The Bald Princess and Other Tales by Ariele Sieling

Author:Ariele Sieling
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: fairy tales, new fairy tales, fairy tale retellings, fantasy, fantasy fairy tales
Publisher: Ariele Sieling, author
Published: 2022-05-26T00:00:00+00:00

The Wolf Princess

Once upon a time, King and Queen Acron of Balini birthed a beautiful daughter with pitch black hair. They had spent many years trying to conceive, and when they were finally successful, they were thrilled. However, on the day of her birth, the evil enchantress Liaandra the Bold strode into the castle, miffed that the King hadn’t paid her wages, for back in those days, she worked as a powerful battle mage on behalf of the royal family. But surely, so the story went, the King couldn’t be expected to remember something so paltry as wages on the day of the birth of his daughter, a long-awaited event due to the queen’s struggles to bear children.

But Liaandra the Bold was most displeased, and as the King and Queen stood at the head of the throne room, ready to introduce the child to the court, her words echoed, “You dare treat me so, my liege?” Her voice was tinged with a vile sneer. “Throw me to the wolves, and so too shall your daughter be thrown to the wolves!”

And then she strode from the throne room in fury, her emerald green cape swirling in the wind.

At first, everyone thought they were just the ordinary words of an angry enchantress. But that night, the wolves outside howled fearfully in the gusty night. And the next night, the creatures drew closer to the castle, and the next night, even closer.

Of course, the king and queen had no intention of letting the wolves anywhere near their daughter. So they put out a bounty: any man or woman who brought a dead wolf to their doorstep would be paid a handsome sum. And as their daughter grew in age, wisdom, and stature, they resolved never to let her outdoors, nor anywhere near where she might encounter a wolf.

But their plans were ever foiled. Not a single man nor woman successfully captured, maimed, or killed a wolf, though the entire kingdom could clearly hear their howls from the forest and see their paw prints in the snow. And when the princess was a mere five years old, she sneaked out from under the watchful eye of her nursemaid, and made it all the way to the courtyard before anyone caught her.

Her parents added more guards, more nursemaids, and more servants to keep a watchful eye on her, but when she was eight, she escaped again. This time, they caught her all the way at the castle wall. And when she was fifteen—well, at that point, she was too smart, too clever, and too motivated, and she vanished without a trace. It was the middle of the winter, and on the night of her departure, and they tracked her footprints deep into the forest to a clearing, where they were most distraught to find the prints of dozens of wolves.

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