by Liz Braswell
The girl flickered, appearing a few feet away.
Phillip spun around and slashed, even faster than he had before.
It didn’t matter.
They kept going at it: Phillip attacking and the girl smiling and disappearing and reappearing and nothing else.
Aurora Rose felt sick. None of the magic, nothing they had seen in the dreamworld before, had looked anything like this.
Finally, Phillip fell back, exhausted.
“I told you,” the girl said—not with a mocking tone but with one of infinite patience, which was somehow worse. “You cannot touch me, Prince Phillip.”
“I do not intend to ‘touch’ you, demon,” he growled. “I mean to run you through and keep your evil hands away from Rose.”
“Ah. Well. Not everything in here is a demon, Prince Phillip. Or rather, not all of the…things…in here are Maleficent’s creations,” the girl said, strangely adult sentences coming in her high, young voice.
The prince and princess had matching expressions of confusion, which the girl obviously found amusing.
“Some…things…are from Aurora’s own mind.”
The princess sucked in her breath. There was something resonant in that statement. The girl did not look exactly like her. But the crown…
“Or wait…is it Rose now? What is it? Rose or Aurora? What are you going by these days?” the girl asked, brow furrowing in put-on seriousness.
“If you’re from my mind, you should know,” Aurora Rose managed to say, trying to channel Phillip’s usual insouciance.
“Ah, but you don’t know, do you?” the girl said.
“From your mind? What is she talking about?” Phillip demanded. “Rose, what is she? What is this?”
All of her life had been inaction. All of her life had been waiting for other people to do. Ever since she had escaped the Thorn Castle, she had known she wouldn’t last much longer if she continued this way.
Before she could talk herself out of it, she drew her sword and attacked.
She didn’t question whether she could strike what looked very much like a young girl. She just screamed and threw herself into it.
Unblinkingly, the girl watched the princess come at her. At the last moment she put her hand up. A small wooden sword appeared in it, a clunky plaything.
When Aurora Rose brought her own sword down, the girl moved to deflect it.
The princess’s sword bounced off the wooden sword with an unreal booming sound. It echoed sickeningly off the trees.
Her arms and upper body were shaken by the force of the rebound. She had been completely unprepared for how solid the girl and her sword were.
But Aurora Rose gritted her teeth and swung again.
The girl spun her sword and did a clumsy, childish parry and riposte. The tip of her toy didn’t reach anywhere near the princess’s body.
Aurora Rose raised her sword above her head, prepared to do the girl in. To cleave her head in half if she had to.
The girl made a concerned, tching sound.
“Are you sure you’re up to this?”
The princess shook with the effort of holding the sword. It wasn’t so big a thing, really, but it was solid metal and above her head. She could feel the blood draining down her arm into her shoulder and it ached terribly.
And what was the point?
They couldn’t kill the thing. Whatever it was.
Her sword fell to her side.
“Rose, kill it!” Phillip shouted. “It’s not a little girl!”
“I know,” she said dully.
“Don’t feel bad,” the girl said. “You’ve only killed one other person, really. I’m not counting the mist sprite because your boyfriend here helped you finish it off.”
Aurora Rose felt herself wilting. Person?
“That demon who looked like me was no person,” Phillip said quickly. “It was another evil creature, like yourself, whatever you may think you are.”
“Honestly, you seem a little tired,” the girl observed, looking at Aurora Rose and ignoring the prince.
The princess collapsed to the ground. It was kind of a relief. She didn’t really want to kill the girl, anyway. And the ground was safe and comfortable.
The girl smiled sadly at her like a mother at an exhausted baby.
Phillip watched in confusion—but only for a moment. He took the opportunity to try a sneak attack, running up behind the girl with the pommel of his sword raised to knock her on the head.
The girl didn’t even bother to look. She was suddenly a mirror image of herself, still turned to observe the princess, but now at the opposite angle.
Phillip fell over, with no plan in his mind for stopping once he had engaged the girl.
The girl stood there, looking mildly disappointed, both teenagers on the ground around her.
Aurora Rose struggled up from the inviting ground. She had to do this. She had to. She was just so weak, and battered-feeling, and exhausted….
“No, no, stay there. Really. You look like you could just…use…a little…lie…down…” the girl said sweetly.
The princess lay down with her head in the dirt, feeling waves of not caring wash over her. It was just like when she was a little girl….
“Rose!” Phillip cried. He leapt up. “Rose! What are you doing? Get up!”
“Leave her alone, can’t you see she’s done in?” the girl said with mock impatience.
Aurora Rose felt sluggishness pour over her like molten lead from her feet to her shoulders. It was a dark wintry day in either life, Thorn Castle or forest, when the sky was an ugly noncolor and it was cold, but not the kind that made you want to bundle up and be comforted with a cup of hot tea. It was the kind of day when you just lay, unblinking, and wished to die.
“Rose! Stop it! Get up! Why are you listening to her?” Phillip demanded.
“She’s listening because I’m not telling her anything she doesn’t already feel,” the girl explained with a mysterious smile. “I’m not telling her to do anything she doesn’t already want to do.”
“That’s not true,” Phillip said—but he was hesitant. “Rose?”
She picked up her weary head to look at him. She couldn’t do much more than that. This really was what she wanted: to be left quietly, at rest, alone.
Maybe it would be better if everyone just stopped talking.
“Behold your true love,” the girl said through perfect tiny white teeth. It was almost a hiss. “A directionless, indecisive, despondent, sad little girl.”
The princess wrapped her arms around her legs, each word dripping acid into her ears. It felt strangely good.
“That’s not true!” Phillip said, going to her and kneeling down. He put his hand on her chin and turned her face so she was forced to look at him. His eyes were large and bright and passionate. “I fell in love with Rose because she was happy and lighthearted. I fell in love with her because she was beautiful and as cheerful as the sunshine. I fell in love with her because I heard her singing with her beautiful voice…as carefree as a songbird. I fell in love with a girl who danced and twirled across the meadows like an angel of happiness.”
Aurora Rose listened to him. The words sounded sweet and he obviously meant each one.
But her chin felt awkward in his grasp and she began to think about what he had said.
“That’s why you fell in love with me?” she asked, feeling a little bit of energy come back as she spoke, a little bit of anger rising through the sloth.
“Yes,” Phillip said uncertainly.
“Because I twirled?”
“You were so beautiful when I came upon you…your hair sparkling in the sunlight….”
“You fell in love with, as in wanted to spend the rest of your life with, a silly girl you found spinning by herself in the middle of the woods?”
“But,” Phillip said, “it wasn’t just that….”
“No,” she snorted. “It was the singing and the…cheerfulness?”
; “You were the most delightful girl I had ever met,” he protested.
“You were going to drop everything in your life for a pretty girl you thought was delightful?”
“It was either you or a princess I hadn’t even met yet,” Phillip pointed out. “You seemed like someone I could spend the rest of my life with.”
“Because I was given the gifts of song and beauty and grace,” she spat.
“It doesn’t matter how you got them, it’s who you are.”
“I think we’re going to run into some more trust issues here,” the little girl interrupted. “Especially if you think you know Aurora. Rose. Whatever.”
“It’s not who I am,” the princess said, ignoring the girl. “I am not cheerful and lighthearted. You caught me on a good morning, when I was going mad with loneliness from living in a forest with three crazy aunts and the overwhelming desire for a boy. Any boy. I was remembering a really great dream I used to have about meeting the perfect boy, which was as close as I had ever come to meeting a real boy except for the young woodsmen and villagers my aunts so carefully kept me away from. And then suddenly there you were, like out of my dreams.”
“I know,” Phillip said. “It really was perfect.”
“Listen to me,” she said, trying to fight the weakness that was overtaking her again—as well as Phillip’s good-natured but not always insightful personality. “I spent—spend—many days in both worlds just…lying around. More time than I spent twirling. The joy I felt when you came was more than I had ever experienced at the cottage in the woods.”
“But…it seemed so idyllic,” the prince said helplessly.
“It was boring. Nothing ever happened. Ever. I wanted to…I don’t know…do things. See things. I don’t even know what I wanted.”
“But isn’t that normal? I know I felt that way.”
“You say you felt that way. Past tense. What changed that?”
“Well, I went to university and made lots of new friends and…” Phillip trailed off.
The princess shook her head and looked at the ground.
The creepy girl gave a quiet laugh. “Oh yes, given your opportunities, perhaps she would have been all right. If she could have gone to a place where her other talents could have been trained. Where she would have been forced to work and learn and make friends and go out into the world.
“Honestly, even if she were raised normally, maybe she would be better in time and her sadness would become a passing stage. In a farm family, where there was work to do, things to learn and keep her occupied. Or a village family, where she looked forward to meeting boys at the dance every season. Or even as a royal princess, who had charity work to organize and…I don’t know…tapestries to sew. But she didn’t just feel trapped; she was. And she didn’t even know it. She just felt it.”
“You’re speaking nonsense,” Phillip said. The phrase was so odd for him Aurora Rose wondered if he had heard it often from someone else. “Everyone is sad once in a while. Rose is fine. She’s not a sad person, or whatever you’re trying to imply. You’re filling her head with lies, demon.”
And with that he rose and looked away—then dealt a blow to the girl in the face with the pommel of his sword.
It was horrible to watch.
The rounded metal end sank into the girl’s nose noiselessly; there was no expected crack of cartilage or snap of bone. The girl’s features simply crumpled around the metal like a pillow being crushed.
And then her face slowly popped back into place.
“Don’t bother, Phillip,” the princess said wearily. “It won’t work. And besides, she’s right.”
“No, she’s not!” the prince cried. “You’re a happy, cheerful, beautiful girl, and she’s trying to turn you into something you’re not…to kill you with these ideas….”
“I pricked my own finger!”
Phillip stared at her.
Even the girl looked surprised.
“How does the story go?” Aurora Rose asked tiredly. “The fairies took me to the castle, where, sad about losing the love of my life, I sat alone weeping and…”
“And Maleficent cast a spell over you,” Phillip whispered. “She hypnotized you, worked her evil magic on you until she controlled your thoughts, and led you to the secret room with the spindle, where she guided your hand…”
“She did open a secret passageway to a room with a spinning wheel. At least, that’s what I assume it was, never having seen one before,” the princess admitted. “And yes, I think she did try to control my thoughts. But for goodness’ sake—she appeared like an evil green ball of fire and told me to follow her. Who would listen to an evil green ball of fire? A total idiot?”
“But…”
“I had a pretty good idea of what was going to happen. The curse sort of gathered itself around me as midnight approached. I knew I was going to die or sleep forever or something and I was completely fine with that.”
The prince’s face was a study of shock and surprise.
“Phillip,” she said, searching for words. “I had been by myself in the woods for sixteen years. At least five years too long. And I had finally met you. You really were like someone coming out of my dreams and into my life.
“And then, as soon as that happened, it was over. It was like it was all on purpose. My aunts whisked me away on the night you were supposed to meet them and threw me into a whole new situation with parents I had never known and a wedding to someone I’d never met—set for the very next day! It was too much. I wanted out. Death was better than living through that much disappointment. And sleep was more than welcome.”
Phillip looked away from her to the ground, eyes bright with tears.
“Well, that was a deeply buried secret,” the little girl said. “Even I didn’t know about it.”
“Why didn’t you just…run away?” Phillip cried. “If you were so scared and miserable.”
“I don’t know,” the princess said, frustrated with herself. “It didn’t even occur to me. I didn’t think to. The spindle seemed like the only reasonable option.”
“No, there are always options other than killing yourself,” the prince said, shaking his head. “You could have…I don’t know…”
“And that’s the nature of her, let’s say, sickness. Her, well, me.” The girl spoke politely, like a professor whose clever students had finally figured out the answer themselves. “The mind traps itself. She couldn’t see any way out. Everything seems too hard. Too difficult. Too tiring. Too unlikely. Too prone to failure. Too inescapable.”
With each pronouncement Aurora Rose wilted: each thing the girl said was absolutely true, had always been true. It was as if it was finally recognized by her mind and body as she said it. The familiar black lethargy came over her.
The little girl smiled, far too widely for her tiny features.
“Go to sleep, little princess. This world—any world—is too much for you.”
Aurora Rose felt her eyes become heavy. The ground seemed to grow up through her, both supporting her and pulling her down into its embrace.
Between blinking images she saw Phillip struggling to reach her. It didn’t seem he was trying very hard, though. He wasn’t coming anywhere close to her. Maybe he was giving up, too.
Or possibly it was the black thorny vines that were snaking up out of the ground and wrapping around his limbs. Holding him back.
It didn’t matter.
Her eyes closed, filled with a permanent sap, and her limbs relaxed.
She heard Phillip rustling but finally growing still.
All was silence and peaceful blackness.
And then:
A single sound.
A quiet groan from the stalwart Phillip, who never complained about anything.
She cracked open her eyes.
The prince was now lashed tightly to a tree by the vines, and they were still tightening. Thorns pressed into his flesh. His face was white as he struggled to breathe but was obviously losing that
fight.
There would be no rescue by him. Or for him.
Or for the hundreds of people lying asleep in a castle somewhere in the real world.
And it’s your fault, Aurora Rose.
Usually being yelled at—even by her own mind—only made her want to run away more. To escape into herself. She winced and shifted uncomfortably.
There is an entire kingdom of people asleep, at Maleficent’s mercy, depending on you to rescue them. This is your quest. This is your adventure.
This was her quest. This was her duty.
The little girl must have noticed something shifting in the princess’s countenance; she barely moved and another heavy black wave of lethargy crawled over Aurora Rose and pressed against her like a physical weight.
What could one princess do against a powerful fairy? A fake world? An army of inhuman guards? What was the point in trying? She was only going to fail.
And then a single image came forward and burned itself into the back of her eyes.
Lady Astrid.
Lady Astrid bleeding out on the floor, a once energetic and funny little woman reduced to piles of lifeless flesh.
Somewhere out in the real world her husband wouldn’t even know that she was dead yet.
Aurora Rose began to struggle to her feet. Her legs felt like stone. Her arms ached like she was sick. She ground her teeth together, stepped forward, and swung her sword.
The girl deflected the attack but stepped backward as she did so.
“You should give up,” the girl whispered.
Defeat loomed, ugly and unavoidable, around the princess. She staggered under the fear of failure.
With a moan she stabbed poorly at the girl again, trying to move, trying to continue the fight. Trying to stay awake.
The girl knocked her sword aside easily.
And then she lunged.
It didn’t seem like a blunted wooden toy sword could do any damage. Its painted tip just grazed the princess’s left thigh, but it sliced through her flesh like cloth. Aurora Rose fell back, gulping in pain. It looked like a clean cut, with the precision of the line and the immediate flow of blood; it felt like a jagged, ugly ripping of her skin and the pain of a thousand swords dragging across her.
Like it had been made by the rippled knife Maleficent had used on Lady Astrid.