One night, as she roamed through the castle searching for a midnight delight, she heard the grunting and scruffling of some creature, coming from the room of her three younger half brothers. The light was dim, the floor creaked and inside she saw three little things, little Trolls. Out from her came a screech, and the three little ugly things made her weep. They took her by the arm, groaned and scuffled, and made her quiet. As she looked into their eyes, she recognized their fury and called them by name.
Their true form was a wonder to Cassiopeia, not able to understand how they could be of the same tree that sprouted her supposed beauty. But their hideous form was all the same to the sweet princess, for they were her blood. She broke into a smile, radiant, and night after night, she visited them in secret bearing gifts to delight. So the three little princes, moved by their sister’s unexpected acceptance, began to tell the truth one fateful night: the Wood, the Trolls, the bridge, her mother, their mother, their family, the kingdom and Cassiopeia.
Cassiopeia promised her secrecy, so long as her brothers offered the same, and no child ever spoke a word of that night. When the sun rose, and the Castle’s servants went to wake the elegant princess from her rest, all that was found was an empty bed.
The sun’s rays fell warm on the back of the princess, riding horseback in tears, realizing everything she had known was a fable. The Castle was miniature now, and the Kingdom she had once made beautiful was but a memory. She could not go back as their princess.
So she rode until that night, my Dear reader, as she felt the horrible groan of her stomach weeping for food. She rode well past the view of her kingdom, past a lake, past the bridge under which her mother was found, and stumbled by the land of the cast away, the unaccepted and ugly, The Wood.
Shacks of pine built with doors over gaping holes, dirt pathways, and stumps all over. The most hideous of inhabitants Woodlandia could ever imagine all roamed its worn away streets. All of God’s ungodly creatures, walking side by side in The Wood. And Cassiopeia, hiding under a cloak, viewed not in horror, but in awe. She looked at the homes, the establishments, each adorned with mushrooms. As she walked and walked, she stumbled upon a tavern. Inside was a glowing light, music and chatter and she entered, searching for a meal, sporting a black cloak. Beyond the music and the clatter of glassware, across the long table she sat at, Cassiopeia saw a rabbit. Black spots along his back, around his eyes, and dark gray ears that stood perched. The rabbit took a sip of his foamy drink, leaned against the table, and rested his head on the wooden structure.
The rabbit’s name was Shiloh, adored by all the patrons of this tavern. As Cassiopeia glanced over the room, the rabbit began to sing an old folk song, and thump his hind legs. All ungodly creatures felt the divine presence in the room that night, and on his final belt, the rabbit collapsed and was escorted out on his tail. Cassiopeia followed, wanting to help this poor, boisterous ball of sweet fluff, but was afraid of barking up the wrong tree. She followed the rabbit from a distance, and in the dark satchel he wore, thrown out alongside him, he pulled out a pair of wire framed, circular lenses, a flask and a green little creature to whom he began to speak.
The princess was confused. Examining this dainty thing, she couldn’t begin to understand his complete disregard for the spectacle caused by his rude ejection from the tavern. For he was just a drunk little rabbit.
“Don’t fret Isadora, let us rejoice in the wine imbibed,” said the rabbit to the emerald green sprite.
Cassiopeia, examining the two creatures, began to contemplate her approach, or her exit, running from all civilization and madness. With a jolt, she suddenly found herself speaking to the rabbit and the little fairy. Learning their names, she pondered on the invisible links that tied the two together. What stroke of catastrophe or devils dealing led the three to stand in each other’s presence?
So my Dear Reader, the rabbit began to tell of his family, of how men with bows and arrows came when he was just a kitten. How he hopped into a meadow with flowers, how he fell in with a company of drinking soldiers who loved his singing, and how he fell how with them. He told of how one drunken night he stumbled upon this fairy who was pinned by her broken wings to the doorpost of a tavern, so strange he had to slap himself to know if he was dreaming. And the fairy, with a voice and laugh that sounded like a glass bell, told of her time in Woodlandia, how she granted wishes, and how her sharp wit led to the clipping of her wings, her dismissal from the wealthy, and how she saw a drank rabbit as she cried outside of that same pub he had been thrown out of many times.
Cassiopeia, without a single bone of contempt, embraced the creatures and told them of her history. And so, God’s smile bound these three together.
“I shall give up all I’ve known, for it was all a lie.”
Shiloh looked around sniffing the air, wary of any enemies or ill-wishers lurking in the gloomy night. From his satchel, he retrieved a rusted smallsword and began to spar with an invisible foe. . Cassiopeia watched dumbfounded at the rabbit’s transformation from troubadour to swordsman and he did not fail to notice the impression he had made. . A wise being, he knew that soon enough, he would begin to instruct the princess in the fine art of fencing. And each night after that, she would learn the way of fighting with dignity, honor and grace.
Some time passed and our dear princess, once irresistible to a man with a sword, decorated herself with one. Her long hair was traded for a suit of mail, with a mushroom on her cap. And the little rabbit, not having drank a sip of wine since he assumed the role of the princess’s tutor, smiled at her as if she was his own. Isadora rejoiced in providing the princess with a new name, words of wisdom and the comfort she once felt from her own mother.
Cassiopeia of the Wood, with her two strange companions and copper sword.
For months. King Brent sat in horror, not knowing where his beautiful offspring could have gone. Oh well, my Dear Reader, that was the least of his worries. As he once found enticing, he again shared a bed with a troll. Lady Catherine, now Cather again, needed the princess, and so did her poor sisters, and all the kingdom. For without her touch, who would make her and her kingdom so beautiful?
King Brent could lay with the ugly, revolting Troll, but could no longer parade her as his wife. For the public to witness his true desires would make him something unassimilable. Against the advice of his Troll wife, he set off to bring his bewitching daughter back.
So he rode in circles, my Dear reader. He rode past the view of his kingdom, past a lake, past the bridge he killed his wife under, and stumbled upon the land of the cast away, the unaccepted and ugly, where he exulted in his true impulses, and was victim to the clutches of the Trolls’ seductive ways, The Wood.
He rode past the pub, and the warmth of singing beings, wishing he could feel the scruff of a Troll once again, thinking of how he met his three great loves, how they adored him, and how he worshiped them. But before he could finish his thought, he saw his young daughter, who resembled what should have been a son, strutting out of the pub with an inebriated rabbit wearing a satchel across his body. And the king rode to the creatures, stepped off his white horse and approached with no ease.
Terrified that his daughter now had the demeanor of a man and what that may mean, he demanded her to ride with him, sidesaddle, back to Woodlandia, back to beauty, long hair and dresses, and flowers and evergreens. Knowing now that there was nothing worse than being the fixer upper, the maker of masks to cover beasts, Cassiopeia declined.
The king, having never heard the word no before, began to raise his sword. Brent, fighting his rage, knowing he would not win if he struck his daughter or didn’t, seized the rabbit in his grip and taunted him with the touch of death. And so Cassiopeia took in hand her copper weapons and crossed swords with her father.
Unbeknownst to them all, the three trolls, knowing their lover, had followed after him. When approaching The Wood, all those who once crossed them all those years ago instantly recognized them, and their return, while anticipated by the inhabitants of The Wood, seemed rather delayed. Across the pub they so dearly missed, Cather, Joc, and Edwina, weakly watched the King and his daughter, who would never feel their clutch again, and screamed in horror.
The clanging of swords, the screeching Troll cries, and the ringing bell of Isadora’s voice brought out all ugly things to serve as witnesses.
Cassiopeia screamed the truth through the clanging of the swords, and her father fought in fear, for this fight was a fight of honor, and he could not let a woman win.
The onlookers, ugly beings who hid behind prosthetic beauty and the cloak of being noble people of Woodlandia, but were truly all The Wood’s castaways, heard the fables that held them together, the mushrooms that were replaced by flowers, and royals that were just as ugly as them, felt the Princess’s rage.
As the crowd roared, the Trolls looked on with horror and the rabbit and his dear fairy friend hoped this would end, Cassiopeia’s sword met her father’s chest, and the Noble King saw his death.
The onlookers cheered and the three Trolls, Joc, Edwina, and Cather, hoped to lose themselves in the crowd, just like every other being, but instead saw themselves chased away in shame. Onlookers raged at their lies, their cowardly ways, and most at their rejection of their true appearance that made even the devil laugh without pity.
And the king laid, impaled, with his knight of a daughter standing over him. Cassiopeia, embraced by the ugly creatures, no longer had the ability to turn a toadstool into a tulip. No longer running from the past, happy to be her own creature, she retrieved her sword from the body of a dead king, hopped upon the white horse with the rabbit and fairy, and rode beyond Woodlandia, to never return.