snow white and Ice Lily

 a twist or two on Snow White, with touches from Donkeyskin and Sleeping Beauty and a nod to the odd Italian fairy tale with dragons

Snow White and Ice Lily.

 

Once upon a time there was a king, whose proud boast it was that he was married to the most beautiful woman in the land. He had had a magic mirror made, and every morning he made his wife look in it, and say, ‘Mirror, Mirror, on the wall, who is the fairest of them all?’ and whilst it said ‘Why, you are, dear queen,’ he was quite happy. They had a baby girl who was growing up as lovely as her mother, with black hair, pale skin touched with roses at her cheeks, and big beautiful dark blue eyes. But the mother, Queen White Rose, was starting to age, and one day, the mirror said, ‘The fairest of them all is Ice Lily.’ White Rose gasped, but she did not tell her husband. She did not know that her husband had a duplicate mirror which told him; and before long, the child, Snow White was informed by her nurse that her mother had died, and that she was to have a stepmother.

Ice Lily was terrified to be consort to the king, whose standards in all things were exacting. But she had no choice.  She concealed, however, that she was a witch, and knew a few potions to keep her husband happy. She remained distant from the child, to ensure the little girl did not get too fond of her, for when her own end inevitably came, for Ice Lily quickly worked out how things worked. She took to asking the mirror very early in the day, so that she had time before King Strong Horse awoke. If she had been able to give him a son, she might have rested more easily, but alas! It appeared that she was barren.

Some seven years passed, and Snow White was becoming a beautiful young woman; and one day, when Ice Lily asked the question, the mirror returned the answer, ‘Snow White.’  At first, Ice Lily was relieved, thinking that Strong Horse would not consider marrying his own daughter; but then she recalled that he had sworn an oath only to be married to the loveliest woman in the land.

She summoned a loyal servant, and Snow White.

“You must go away, and try to reach another land before your father wakes up,” said Ice Lily. “Brand here will go with you and serve you. I will keep him asleep for another day, but I cannot do so for longer.”

“But why, Stepmama?” asked Snow White.

“You know his oath,” said Ice Lily, harshly. “And the mirror informed me that you are the fairest in all the land.”

“But... but he is my father!” cried Snow White.

“Yes, and he does not care,” said Ice Lily.  “But if you wear this cloak made of donkey skin, it will make you look very ordinary, but you cannot take it off until you are far enough away to be safe.”

“I see,” said Snow White. “What will you tell my father?”

“I will tell him that I killed you in jealousy,” said Ice Lily. “With your beauty concealed, and then far away, he will believe me, and will laugh that I am so desperate to keep my life and my position.”

“Did he kill my Mama?” asked Snow White.

“I believe so,” said Ice Lily. “I was summoned to get married.”

“Oh, take care, Stepmama!” said Snow White, kissing the older woman on the forehead. She and Brand set off on the long walk to the next land, with a few gifts from the queen. Snow White felt safe with Brand; he was a man she trusted, as he had been her servant for many years, and looked after her. He was a handsome man, too, she thought, well-built, tanned without being weatherbeaten, and with merry blue eyes, though his hair was dark.

 

“We’re nearly over the border, Miss,” said Brand. “Once we cross those mountains. There’s a road through.”

“Oh, thank you, Brand,” said Snow White, who was very tired of walking so far.

They moved into a wooded valley, and suddenly came face to face with seven dwarves carrying mining tools. Brand thrust Snow White behind him, and confronted them.

“We’re just passing through,” he said to the angry looking little men.

“Nobody passes through our valley!” said the leader.

“But it’s the main road out of the kingdom!” argued Brand.

“What do we care?” said another, hitting Brand with his pick. Snow White screamed. Brand fell, bleeding.

“What about the wench?” said another of the bent little men.

“Anyone as ugly as her will be glad to be our servant,” said the leader. They dragged Snow White, who clung closely to her donkey skin, to their cottage, which was frankly filthy.

“You can clean up, and wash and mend our clothing, and cook for us,” said the leader. “Our names are Eendy, Meendy, Mony, Mite, Balico, Halico, and Mo.”

They rigged up a couple of curtains in the corner for Snow White to sleep behind, and pegged a bed frame into the walls, stretching rope to put a mattress on for her to sleep. By the time it was done, Snow White had cooked a meal for them, which they ate, giving her the leftovers. She crept into bed, and cried herself to sleep; though at least it was more comfortable than sleeping on a makeshift bed of bracken made by Brand on the forest floor.

Mo kicked the side of the bed to wake her up in the morning.

“Breakfast, wench,” he said. “Hurry up, we have to be at work in the mine.  Balico and Halico are putting an enchantment on the fence about our garden so you can’t leave. The vegetables need tending and you can scrub the floor, and wash all our bed linen, and wash and mend our clothes which are in the corner over there.”

Snow White milked the cow, collected eggs, and made porridge and eggs for them all, fed the chickens, and the cow, and had enough in the bottom of the porridge pot for a small bowl for herself.  The dwarves headed off for the day, and Snow White decided to test whether Mo was telling the truth about spells. As she tried to go out of the gate, she felt a stinging pain as if she had been struck with a whip. She tried climbing the fence, and the same thing happened.

Snow White limped back to the house. She knew how to do household chores because her mother believed that even a princess should understand what the servants did; and Ice Lily had taught her more. Snow White dragged all the furniture outside, to clear the floor, and let the air in.  Then she did all the washing, to try to give the washing time to dry, on the bushes, and she used the dirty water to give the floor a first rinse as it was so dirty. She took off her gown to scrub, so that she did not dirty it, and belted up her shift. But she kept an eye on where the sun was, to make sure she had her donkeyskin back on before the dwarves came home. Somehow, she got the floor scrubbed before they came back, but it wasn’t dry.

“You lazy wench!” cried Eendy. “Lying around all day while we work!”

“Oh! I have been scrubbing the floor and you have brought all your mud in and walked on it and messed it up again!” wept Snow White. Eendy sneered.

“Well, you’ll have to do it again, then,” he said. “Get our furniture back in.  And what is for supper?”

“I haven’t had time to think about that,” said Snow White. The blow to the side of her head knocked her to the floor.

“Go and wash; you’re filthy. And then get our supper,” snarled Eendy.

“Oh, oh! You will have to fetch the table and chairs in then,” sobbed Snow White. Poor thing, she was exhausted.

The days stretched one into another, and Snow White’s soft hands became callused and ingrained in dirt, listening every day for the song the dwarves sang going to and coming from the mine.

“Down down we go,

In the mines below,

To the dark of the deep sunk mine

But we gather the brightest gems that glow

In the crowns of the mighty shine

Whatever they need comes from our deed

Whatever they assert

Their jewels aglow the sweat of our brow

Is won from the deepest dirt.”

They worked hard; Snow White could not deny that, and if they had shown her basic gratitude, she might even have been prepared to work willingly, but all she received were blows and curses and it wore her down more than the hard work. She was so hungry all the time, and her cheeks furrowed with tears, when she caught sight of herself reflected in the well, she knew that she would no longer be the fairest in the land. 

“Oh, stepmama, if only I had a fraction of your magic!” she cried. “If I could escape the fence, I could be over the border before I regain my looks. But maybe I can; the magic line cannot extend far, can it? And it will hurt, but I will get over it.”

 

Meanwhile, Brand had been dealt a cruel blow, but he had survived it, for it had knocked him off his feet, and the force of the blow had been lost. His shoulder was broken, and he was giddy from pain and blood loss, but alive.

What nobody knew, save Ice Lily, was that Brand was Ice Lily’s brother, who had come with his sister to her wedding as her loyal servant. Her proper name was Lily, for it was an affectation of the nobility to add a second word to a name. Brand loved his sister very much, and he also loved the young girl his sister had set him to watch over, with a fierce intensity. Hence, he dragged himself to his feet to see what he might do to rescue Snow White. He made a sling for his broken shoulder and made his painful way to overlook the hut, watching the cruelty of the dwarves towards their young slave.  It angered him, but he did not know how to overcome their magic.

As Brand had managed, one-handed, to climb a tree to sleep and watch, he could see what the dwarves could not; which was a dragon, circling above. Brand was a brave man, and he knew more about the lore of dragons than most, as his sister was a witch. When the dwarves were away, he made his way to a clearing in front of a cave, whose location he had guessed by watching where it withdrew.

“Good dragon, your magnificence,” he called. “I may have a trade for you.”

Thirty two feet of head and neck thrust out of the cave entrance.

“Oho, little man who roosts in a tree; I have seen you, and you have seen me.”

“Are you interested in the jewels the dwarves dig?” asked Brand.

“Nasty little thieves stole from my gold, I want them punished until they are old,” said the dragon.

“They have taken the girl I love and made her their slave, but there is magic about their house,” said Brand. “Oh, and they have robbed her cheeks of their roses, and made her move like an old woman in pain from drudgery.”

The dragon smiled.

“She has an apple, her stepmother’s gift, tell her to her lips she should lift,

Take but a bite, and lie on her bed, and the sorry dwarves will think her dead.

Her beauty returns as in slumber deep she lies upon her bed in sleep;

They will place her into a crystal tomb, then you and I to capture them come.”

“Thank you, your magnificence,” said Brand. “And what then?”

“Lift her and give the true lover’s kiss, the enchantment will fall and allow your bliss.

And I will have seven miserable slaves to dig as much as they stole from my caves.”

“How suitable,” said Brand. “And then I will take her away to be safe from her father, and hope my sister is safe too.”

“The king is a fool and I have a hunch that he would go down with a toothsome crunch,” said the dragon.

“Couldn’t happen to a nicer chap,” said Brand, laconically.

The dragon sniggered, and smoke seeped out between his teeth.

 

Next day, a seeming old woman came to call at the cottage gate.

“I can draw you water, good mother, but if I give you food, I will be beaten, even if it is my share,” said Snow White.

“Snow White! It is I, Brand; I am recovering from that blow, and I have made a friend!” said Brand. “You must go into the hut, take off the donkey skin, and take a bite from the magical apple that Lily gave you! And then, leave the rest to me.”

“I trust you, Brand,” said Snow White. “I tried to run through the gate ignoring the feeling that I was being whipped, but I was dragged back, being whipped all the while.”

“I saw you dragged back,” whispered Brand, tears in his eyes. “You are so brave to try to push through the pain.”

“I can barely move, for it,” sobbed Snow White.

“Then try the plan my friend suggested,” said Brand.

“I will; but go, quickly, lest they return early, as sometimes one of them does, to spy on me,” said Snow White.

Brand took her hand and kissed the callused palm.

“A dear little hand, so badly used,” he said. His tears fell on the calluses, and they healed! He took the other hand and wept on that too. And then he left her.

Snow White had half wondered if the apple would prove to be poison, but as it was, she hardly cared. She laid aside the donkey skin, laid herself down on her bed, and bit into the apple. And suddenly it was as if she was in a dream, half aware of what was going on, but as if it happened to someone else.

 

The dwarves came home, singing, and growled in anger to see the garden untended, and the door standing open.

“Slave! Slave! Where are you?” yelled Eendy.

“Brother! There is someone on her bed!” cried Meendy.

“It is not her, this girl is beautiful!” said Mo.

“She is dead, quite dead,” mourned Balico.

“But who is she?” asked Halico.

“And where is our slave?” asked Mony.

“Is she fresh enough to....” Mite put a hand on Snow White’s body, and Eendy hit him hard enough to send him rolling end over end.

“This is our slave,” said Eendy. “She must have been under an enchantment to hide her true looks, and was freed from it in death.  Quick, brothers! We must use our magic to make a crystal casket to keep her from decay, just outside our fence, and we can work then on spells to animate her body.”

They made a crystal tomb for Snow White, and Brand, who could see the cottage, sat on the dragon’s neck, allowing the dragon to see through his eyes as there were spells of dragon gaze repelling on the cottage. Sniggering, the dragon dove through the air, through the bubble of enchantment, his very nature enough to destroy all the magic. The dwarves tried to scatter but the dragon blew smoke rings which lassoed them, and tightened on their arms painfully. And when he had gathered them all, he made a delicate and singular mark on their foreheads with one claw.

“Now you’re punished as my slaves and work until you’re in your graves!” he bellowed. “In your mines for me you’ll work, and heaven help you if you shirk!”

Brand slithered down, and, heart hammering, went to the crystal tomb. He pushed aside the lid, and lifted Snow White out, and kissed her on the lips.

She coughed, and spat out the bit of apple, to the side of him.

“Oh, Brand!” she cried, and kissed him properly.

The dragon cleared his throat.

“Let’s leave these miserable fools to feed themselves and clean their tools,

And to the castle let us fly, it’s time for King Strong Horse to die.”

 

The flight was thrilling, and King Strong Horse, convinced that he was wearing a suit of invisible but invulnerable armour his wife had given him, strode out of the castle naked to confront the dragon.

“How thoughtful of the kindly witch to send him out without a stitch,

For armour plate is hard, in sooth, I shall not have to crack a tooth,” said the dragon.

Liking his food cooked, he sent forth a burst of flame to grill Strong Horse nicely, and promptly ate him.

Brand was crowned King Fire Brand, and married his beloved Snow White, and the dowager queen went off with the dragon to share knowledge. And they all lived happily ever after. Except the dwarves.