by Anita Valle
Rotten Rapunzel
Copyright © 2017 by Anita Valle
All rights reserved
No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission of the author except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews. For information, e-mail the author at [email protected]
Anita Valle Art
Cover art by Anita Valle
First Edition: September 2017
Prologue
Snow White locked me up in this tower.
For fifteen years, I have been her prisoner. It’s enough to drive a girl batty. When I was younger, she’d let me out sometimes to play in the snow. But not anymore. The kingdom is in peril, or so she says. We’re in “dark days” now.
Ooh, I’m so scared.
What really burns me up is that this is my kingdom. Snowy could’ve been the queen but she chucked it years ago. So the title falls to me, her younger sister. It should be mine. It will be mine.
Someday, I’ll escape my stupid tower. I’ll cross The Wood that covers this kingdom and take back the palace. I’ll become the queen I deserve to be and have a huge party with all of my friends.
And maybe even get a haircut.
~*~ 1 ~*~
Snowy summons me to the window.
“Rapunzel!” she calls. “Let down your hair!”
You know, there’s a door here. And stairs that wind up through the tower. She used to use them. But when a nasty queen took over our kingdom, Snowy sealed the door with ice. She’s magic like that. My foot has not touched the snow for five years. And she doesn’t even care.
I turn on the stool and slide away from the pipe organ. She’s always interrupting my music, right at the good parts, too. I walk to the window, my long red hair dragging over the floor like a snake. I’m so deathly sick of doing this.
The window is of glass, two frigid panels that open like doors at the center. I push them out and lug my braid to the front of my shoulder. I gather up the long weave, looping it over my arm, and hang it from an iron hook that sticks out above the window. The braid rolls down to where Snowy is standing. I wait until I feel the tug, then I lurch back and pull, hand over hand, my braid hissing over the hook. It’s like trying to haul up a cow - I guess. I’ve never actually seen a cow.
Snowy rises to the window and steps through. She’s wearing a white fur coat all the way to her ankles, which makes her twice as heavy. And she always sticks her foot between the strands of my braid, which completely screws it up. I’ll have to unravel the last two feet, brush it out, and braid it again.
“Did you get my gingerbread?” I ask, my breath whitened by the freezing-cold air that swoops in. I snap the window shut.
Snowy sets down her basket and slides out of her coat. She smells like fresh air and berries and faintly like pine. I’ve got a good nose.
“I tried,” she says. “None of the bakers had any. Not much call for it right now.”
I exhale loudly and walk back to my organ. It’s a massive instrument, with rows of old pipes that cover the wall, rising tall at their center like fingers pointed in prayer. I lift my toes onto the pedalboard and press my fingers to the bone-white keys. Music fills the tower, high and whiny.
Snowy passes behind me and clomps down the stairs with her basket. The rooms here are round, each one stacked above the other. My organ room is highest, the only one that has a window. Our tower stands in the hills and Snowy says my music travels far across The Wood. But no one comes near this tower, they’re too afraid. Not of me, though. Of her.
The Snow Queen.
She comes back up the stairs now. I break off my music in mid-phrase and spin around on the stool. My braid curls around my feet like the tail of a cat.
“You could’ve asked the baker to make some gingerbread,” I say. “I’m sure he would’ve done it for you.”
“That would have taken hours,” Snowy says. She’s wearing a plain dress of white wool with long, tight sleeves. Her straight, black hair is loose and long, though not nearly as long as mine. Snowy is sixteen years older than me but we look almost the same age. Something about the ice magic that’s in her, it’s frozen even her youth.
I give her a withering look. “Well, it’s not as if I’m going anywhere, is it? I could’ve waited for the gingerbread!”
“Then you would’ve been mad at me for taking so long.”
“What did you get us for supper, some dumb bread and cheese?”
“Some figs too,” she mumbles.
“I want gingerbread!” I slap my hand down on the keys, the organ growls. Snowy flinches back. “Rapunzel, please, it’s such a long walk.”
“Is that my fault?” I press a hand to my chest. “We could be living at the palace! And have all the food we wanted. But no, you had to hole us up here like some kind of coward!”
“The kingdom is dangerous!” Snowy shouts. “Today I heard rumors-”
“I want GINGERBREAD!” I scream, grabbing the sheets of music off the organ and flinging them at her. They fan out and flap around before swooping to the floor. “Gingerbread, or no more tears.”
Snowy looks at me. “You can’t do that.”
“Oh no? I don’t have to cry.” I fold my arms and smirk. I cry much less than I used to and I know it worries her. “How many tears have you got left?”
Snowy sighs. “One.”
I cock my head. “Get my gingerbread. And then – maybe - I’ll cry for you tonight.”
Snowy rubs her face and looks tired. Slowly, she walks to the window. “Very well, Rapunzel. Let down your hair.”
~*~ 2 ~*~
Where has all the color gone?
The sun is sinking. It nearly touches the tip of the palace which sits down in the valley, past the long sweep of hills covered in sharp treetops. It’s always so cold in here. But I stand at the window to fill my eyes with the pink and purple sky. Sunrise and sundown. The only times my world has color.
I remember when the world was green – it was so long ago. I would play in the clearing that surrounds this tower and my feet ran over something fluffy and warm that Snowy referred to as grass. It looked like green hair and smelled like sunshine. Then came the winter, with the clouds and the snow. And it never left.
The winter grew to cover the kingdom. In The Wood, even the pines are gray now. Black, white, and gray – that’s all I see outside my window. The sky is often curdled with clouds, ready to release more sickening snow. I hate white. I hate it so much.
Chilled, I turn away from the window. Snowy hasn’t gotten back with my gingerbread. The days just feel eternal sometimes. I pick up a candle on its little tin plate and carry it down the rickety stairs. The room just below is our bedroom, cold and dark as a cave. There’s a wide bed for me and Snowy – I sleep on the right. We’ve also got a trunk for our clothes, a table with two candles, and a box where I keep my books.
I set the candle on the table and kneel in front of the box of books. It’s actually a crate. Snowy’s told me, a few thousand times, that I slept in this crate as a baby. I don’t know why she thinks I’d care about that. I don’t even care about my twin sister who was stolen from us when we were infants. It’s just a story I’ve heard too many times. Snowy’s full of them.
But I like my books. I grab the one on top and crawl onto the bed. My braid lies on the floor and goes up the steps, the end of it still upstairs. I just started a book about a poor peasant girl who lives on a farm but wishes for a grand adventure. Lucky girl, it’ll probably happen to her. Sometimes, I think Snowy really regrets that she taught me to read. If it wasn’
t for books, I’d have no idea how abnormal my life is.
For example, from books I have learned that most children grow up with a mother and a father. And if two girls are born from the same mother, they’re called sisters. But even though Snowy says she and I are sisters, we don’t come from the same mother. I try but I still can’t understand it. Snowy’s mother was once queen of this kingdom. So was my mother, but she was a different lady, named Cinderella. Cinderella was Snowy’s stepmother. That confuses me even more.
I wish I had a mother and father. They sound like nice things to have.
From books, I have also learned about men and boys. And sometimes – it’s pretty rare – I’ll even see a man down in The Wood when I’m looking out my window. Small and far away, but my eyes are good. They’re so funny! They don’t grow their hair long. They have strange, low voices and thick arms. They wear a tight sleeve on each leg (called pants, I believe.) And hair grows right on their faces! I’m dying to see a man up close but I know if I do, I’ll either burst out laughing or run away screaming. Neither of which would be very polite.
My father was a man. His name was Edgar and he was the king. I never saw him, he’s long dead, just like my mother, Cinderella. Snowy says I shouldn’t miss them, they were both bad people. But I don’t believe her. I really wish I could’ve seen them, at least once. Just to know what they looked like….
No. I blink rapidly. I’m not going to cry. But gob dash it, a tear drops onto my cheek. I hop off the bed, run down to the kitchen, and let the tear fall into a cup. I promised Snowy, after all. She’ll freeze it and sell it later. That’s how she gets our food and clothing and other supplies.
Because, apparently, most girls don’t cry magic tears.
~*~ 3 ~*~
Snowy is helping me wash my hair.
It’s a huge job. We do it in the kitchen. It’s the smack-bottom room of this tower and has a small iron stove. Snowy puts two kettles on top of the stove and fills them with ice. I wish she could shoot hot water from her hands, but nope, just ice and snow. She builds a fire to melt the ice inside the kettles. That’s how we get all our water.
“How’s the gingerbread?” She’s crouched at the washtub about six feet away, rinsing my hair. We have to wash it in sections, my forty feet of hair doesn’t fit in the tub all at once. So we start with my head and work back, dunking, scrubbing with scented soap, rinsing, then moving on to the next section.
“Pretty good,” I say. “But now my head’s getting cold.” The kitchen is the only room that ever gets warm, but it’s not warm enough. It’s so depressing down here, there are no windows, just a bunch of drippy candles that make everything look wobbly and orange.
“So throw a towel over your head,” Snowy grumbles. She’s got sparkles of sweat on her forehead as she lifts the sodden bundle of hair out of the tub and squeezes the water from it. Towels are spread across the floor to hold the clean hair while she washes the rest. She drops the wet section, limp as a dead animal, and lifts the next eight feet or so of my hair.
“You need to change the water.” I pinch off a morsel of soft, sticky gingerbread and slip it into my mouth. The water must be changed twice with each washing.
Snowy sighs. “No, I don’t.”
“I can smell the dirt.”
“No, you can’t!”
I turn on the stool, look at the water, then her. I raise my eyebrows. “You are not putting my hair in dirty water.”
Snowy sighs again, longer this time. “You’re such a brat!” She picks up the washtub with an angry grunt. She’s got to go all the way to the top floor and dump it out the window. Oh well, not my fault. She could’ve gone right outside if she hadn’t iced up the stupid door.
I hum and chew on my gingerbread while she clunks up the stairs, resting the tub on each step. I wish I could play my organ but I have to stay in the kitchen all day and let the warm air dry my hair. I can’t even walk when it’s wet, it’s too heavy. Tonight, Snowy will comb it out and braid it again. I’m glad we do this only once a week, I get so tired of sitting on this stool.
About ten minutes later, she stomps back down with the empty tub. “You should wash your own hair!” she fires at me.
My fingers are sticky and I lick the sweetness off them. They smell like ginger and sugar.
“Don’t lick your fingers!” Snowy snaps.
I keep licking. She drags the second kettle of water off the stove. “You could’ve gotten this down for me, you know, or put in some more firewood!”
I mimic her voice in high-pitched tones. “ ‘You never help out around here!’ ”
“Well, you don’t!” Snowy shouts. She heaves up the kettle and tips it into the tub. “I do everything while you just sit there! You could learn to cook and clean a little!”
“But I’m a princess!” I give her a prim little smile.
“Spoiled rotten is what you are,” Snowy says as she gathers up more of my hair. “Hunter wouldn’t have stood for it.”
Oh no, please, not the Hunter stories! I’m so deathly sick of them. Her handsome, honey-sweet lover who died when a magic mirror exploded. Boohoo, it’s been fifteen years, get over it.
“Are you done yet?” I say to distract her.
“I’ve still got another six feet to do,” she growls, lathering in the soap. “I hate your hair.” She has said that for years. “One of these days I’m going to cut it off while you’re sleeping!” She has said that for years too.
I’m not worried. I never let her touch my hair as a child. I liked having it long. And something about the sound of the scissors would freak me out. I threw crazy tantrums, loud and violent, to keep her from cutting my hair. It worked every time.
And if she couldn’t control me then, she certainly can’t do it now.
~*~ 4 ~*~
I’m playing my organ while Snowy paces behind me. “I need you to cry, Rapunzel!”
“Not now!” I yell above the music. Nothing happens until I finish my sonata.
“It’s past noon already. If you don’t cry, then we don’t eat today! All I need is one – oof!” Snowy trips on my braid, lying in bundles around the room, and kicks it aside. “Stupid hair!”
“Get off it!” I shout. My fingers pump the keys, the music throbs against the wall, warbling high and grumbling low at once. I practice six hours a day. I mean, what else have I got to do?
I’m wearing a thin, silky dress of pale peach. It used to be Snowy’s until I decided it looked better on me. I feel like a princess in it. It’s not heavy enough for our endless winter, but my playing keeps me warm. The organ is a four-limb exercise.
Snowy prowls around in her white fur coat. With a huffy sigh, she stops at the window and stares out for a minute.
“Rapunzel! Look!”
I glance over my shoulder. “What?”
“I see one!”
I hop off the stool, hop over my hair, and run to the window. “Where? Where?”
“Down in The Wood. Look. Under the yew trees, that space between them. Do you see her?”
I do. A fairy, far below us in The Wood. She’s got her back to us, so we can only see her wavy brown hair and delicate wings. Her feet hover a few inches above the ground and she gives off a gentle glow.
I’m breathless watching her. She’s so beautiful. I wish she’d turn her head so I could see her face. I wish she’d come up here and talk to me. We could be friends. I’ve never had a friend.
Snowy’s eyebrows draw lower. “She’s so stiff.”
“Stiff?”
“I mean she’s not moving. She’s facing one direction, not looking right or left. And her posture is rigid. I think she’s watching for something.”
“For what?”
The fairy turns her head, snaps her wings, and shoots into The Wood. The trees prevent me from seeing where she goes.
“They’re everywhere now,” Snowy says, turning back into the room. “It’s so strange.”
“What is?”
“The f
airies. They’re appearing in the kingdom, especially in the towns. It’s no longer uncommon to see one.”
“Why? Why are they here?” I follow her across the room to the stairs, stooping for a moment to pick up my braid. I loop it over my elbow and let the end dribble down the steps behind me.
“Dark days have fallen,” Snowy says.
“Oh, will you stop saying that!” I cry. “What’s happening out there, just tell me!”
Snowy remains quiet as she glides down the stairs, fingertips hovering just above the railing. Like always, our bedroom is chilly and dark, only one candle burning on the small table. Snowy looks at me. “Get your cloak and come sit on the bed.”
I grab my cloak of brown bear fur off the chair where I left it and wrap it over my shoulders. It’s soft and heavy and solidly warm. I crawl onto the bed and fuss with the cloak until it covers most of me. But Snowy doesn’t join me at the headboard. She perches on the side of the bed, folds her hands, and faces the wall as she speaks.
“When I brought you to this tower, I left the palace empty, without a king or queen to rule the land. I couldn’t go back. Dangerous men were hunting for me and my ice magic was not yet strong.”
She has told me about these dangerous men before. A brutal gang of criminals who call themselves The Dwarves. She was their friend at one time. Until they turned against her.
“But your power is strong now,” I say. “So why can’t we go back?”
Snowy lifts a hand to silence me. “I watched from this tower as war broke out across the kingdom. I didn’t care at all. I was grieving for my Hunter. I never even got to bury his body.” She looks at me, her eyes glossed with a layer of tears.
I exhale. “Yes, I know about Hunter. What happened next?”
Snowy turns away. “Nothing. Why should I tell you? You don’t care about anything.”
“You want my tears or not?” I say.