Fierce, Fearless and Free

by Lari Don

  But Sister Lace didn’t change her mind. Every day the emperor visited her cell, to demand that she marry him, stay in his palace and make lace only for him. Every day she refused.

  Eventually he said, ‘I will give you one chance to go home to your village. I will set you a lace-making test and if you pass I will set you free. But first you have to agree that if you fail, you will marry me.’

  Sister Lace was keen to go home and was confident of her lace-making skills, so she agreed.

  The emperor grinned. ‘Then by tomorrow morning, you must make me a real live mouse of lace!’ He tossed her bobbins and pins through the bars.

  Sister Lace worked all night to make a perfect life-sized mouse, with ears and nose and tiny little paws. When the sun came up, she pricked herself deliberately with a pin and let one drop of her blood fall into the lacy eye of the mouse.

  The delicate little mouse began to move. It scurried around the cell, sniffing the corners and nibbling the dry rice. When the emperor arrived, the pink-eyed white mouse was running happily around the lace-maker’s feet.

  ‘A mouse of lace,’ said Sister Lace, ‘as you requested.’

  ‘But… but… but… that’s impossible!’ he shouted. ‘That moving mouse can’t be made from lace, it must have crept in through a hole in the wall. You must try again. By tomorrow morning, you must make me a real live cockerel of lace.’

  Sister Lace worked all night to make a perfect life-sized cockerel, with feathers, beak and high confident tail. When the sun came up, she pricked herself deliberately with a pin and let one drop of her blood fall into the lacy eye of the cockerel.

  The proud white bird began to move. It strutted around the cell, flapping its wings. When the emperor arrived, the white cockerel crowed.

  ‘Cock a doodle doo!’

  ‘A cockerel of lace,’ said Sister Lace, ‘as you requested.’

  ‘But… but… but… that’s impossible!’ he shouted. ‘That crowing cockerel can’t be made from lace, it must have flown in the window. You must try again and this time you must create a beast that can’t possibly get into your cell any other way. By tomorrow morning, you must make me a real live dragon of lace.’

  Sister Lace worked as fast as she had ever worked, to make a life-sized dragon, with sharp horns, long claws, wide wings and powerful jaws. By the time she was finished, the coils of the lace dragon covered the floor of the cell.

  When the sun came up, she pricked herself deliberately with a pin and let one drop of her blood fall into the lacy eye of the dragon.

  The huge sinuous dragon began to move. It twisted and stretched, filling the cell with its tail and wings and jaws, pushing the lace-maker, the mouse and the cockerel into one corner.

  When the emperor arrived, sure she must have failed, sure she would have to marry him now, he saw a dragon in the cell.

  ‘A dragon of lace,’ said Sister Lace, ‘as you requested.’

  This dragon was obviously made of lace: the emperor could see intricate lacy patterns on every scale. It was obviously alive: moving and breathing and pushing against the bars. And there was no other way a dragon could have got into the cell.

  But if the emperor admitted that his prisoner had made a live dragon of lace, he would have to set her free. So he said, ‘That’s not what I asked for, that’s not a dragon, that’s just… that’s just… that’s just a big fat snake!’

  Dragons do not like being called snakes. Especially not big fat snakes.

  The lace dragon stared at the emperor, with its blood-red eyes set in pure-white scales, and it blasted a ball of fire at him.

  The lace dragon burned the emperor where he stood.

  The lace dragon burned down the prison and the palace.

  Then the lace dragon leaped from the ashes and flew away, with Sister Lace, the delicate mouse and the proud cockerel sitting on its back.

  The dragon flew the cockerel, the mouse and Sister Lace to her village. The mouse made a nest in Sister Lace’s bobbin box, the cockerel bossed the local hens about, and Sister Lace taught a whole generation of talented lace-makers, so their village became famous and prosperous.

  Sister Lace continued to make lace for her family and friends, and that lace was so beautiful it looked almost alive. Almost, but not quite. Because she was far too skilled to prick her finger and drip blood on her lace by accident.

  And the lace dragon, pure-white with blood-red eyes, flew to the mountains and lived on the highest peak. Almost, but not quite, hidden in the snow and ice…

  ALTYN ARYG AND THE SNAKE’S BELLY

  SIBERIAN LEGEND

  Once there was a khan who led the largest tribe in Siberia. He described himself as an unfortunate man, because he had no sons. But the unfortunate person was really his one daughter, Altyn Aryg, because the khan never stopped moaning about how much happier he would be if he had a son instead of a daughter.

  It didn’t matter how hard Altyn Aryg trained to become the tribe’s fiercest warrior, most skilled horse-rider and strongest sword-fighter. Her father just kept saying, ‘But who will lead the tribe after me? How unfortunate I am to have no worthy heir…’

  It didn’t matter how many lost lambs or calves Altyn Aryg found and returned to the herd, nor how many tribal disputes she resolved with wisdom and diplomacy, nor how many thieves she tracked and caught. Her father still kept saying, ‘Even one hundred girls wouldn’t be equal to one boy…’

  Eventually Altyn Aryg realised that her father would never be impressed with mere human deeds. She needed to do something superhuman.

  She said to her father, ‘I will show you what one girl can do!’ Then she grabbed his favourite sword and marched out of the tent to hunt for a snake.

  She wasn’t hunting for an ordinary snake; she was hunting for the giant snake that had been terrorising Siberia for years.

  This snake was so enormous that a horse would take a day to gallop along its spine and a tribe could pitch fifty tents in a line across its neck. Its fangs were longer than ten men are tall, and its mouth was wide enough to swallow a tribe in one gulp.

  The monstrous snake demanded that each tribe pay tribute of one thousand cattle a year. If any tribe refused, the snake ate the whole tribe. In one gulp.

  When khans ordered heroes to defeat the snake, the snake devoured the heroes too.

  Altyn Aryg hoped that if she could defeat the snake, her father would finally respect her.

  She tracked the monster, following the trail of crushed plants, cracked earth and weeping relatives. She found a snake as long as a river, as high as a hill, with a grass-green belly and a sky-blue back.

  Altyn Aryg rode all the way up to the monstrous head, jumped off her exhausted horse and stood in front of the snake.

  ‘Have you come to pay me tribute?’ asked the snake.

  ‘Why would I pay tribute to a monster? You don’t deserve my respect or my tribute.’

  ‘Then I will eat you.’ The snake opened its massive mouth.

  ‘No need to eat me,’ replied Altyn Aryg. ‘I’ll jump right in!’

  And she did. The khan’s daughter leaped between the snake’s fangs into the snake’s mouth. She ran down the snake’s throat, towards the snake’s belly.

  And the snake’s jaws snapped shut behind her.

  Altyn Aryg looked around the long belly, which was full of people, their animals, their tents and their lamps.

  The snake’s digestive juices worked slowly, so while there were many gently dissolving corpses at the far end of the belly, there were also herds of cattle, tribes of people and one hundred heroes, all sitting sadly at the other end, waiting to die.

  Altyn Aryg marched up to the one hundred heroes and said, ‘I’m here to help.’

  ‘No one can help,’ said one of the swallowed heroes. ‘There’s no way to escape and no way to kill this beast.’ He pointed to the left side of the belly. ‘Its heart is so hard, none of us can pierce it.’

  Altyn Aryg said, ‘Give me your swords!�
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  The heroes handed her their one hundred swords, then she stabbed and slashed at the heart. It was like hitting a rock, and she couldn’t pierce it either. However Altyn Aryg was so strong that every sword she swung against the snake’s solid heart shattered into a dozen pieces.

  Finally she only had one sword left: her father’s favourite sword.

  She looked closely at the snake’s heart. In the place she’d been striking, the spot where she’d already broken one hundred swords, there was one hairline crack.

  She aimed at the tiny wound, she lunged forward with all her strength…

  And Altyn Aryg drove the sword deep into the snake’s heart.

  She dragged the blade out. The snake’s black blood oozed on to her hands.

  The snake gasped and shuddered, and its mouth fell open.

  Altyn Aryg led the tribes, the herds and the heroes out of the snake’s belly and out of its open mouth. They stood together and watched the snake writhe and die.

  The tribes thanked Altyn Aryg. ‘You have defeated the monster and set us all free. We will pay tribute to you now.’

  Altyn Aryg shook her head. ‘You may keep your herds.’

  ‘But you’ve done what one hundred heroes couldn’t do! You can’t go home empty-handed.’

  She smiled. ‘Once I tell my father how the snake died, my hands won’t be empty for long.’

  Altyn Aryg rode back to her father’s tent, and she told him about the snake, the one hundred shattered swords and the pierced heart. She showed him the black blood on his sword and on her hands.

  The khan bowed his head to Altyn Aryg. ‘You have done what one hundred sons could not have done.’

  Finally, the khan named his one and only daughter Altyn Aryg as his heir, and he offered her both his favourite sword and his respect.

  FINDING OUR OWN HEROINES

  I’m sure all the readers of this book know that girls and boys are equal and should be allowed – in real life and in stories – to defeat their own monsters, go on their own quests, make their own mistakes and solve their own problems. But unfortunately not everyone acts as if that were true, so there is still a need for stories which show that girls are and always have been just as capable, strong, brave and smart as boys.

  Just like the stories in Girls, Goddesses & Giants, my first collection of heroine myths and legends, these stories are all genuine traditional tales. I’ve not turned any heroes into heroines, or male warriors into female ones. I’ve not taken a story about a boy doing something amazing, then stuck a girl in the lead role instead, just to make a point. These tales have all been told, for many years, in many places, about girls who are the stars of their own stories, rather than sidekicks or prizes. (Girls have starred in stories for as long as stories have been told: the story of the goddess who wrestled a mountain is well over four thousand years old.)

  However, I have made other changes to the stories, as every storyteller does. When I share these stories, with live audiences or in print, I tell them in my own voice and in my own way, which is never exactly the way I first heard or read them.

  One change that I’ve made to several of these stories is to cancel the wedding at the end. I’ve always done this when telling stories out loud, and I used to think I was making a major and radical change to the plot. But recently I’ve wondered whether the ‘happy ever after’ ending may have been stuck on to some stories because it was the easiest way to end them. Finding the right line to end a story can be really hard, and once upon a time a storyteller might have thought, ‘I’ve no idea what to do now the girl has defeated the monster! I’ll just say she married a prince and lived happily ever after, then everyone will know the story has ended…’ If a story is about someone searching for the love of their life, the ‘marrying a handsome prince’ ending might make sense; if the story is about a girl escaping an ogre, a ‘marriage’ ending isn’t necessary to the plot and might not have been part of the original story. (We’ll never know, because most traditional tales weren’t written down until relatively recently.) So I’ve removed those unnecessary weddings and let the girls decide their own futures…

  I’d like you to be able to track these heroines back a few steps, so here’s information about where I found each story. I hope you enjoy discovering more about the stories and the people who first told them, and possibly retelling them yourself, in your own way!

  KANDEK AND THE WOLF

  Armenian Folk Tale

  There aren’t many female werewolves in folklore, and even fewer elderly werewolves. So, unlike Kandek, I was delighted to meet this hungry old wolf! I found the story in Armenian Folk-tales and Fables by Charles Downing (Oxford University Press, 1972).

  GODDESS VS MOUNTAIN

  Sumerian Myth

  This was the first Inanna story I ever told, when my frustration at the lack of strong heroines in classical mythology prompted a university lecturer friend to suggest that I look further back in time, at the stories hidden for thousands of years under the sands of Iraq, to find a really kickass goddess. I’ve been an Inanna fan ever since. I’ve worked with various translations of this mountain-wrestling myth, but it was Betty de Shong Meador’s Inanna, Lady of Largest Heart (University of Texas Press, 2000) that encouraged me to imagine Ebih as a volcano.

  NERINGA AND THE SEA DRAGON

  Lithuanian Legend

  There are stories all over the world about giants creating the local landscape, often when they’re fighting each other, so it’s unusual and wonderful that Neringa built this sandy peninsula to protect the people she loved. I first discovered Neringa in The Atlas of Monsters by Sandra Lawrence and Stuart Hill (Big Picture Press, 2017) then pieced together her story from various tourist publications, travel blogs and websites.

  KATE CRACKERNUTS AND THE SHEEP-HEADED MONSTER

  Scottish Fairy Tale

  This is one of my favourite Scottish fairy tales, partly because of that grotesque sheep’s head, but mainly because the two stepsisters love each other, which doesn’t happen nearly often enough in stories. There are lots of versions of Kate’s story, but I first found this tale in The Mermaid Bride by Tom Muir (The Orcadian Ltd, 1998).

  RIINA AND THE RED STONE AXE

  Solomon Islands Folk Tale

  I was drawn to this story not just by the boat full of warrior women, but also because Riina defeated the cannibal by breaking a taboo. Breaking rules is often punished in traditional tales, but this is a wonderful example of how breaking rules can give you power. I found this Solomon Islands story in Pacific Island Legends by Bo Flood, Beret Strong and William Flood (Bess Press, 1999).

  MEDEA AND THE METAL MAN

  Greek Myth

  Medea gets a bad press (she does some horrible things in other stories) but she is a heroine in this tale, using her cleverness and courage to defeat Talos. As with any Greek myth there are as many versions as grains of sand on a Cretan beach, but my starting point for this retelling was Tales of the Greek Heroes by Roger Lancelyn Green (Penguin Books, 1958).

  BRIDGET AND THE WITCHES

  Irish Folk Tale

  This story is told in slightly different forms in my own country of Scotland, so I was intrigued to find this version in Irish Folktales, edited by Henry Glassie (Pantheon Books, 1985). I’m not a big fan of housework (reading books and sharing stories are always more urgent) and I’m relieved to say that, despite my untidy house, I’ve never been bothered by witches spinning beside my fireplace.

  PETROSINELLA AND THE TOWER

  Italian Fairy Tale

  This story reminds me that any well-known fairy tale, like Rapunzel, is just one version of a tale which has been told in many different ways in many different cultures. I particularly like this ‘girl with long hair trapped in a tower’ tale because she manages to escape using magic and because it has a wonderful chase scene. (When I tell it to audiences, I usually end up crawling around on the floor looking for those acorns. It’s a glamorous job, being a storyteller…) I found Petr
osinella in The Tale of Tales by Giambattista Basile, originally written in the seventeenth century (translated by Nancy Canepa, Wayne State University Press, 2007).

  FIRE AND RAIN

  Mexican Myth

  Many cultures tell stories about how humans first got access to fire, often about a bird bringing fire to earth. I like this very different fire origin story, from the Wixárika people of Mexico, because it recognises how dangerous fire can be and gives fire a personality. Also, I love the image of the goddess brushing raindrops out of her hair. There’s a more detailed version in Huichol Mythology by Robert Zingg (University of Arizona Press, 2004).

  NANA MIRIAM AND THE HUNGRY HIPPO

  Nigerian Legend

  I love stories about magical apprentices outdoing their teachers, and it’s even better when a daughter shows her dad how to defeat a monster! The story of how Nana Miriam defeated the hippo is told by the Songhai people in the lands by the River Niger. I found it in West African Folktales by Steven Gale (NTC Publishing, 1995) and it has become one of my favourite stories to tell when I visit schools.

  MARIA AND THE CONDOR

  Ecuadorian Folk Tale

  I didn’t find this story in a book: it reached me in a much more interesting way. I was mentoring a wonderful young Scottish storyteller called Ailsa Dixon, and during the time we were working together, she went on an international scout camp, where she asked her fellow scouts if they knew folk tales from their own countries. Two Ecuadorian girls called Sara and Adriana told her this story, then she told the story to me, and now I’ve told the story to you. That’s how stories have always travelled the world. (It’s also how they change, because Ailsa and I tell the story slightly differently!) Thanks so much to Ailsa, Sara and Adriana.