The Princess

The gentle breeze passes my extended arms. I take in the rising sun, and bask in it, the once cold air around me turning warm. The waves from the surf crash ceaselessly, creating a constant muted sound for the villagers on the coast. The village is run down but strong. It’s ancient stone walls, testing time. The fishermen are out early, already trying for a meal, and possibly a trade. The olive trees around me, in lines, create cornrows on the mountain I live in. For the past four months the crops have been bare, and the fish are seldom. The villagers are starting to worry.

I see her running with her arms out, her long, tangled hair flying. Her swift legs, tugging at her toga. She has an unforgettable laugh that reaches up to my leaves. She runs towards me. Setting one foot on my exposed root, and another on my low-level branch, she wriggles up me like a monkey. She lays in a familiar spot on my head, and looks at the ocean, a ginormous expanse of water, and an even larger expanse of curiosity for her. 

“Eudora!” her grandma is calling her. Gift of god, it’s a fitting name for her. 

This is the day Eudora dies. Her story is one of deception.

—

It is nighttime and I have my arm around her. She’s been running so much today, I can tell. Her cheeks are red and she is breathless. The campfire keeps us warm, from the looming moon overhead. Looking into her sweet hazel eyes, I begin my tale.

“Her story is fantastic. She was the Princess from a not so distant region, and she was the fairest girl in the land. Just like you my kardia mou. My heart.” I bop her nose, and she giggles. I love her little laugh. “One day, a meeting is held by the kings in all the lands to decide who will wed the fair princess. But the princess does not want to marry any of those old men!” Eudora squeals. She loves it when I get to this part, because of what comes next. “So she decides to run away with her secret lover. At dawn, they ride their horses to get to the port. There, they get on a boat, and sail away to the ever open horizon.”

I look down and she’s already fallen asleep. I brush her soft hair, and fine eyebrows and lift her on my shoulder, taking her to the one bed we share. Later, I go back to kill the campfire. When the fire is put out, the stars shine brighter. I watch the dark sea, and I feel like stone. The waves falling mark each second that passes. Argus comes to mind. His body was so small, he was so little. How did he not slip between the cracks of the chest? 

In the morning I bathe her, and we walk down, hand in hand, on the weathered limestone path, and into the village center at the bottom of the mountains. We walk into the market, where stands for fish, grain, wheat, and grapes are lined up. There she lets go of my hand and runs toward the sandy beach. She starts stacking some stones, using her concentrated face. 

“The usual, Doto?” the fishermen looks at me with a leather face, worn by the sun’s ceaseless stare. I absentmindedly nod my head.

The fisherman hesitates before opening his mouth. “How are you doing Doto? This drought really is bad, huh? Tsk, Tsk. She’s had a good time …”  but my ears are no longer open to him. I look around the market. At each person passing and bustling. It may be a small village, but each person finds a way to stay busy. The fisherman stops speaking to me. He just stares as I take a second to turn in a slow circle and watch everyone. Everyone needs something from someone. Like I need the fish from this man. They need Eudora. 

The smell of the fishes are so potent it sickens me. I look at one of the sea basses’ eyes. It is yellowing and there is puss around it. Did these fish have a choice? Obviously not. What am I thinking?

As I am coming back to face the fisherman, I notice a little boy approaching Eudora. They may need Eudora soon, but they will not take her away from me this soon.

“Eudora!” I scream. The little boy runs away, more frightened by my yell than my presence. I grab Eudora’s arm, “Let’s go.” 

She’s whimpering. I think I pulled on her arm too hard. 

When we start our walk uphill and near our home, Eudora sprints to the olive tree and climbs it. I call her down but she doesn’t respond. I walk inside to make supper. Eudora still doesn’t come inside. I decide to scrub the floors, then tidy the garden. I look out the doorway. She’s still perched in the tree. I call out to her for supper, but she ignores me. There’s no time for fooling. 

“Eudora come down now or else I’m not telling you a story tonight!” My eyes can’t see far in the dark, but I hear scrambling and scratching. Soon enough Eudora is by my feet and with a smile. 

Inside, I pour her dish. She looks up at me expectantly. “I’ll get to it, just be patient, kardia mou.”

When I’ve served us both and I take a sip of my soup, I start.

“There was once a princess. Who was so fair she was known from all around.”

Eudora looks at me with sparkling eyes. She’s happy. That night, Eudora falls asleep at the table before I even finish the story.

—

“Dotos, we’ve invited you today for an important meeting,” the chair committee of the branch looked at me seriously. I’d gotten the invitation by word of mouth, in the morning from an affiliated villager. I had been in the garden killing the weeds, and Eudora was climbing up the olive tree. The man had walked up the hill silently but I still heard him since his weight shuffled the gravel walk. 

“Midnight. Cabin by the ocean,” was all he said. I nodded, and he silently crept back, unnoticed by Eudora. 

At midnight, after I had fed, bathed, told the Princess story to Eudora, and put her to sleep, I was standing at the door of the cabin. I knocked, my breath shaky. Four people were seated at an old wooden table, all elders, except for the chair person, their leader. There was one empty seat I sat on.

“We’ve called on you today,” the leader said close to a whisper, “because we need a peace offering for the Gods.” I knew this was coming. 

My family had, centuries ago, wronged the village. I am not even sure myself of the full story, but I remember my ancestors did something bad, or so that is how my father framed it, and now we were paying our dues whenever the village was in a bind. In my lifetime, I’ve seen this tradition only play once, with my little brother, Argus. I had been lucky that year, it seemed that fate was going to end me, but Argus was born just in time to take the attention away from me. When I was a child, my younger brother had paid the due. The family tradition is to give up the youngest child, because as the logic goes, they have lived the shortest, so their death will not be as painful. This time, the tradition chose Eudora.

“I can not possibly do this.” Tears swelled in my eyes. “Eudora is the only one I have left. I will have no one without her. I can not move on without her.” I felt like a boulder had just dropped above me. My breath became short, and I fell to my knees. I begged them with hoarse cries in between.

“We need Eudora.” The leader said with cold eyes. “You just have to say yes, this is the hardest part, Dotos.” The tradition was what kept this village alive, it was what kept all the people living here alive. I just had to repay my family’s history. 

Eudora was just a child. If she did not know about the world, then she would not leave it regretfully. With half a sob, I agreed.

—

It’s the early morning of The Night, and I go feed the goats. Eudora is still laughing in her dreams. What could she be dreaming of? I picked up a little goat to bring inside. It bleats in despair. If only I could tell it a story. Let it know that it will be okay. I’m holding it like a baby, and swaying it up and down like I did with my daughters. They had been fortunate. As soon as they married they left the village. But war raged their regions and made them slaves. Eudora was the only gift that made it. 

Tonight will be The Night for Eudora. I must tell her the story one last time.

It is now the time when the chickens have been brought in and the owls have come out to play. The moon creeps behind the clouds. The council will soon walk up to the house, knock on the door three times, and take her away.

Eudora is fast asleep. I do not want to wake her up for this.

I place my hand on Eudora’s shoulder. She slowly stirs awake, she was not very much asleep before. “Eudora, time to go inside the chest, my dear.” 

The council knocks on the doorframe and I let them enter. They open the chest and peer inside. Eudora is in it and she has her eyes closed. She is in a fetal position and has both her hands clasped one on top of the other. They stand there judging her, and then turn around saying, “accordingly.” Two of the council members lift the chest, and walk down the hill. I stay in the house, not daring to step outside. I follow them with my ears, until I can no longer hear their shifting weight on the gravel.

—

A little after midnight, I saw a group of people bring down a chest from the house into the port, and bring it up to a ship. The vessel did not travel far as it was quickly engulfed in flames. 

An hour later, the townspeople awoke with smoke and soot dancing into their bedrooms. 

Everyone on the boat either couldn’t breathe from the smoke or did not know how to swim. I stretched myself as far as I could see, but all I saw was a desolate board, with only burnt and bloated bodies floating around it, and an open chest with no treasure inside it. After that night, I never saw Eudora again. I knew Eudora wouldn’t come back. 

–

“Eudora, I never told you the end of the story.” I brush her soft hair off her eyes. She looks up to me and asks “but I thought I knew the ending?”

“Oh no my heart, there is more life for this princess to live.”

She lights up and says, “How does it end?”

“Well, the princess, not known for staying true to tradition, woke up in the middle of the night and realized she wanted to burn the castle down. She knew this feeling was from her not being content where she was. The prince had brought her to his paradise, but now she had been taken away from hers: her home, her family. But now she could never see her loved ones again. After her escape with the prince, she had been exiled from her land. One night she wakes up and decides it is time. The prince is in the Great Hall entertaining a party. She is beside him and tells him that she is not feeling well and needs rest, and that there is no need for the servants to follow her. The moon is like a shiny rock, challenging the ocean to interrupt its glare in the endless black mirror. She grabs a torch from the bedroom and throws it on the bed. Fire catches quickly and soon her room is filled with smoke. She jumps out the window that faces the ocean and splashes onto the harsh waves and swims as far as she can. She doesn’t look back. She is hurt all over, but she does not stop. She keeps swimming. She can’t go back home. But she can swim somewhere else. Anywhere else.”

Eudora is quiet. “I do not like this ending.”

“I know my sweet, but the princess did it out of necessity. She had to get out. Or else she would die.”

“But did she not love the prince?”

“Oh, yes she did. Oh, she loved him dearly. But she had to go. For her own life.” Eudora looked crestfallen. “My darling, tomorrow I will ask a strange request from you. I will ask you if you will go inside a chest.”

Before she went to sleep, I gave her two pieces of dry wood in one hand and pyrite and flint in the other. I brushed her hair one last time in bed, and whispered in her ear, “Tomorrow you will be reborn. Like the sun washing up along the coast. You have a story to live, my princess.”