Chapter 3

Martha bit her lip in order to stop herself crying, but the effort was unsuccessful and soon both girls were weeping, their arms wrapped around each other and their mingled tears running down their faces as they prepared to go their own separate ways again. Martha could see the sense of her beloved friend’s words. She marveled at how the formerly frail young Princess had matured and grown in strength in a few short weeks. She could leave her to fend for herself knowing that Sara would survive and return in triumph to her own people and a life with the Prince Adalbert on the appointed day.

Finally, both dried their eyes.

Sara said “We must find some clothes for you, my love and earn some money to pay for your return home. I hope you can stand up to a bit of extremely hard work - it’s the only sort of work there is in these parts! Then it must be goodbye for eleven months. Think what a celebration there will be when I return! What fine clothes we will both wear - although I am getting almost to like the way I am now, even though it is a great and grievous wrong for one of my rank and quality to be exhibited like this for all the world to see! It’s a wrong which that detestable Fairy will pay for. If it takes me the rest of my life, I will fix her!”

The Fairy heard all this and again raged at the defiance of this conceited and self-confident young woman. She was also somewhat afraid, seeing that the Princess’s sufferings were serving only to strengthen her, not only physically and mentally, but in other and more mystical ways. Her rapport with the birds and animals of the forest was a sign of this. Could she one day have powers as strong as her own?

The day had come to say goodbye. It had taken longer than Sara, the vagrant Princess, would have wished once she had resolved to send her friend, the once bewitched, but now restored, Countess Martha back home. They had worked hard in the fields for three weeks, the Princess still naked, of course, and Martha dressed in a rough peasant’s smock and working boots, before sufficient gold pieces had been earned to buy Martha a fine horse and provisions for her homeward journey. Her friend had been given quarters in the farmhouse, but the Princess, denied shelter by the terms of her contract with the Good Fairy, had slept in the field next to where she had been working.

Once more the two embraced tenderly. Martha mounted her steed and rode off, not looking around until she knew herself to be out of sight. She could not bear to let her friend see her tears, and both girls knew that it would take very little to weaken their resolve to part. They also knew that only harm could come from Sara failing to observe faithfully the conditions of her sentence. The Fairy could still make trouble and continue to prejudice the prince against the devoted girl who loved him so dearly.

The humbled Princess was aware that even the three weeks they had been at least partly together might have to be paid for in the form of extra pain and hardship, and she began to doubt her ability to come through whatever it might be. She felt lonelier than at any time since leaving the familiar comforts of the Royal Palace as she saw her beloved childhood confidante diminish into the distance. The Fairy must be hopping mad at the way her victim had been rescued. Yes! She would certainly pay for this - but how?

Turning away from the spot where they had parted, the naked wanderer continued to trudge wearily southwards - her weariness accentuated by her renewed loneliness. All the while, the sun was becoming stronger, beating down on her with an intensity unknown in the Northern land from which she had started her journey nearly two months ago.

After walking five miles she began to feel thirsty and, having no permission to carry water with her, started to look around for a well, spring or river at which she could refresh herself. There was a little cluster of hovels in the distance and she made towards it, the sun becoming hotter as it climbed higher. By the time she came to the hamlet she was close to collapse, her head spinning. To her relief, there was a well in the square next to the village green. A couple of young men were standing beside it as she approached.

With a pang of fear, she saw the lascivious way these two young bucks were looking at her. She knew how beautiful and desirable she still was, even in her present disheveled and dusty state. With the strength draining out of her and no hope of fighting off an attack, she feared the worst as she tottered towards them, gasping out that she was thirsty and must drink soon or perish.

“Where did the clothes go, you little tart? Give us a taste of those ruby lips, a feel of those sweet firm titties and a slap on that tight little rise and you can drink your fill.”

“If you insist,” replied the Princess. “But I should warn you it will not be good for you in years to come. I am protected by a powerful Fairy who watches over me and will wreak a terrible revenge on he who dares lay rude hands upon my purity.”

She knew this was nonsense! In all probability the Guardian Fairy in question had arranged this entire scene, intending that the virgin Sara be brutally ravaged and thus rendered impure and unfit for marriage to a great Prince.

One of the youths stepped back, apparently impressed both by the warning and the calm authority in the voice which uttered it. His companion was not deterred and clasped the almost fainting girl around her waist, kissing her on her mouth. He smelt strongly of beer and she felt sick. Horrified, she drew back, pushing him away from her. He saw her ring.

“It’s not so much fun if the girl’s not willing, although with a pretty doll like you I might still take you! Give me that ring, if you won’t give me your nice little body. I’ll have it anyway.”

With this he seized her small, beautiful, if work roughened, hand and pulled at the ring. It did not budge by the tiniest fraction of an inch and the youth staggered back, holding his right hand in his left and groaning. He took the other hand away and a surprised Princess saw that the member that had attempted to remove the ring was horribly blistered and the skin and flesh were already starting to peel away, revealing the white bone underneath.

The gasps of pain turned into screams as the fingers of the injured hand curled inwards like talons. It was shriveling by the second, turning into nothing more than a fleshless claw. It was obvious that it was damaged forever - the boy would never be able to use it properly again. After this, she was allowed, by the terror-struck youths, to draw water in peace. Having her thirst she continued her long progress to the South.

As she walked, the ground burning the soles of her feet as the sun’s heat reached its zenith, she saw that the flight from the northern cold was bringing her fresh problems. She knew she still had many miles to go before she would be in a region whose winter she could survive and it was becoming harder to make sufficient progress. Soon it would be August and the countdown to Winter would begin. She must go faster, but the problem of water was becoming more of a worry with each day. The land was parched and the springs drying, becoming mere trickles. Perhaps she would have to settle for remaining at this latitude and hope for a mild winter! She rubbed her hands absent mindedly together.

Taking her hand away from the ring, she looked around to see if it had had any effect, but nothing out of the ordinary presented itself and she continued walking. Those feet which had been injured to rough surfaces in her first weeks, were now being tested anew, as the fierce heat began to blister the soles. She made her way to the shelter of a small corpse and rested in the shade. It was imperative that she wait until the ground cooled - or was it?

She examined her soles closely. They did not appear damaged, and the brave Princess decided to continue, even though each step was the most exquisite torment, as bad as anything she had yet suffered. Her determination was rewarded after a week of this, as she developed thicker and thicker soles. The heat no longer hurt her.

Each day she found it harder to find water, often being reduced to begging at people’s houses. Most people were kind, but not all. She was becoming used to contemptuous rejections and even to blows, as she was driven away. Her wretchedness was increasing and even her proud spirit was close to breaking. The fairy saw all this and felt happier than she had for some considerable time!

A flock of crows flew over two weeks after Martha’s departure for home and she learnt from them that her friend was safely returned, engaged, at last to the good Baron. This caused her to feel happier for a while. Her spirits soon started to decline again, however, until one day something decisive happened.

Passing through a largish village, six weeks after she had last seen her friend Martha, she saw a sight that made her blood boil with rage. A large red-faced man was beating a horse with a merciless savagery that aroused all her compassion and newly acquired feeling for the animal world, whose misfortunes and travails she had shared for so long now.

Storming up to this creature, she seized his stick from out of his hand and began to beat him with it, screaming abuse at the wretch as she did so. A knot of townsfolk gathered to watch and applauded her frenzied assault on the cruel man, who finally ran off. As she gradually calmed down, she saw one of the watching citizens approaching her. “What will happen to me now” she thought rather nervously!

The approaching citizen, when he had come near enough to talk to the red-faced and still breathless girl, sweating profusely from her recent exertions, spoke in a voice whose gruff kindliness immediately reassured her.

“Antoine is a cruel brute and not fit to own a horse. I am the mayor of this small community and I heartily congratulate you on your courage and compassion. Would you care to keep the animal as your own? You seem to have traveled far and I could see that your speech is not of this land. You would be welcome to him and to food and drink to sustain you. The region you are headed towards is bleak and desolate and you would fare badly on foot. You are on a pilgrimage as an act of penance, I take it, since you are naked as the day you were born and yet so obviously a lady of the highest estate.”

She replied in the mayor’s own language “I am undergoing a test of endurance to prove my worthiness to be the life’s partner of the man I love. I am denied all shelter and so I must go to warmer lands where the cold of winter, when it comes, will not kill me. I am uncertain that I can accept your offer of this noble and ill-used steed. May I have a day or so to decide?”

The mayor agreed and Princess Sara made for the seclusion of the surrounding countryside, after first being regaled with fine wine and food by the mayor and his wife, who, since she could not come indoors, set up, in the town square, a table for her, covered with a fair white linen cloth such as she had not seen in months. As she made herself as comfortable as possible on the hard ground, before sleeping, she spoke out loud.

“I so want to take the horse which my own efforts have saved from a life of brutality from its worthless owner. May I please accept the mayor’s offer?”

The now familiar mist, solidifying by the second, that has appeared in this story before, showed itself now to the King’s proud and lovely daughter. When the spectral vision finally took shape, it was not the same fairy as previously, but an altogether more amiable figure, with a smile that warmed the Princess to her very core.

“I am Francine, the Queen of the Fairies in this region. You are under my jurisdiction now and I grant your request. You have pleased us in the Fairy realms by your behavior these past months. You are haughty and proud, as is only to be expected in one of your exalted ranks, but there is much love and kindness in you, which grows by the day, and we all salute the uncomplaining bravery which you have shown in demonstrating your love for the good Prince. But you may not mount the horse until I appear to you again. You must walk beside it, though it may carry food and water on its back for the two of you. I know that those poor tired feet of yours are crying out for rest, but they must bear your weight and take you on your travels, treading unshod over many rough surfaces, for a great while yet.

“I will tell the horse where to take you to spend the winter. You must follow where it leads. There is a lake there and many springs as well as caves in which you may shelter at night if you wish. The people will give you work and food and you will not perish from the cold, not with the love of the whole animal kingdom to smother you with their furry warmth every night. Goodbye, my dear - and good fortune!”

The Princess thanked the Fairy Queen with tears in her eyes and the supernatural creature faded away until she had disappeared from view, a few wisps of vapor hanging about for some seconds before the air became clear again. She did not complain at having to keep on walking, in fact she almost welcomed the continuing hardship that this entailed, but she had fallen deeply in love with the white horse. From a practical point of view, the fact that she could have supplies of food and water would speed up her progress immeasurably, now that most of her time would no longer be taken up in a constant search for refreshment at the increasingly fewer springs and wells she was coming across in these arid, sun-drenched regions.

She slept soundly and happily that night and, in the morning, collected the horse, laden with several days’ supply of provisions, generously given to her by the mayoral couple, and took her affectionate leave of the mayor and his stout and motherly wife. She washed herself thoroughly under the village pump, the first time for many days that she had been able to cleanse her body from sweat and dust, and left, promising to call on them on her way back home in the Spring.