Her room had a big window that let in the first rays of the sun.
That was odd. Why was it so hard? True, she was no princess, but her bed was usually comfortable. And the temperature…brrr. It was spring, and a warm spring at that.
Wearily, Giselle opened her eyes.
She screamed, her heart rate increasing with the shock. She was in an ice cold place with glistening blue walls, and – were those jail bars? What was she doing in prison?
"Are you alright, my dear?"
Giselle sat up, looking for the source of the voice.
Sitting in another corner of the cell was a woman with short lavender shoulder-length hair. She was wearing a long dress of sea foam green adorned with many flowers, though the flowers were clearly withering.
"Who are you?" Giselle asked.
"My name is Kalmia," the woman replied. "I am Nieve's younger sister. She locked me up in here a long time ago. What is your name, my child?"
"…Giselle."
Kalmia shed a single tear.
"Giselle…I'm so sorry. It's my fault you're a prisoner. I told Nieve of a prophecy I had, in which I foresaw you and another girl dethrone her. I would not have said a thing, except my sister threatened to harm her messenger."
"Wait!" said another voice. "Giselle? You're here now, too?"
Giselle turned. A girl with dark brown hair in a bun and a purple tutu decorated with feathers had been speaking to her.
"This is Odette," Kalmia explained. "She's the other girl I had the prophecy about."
"I'm sorry Giselle," Odette said through tears. "I hoped she wouldn't capture you. I was cursed by a sorcerer three years ago, and now my sisters are without me…"
Giselle crawled over to her and put one hand on her shoulder. Though she tried to comfort Odette, the future looked bleak to her. There seemed to be no way Nieve's reign would end now.
Kalmia, however, still had one more ray of hope.