The Lost Good Powerless Princess
The Lost Powerless Princesses
Backstory
Rose is six years old. She lives with Queen Sardonia. Rose doesn’t really know what’s going on. For as long as she can remember, she lived on a tropical island with friendly animals and plenty of fruit. One day, she looked out into the horizon to see something in the distance slowly growing larger. Many somethings. It was a fleet of ships from Queen Sardonia’s royal navy. She doesn’t remember having ever met another human before, so she was incredibly shy. When the boats came ashore and crowds of men and women wearing metal clothes and wielding scary sticks arrived, Rose got scared and hid in a bush. It didn’t do her much good. With so many people looking for her, it only took a few days before she was found out.
Rose was scared. The scary people spoke to her, but she couldn’t understand them. She was petrified, too frightened to move. They carried her back onto one of their big boats and set off from the shore. She left her island that day, she hasn’t seen it since. It wasn’t all bad. The people took good care of her on the boat. They gave her food. It wasn’t fruit, but it didn’t take long to figure out it was edible. Rose still tested most things by putting them in her mouth. If there had been any poisonous plants on the island within her short reach, she certainly would have died.
After many days, just as Rose was beginning to get used to life with these strange people aboard the ship, everything changed again. The boat came ashore a strange forest with stone and brick blocks that people lived in. The paths between the buildings were purposefully paved as smooth stone. The boat-people, however, didn’t take her to live in this highly populated city. They took her far inland through a forest.
Out of the window of the carriage, Rose sees a massive brick structure, a palace. It is ornately decorated with tapestries and flags to cover what is otherwise a dull sandy colored edifice. She is brought into a large room with a long red carpet that leads to a throne. Sitting on the throne was a stately woman. She wasn’t elderly, but she was clearly old. Older than middle age. She might have been 45 or 50.
Now, Rose sits in her large bedroom as her maid helps her get into a beautiful red dress. Once neatly attired in her crimson lace, Rose makes her way to the eating room to dine with Queen Sardonia.
“Rose, what happened to the beautiful gown I sent the maid with?” Queen Sardonia asks. Rose doesn’t understand words, so Queen Sardonia looks to Rose’s maid for an answer. The maid is confused at first, then she looks at Rose and her mouth opens in shock.
“I’ve just dressed her!” Rose’s maid exclaims, “Rose, what happened to your outfit?” Again, Rose doesn’t speak. Rose ignores her maid and mother mumbling about Rose’s apparel. “She must have taken it off in the hallway on her way to dine, but I was following only a few rooms behind.” The maid mutters. Queen Sardonia is equally upset and whispers, “Doesn’t Rose appreciate fine clothes? Why didn’t anyone stop her from changing clothes?”
Rose sits on a chair. It isn’t high enough for her to reach the table. A servant places a pillow on the seat to boost Rose high enough to eat from the table. The servant frowns at her clothes but says nothing.
The kitchen maid sets a plate in front of Rose and a fork, knife and spoon all wrapped in a napkin beside the plate. She places a cup by the plate and fills it with water from a pitcher. Soon, another of the kitchen staff brings a platter of mashed potatoes, gravy, fruit slices, and sliced ham.
Rose reaches for the food on the platter, but she can’t reach it with her short arms. She stands up on her chair. She puts her hands on the table and lifts her foot as if to climb up onto the table. Rose’s maid quickly serves her some of each of the food. Rose sits back down.
Rose doesn’t wait for Queen Sardonia to eat, and she ignores the eating utensils and eats with her hands. Her maid puts a fork in her hand. Rose looks at it, curious. She puts it in her mouth and bites down hard. She winces and throws the fork onto the table. She cups her mouth with her hand and leans forward. She gives a muffled cry, “Aah!”
“I’m so sorry!” Rose’s maid says, panicked, “I didn’t mean for you to… that wasn’t supposed to happen.” The maid picks up her fork and puts it back in the napkin with the knife and the spoon. Rose calms down and starts to eat again, closing her fist tight. Mashed potatoes squeeze out between her fingers. She smashes her palm against her mouth, pushing the food in.
Queen Sardonia grimaces in disgust. She waves at Rose to try and get her attention. “Rose? Rose!” She says, “Try like this.” Queen Sardonia moves her fork slowly in exaggerated movements to show her spearing fruit slices and bringing it up to her lips. Rose stares at her. “Come on, Rose,” Rose’s maid says, “Give it a try.” Rose’s maid spears a fruit slice with Rose’s fork and gently, slowly, brings it to Rose’s mouth. Rose grips the fork with her own hands and the maid lets go.
Rose slowly, hesitantly, moves to the fork piercing the fruit to her lips. Her hands shake slightly. The piece of fruit wobbles. Rose squeezes her eyes closed. With grit and determination, she rams her fork toward her mouth. She misses. She tries again, one of the prongs of the fork hits her cheek, the fruit falls off the fork, landing on her clothes. Her clothes… what happened to her dress?
“Meh!” Rose cries out, “Meh!” She slaps her grey fur hide shirt over and over again. “Be patient, Rose,” Her maid says, “You can do it. You’ll learn how to use a fork eventually.” Rose still doesn’t understand her words.
Queen Sardonia waves over Rose’s maid and whispers to her. The maid nods and takes Rose’s fork from her hand, replacing it with a spoon. Rose finds it much easier to scoop food with a spoon. It is still difficult for her. She has to hold the spoon level or her mashed potatoes slide off. She learns to not bite. Mashed potatoes don’t need to be chewed anyway. For the rest of her food, she just uses her hands. She handles sliced ham and fruit with her hands since utensils are too hard to use for such materials.
Rose can hear Queen Sardonia speaking softly to Rose’s maid while they’re eating. “After Rose is done eating and you’ve washed her up, You are to change her into something appropriate. I won’t have my daughter dressed like an animal.” Rose is beginning to recognize her name more and more. She understands that people say “Rose” to get her attention.
However, she is still not sure if it is meant as some sort of greeting or if that is what she is. Is she “Rose?” The people sometimes say her name when they are not speaking to her, so she isn’t sure. Queen Sardonia isn’t talking to her right now, yet she says “Rose” in her conversation with the maid.
It doesn’t take long before Rose stops eating. She doesn’t understand what she is feeling. She feels disinclined to eating more, but her belly hurts. Is she hungry? Why can’t she finish what is on her plate. Her maid sees this and uses the napkin to wipe Rose’s hands and face. Then she helps her down from her chair and brings her to the washroom.
There is a large, shallow bowl full of water. There is also a mirror in the room. Her maid helps Rose scrub her hands together in the water and her face around her mouth. In the mirror, Rose sees herself. She has curly red hair that goes down to her shoulders. She is wearing the grey fur skin of some wild beast. The hide outfit is too large for her but too small to fit comfortably on an adult.
Looking at this animal skin outfit through the mirror reminds Rose of the gruesome scene she has been thinking about lately. Back on the island, while she was hiding from the armored navy men, one of the soldiers got close to the bush she was hiding in. A wild cat, a lynx leaped from a tree branch, pouncing on the soldier, knocking him to the ground. The soldier threw the feline off him and stood up, taking out a wicked handaxe. He hacked the lynx to death, and skinned it with his axe.
Rose feels scared and disgusted whenever she thinks about that event, but the memory of that traumatic scene keeps coming to the forefront of her mind. Her furry outfit reminds her of it. She hates this outfit, she doesn’t want to see it. It makes her remember. Rose’s maid brings her back to her bedroom. “Let’s get you changed out of those clothes and into a pretty dress,” her maid says. Once Rose is in her pretty pink frilly dress, her maid folds her animal skin outfit and frowns at it. “How do I get rid of this?” the maid asks herself aloud.
Rose’s maid leaves the room. She doesn’t even bother explaining herself to Rose because she knows Rose can’t understand. Rose follows her maid. “Oh, I guess it should be okay if you come along,” the maid says, “I just need to get rid of these fur clothes.” Rose follows her maid out through a series of hallways with many twists and turns until they finally arrive in the courtyard.
The maid leads Rose outside of the walls of the palace and to the edge of the forest that surrounds it. There is a small wooden shack up against some trees. There is a pile of lumber leaning against the wall of the small building and a man in rough, dirty clothes is chopping logs with his axe.
Rose’s maid calls out to him and waves the fur shirt and pants in her hand. The woodcutter walks over and Rose hears them have a conversation. She isn’t sure what they’re saying, but it ends with the man taking the animal skins and returning to his work of chopping wood. Rose’s maid turns away from the forest and starts walking back toward the palace. Rose continues to stare at the man as he chops the wood.
It seems everything reminds her of that terrible scene. When the head of the axe comes down upon the logs, Rose can’t help but see the spray of chips as blood. The animal skins, the axe, the forest. The log seems to her to be a slumped figure, shaking each time it is struck. Rose can’t even see the woodcutter anymore. She is so consumed by her memory that all she sees is the soldier hacking away at the lynx with his hatchet.
“Rose, are you coming?” her maid asks. Rose snaps out of her memory and turns to join her maid. Before she leaves, she notices that the man wielding the axe and holding the animal skin outfit is gone. Her maid takes her hand and she returns to her quarters in the palace.
The next day, Rose awakes to the sound of argument. She gets up out of bed, still in her nightgown. She still can’t wrap her mind around why she would need to change clothes multiple times per day. She creeps over to her door. She looks out into the hallway. To her right, at the end of the hall, it opens up into a sitting area. Two women are sitting in there, talking harshly. Rose walks slowly, gently toward the sitting area. The women are not facing her, they’re seated facing each other and are too engaged in their conversation to notice anyone else.