We all know the story. The taste of his lips as her eyelids flutter open. True Love's Kiss breaks the curse and awakens the sleeping princess. Like all good stories though, things aren't quite as simple as they seem. Because in this story the real adventure happens in your dreams.
Rosamund was just as beautiful as the stories say and once upon a time, when she was but an infant, a dark fairy laid out a sleeping curse to come upon the poor girl. But even the fairy did not know the extent of what her magic would do.
It is the case with all things cast in shadow, even the wielders know only a fraction of the harm and never in their anger do they stop to wonder if the magic will hold any ill effects for themselves.
Not only Rosamund but the entire kingdom fell under the sleeping curse, thorns and briars grew around it and the kingdom itself passed into legend as weeks turned into months turned into years. But Rosamund's sleep was not an unproductive one, and this is our story, dear reader, a story that begins: Once upon a dream...
Once upon a dream there was an enchanting woman. With long golden locks, eyes blue as the midday sky, and beautiful full red lips. She had been blessed by fairies in infancy with gifts of beauty, of singing, but also of intellect and of kindness.
She faced the last spinning wheel in the kingdom on the dawning of her 18th birthday and made a decision that would change the history of her nation forever.
Her delicate finger reached out to the sharpened spindle of the orrnate spinning wheel and with a sharp prick a single drop of ruby red blood fell to the stone floor.
A tear slid down her cheek. Not from the pain, not even from the curse, but from relief. She had lived her whole life with this curse looming over her. Now it was finally done.
Shee would enter the world of dreams.
It was a wider world than she imagined it would be. Forests and oceans and floating kingdoms that danced through the clouds.
t made one feel hazy and dreamy, ready to slumber at any moment, but the words of her fairy protector always came back to her.
"You must break the curse, Rosa. The world of dreams is very seductive, and you'll be tempted to stay there forever, but you must for your people break the curse, my darling." The words were so tender, Rosa could still remember the tone in which they were said, but she could not remember the face.
She had no idea how long she had been in this world of dreams, but the words kept her holding onto a sense of purpose, at least when she wasn't too busy enjoyying the enchanting life she got to live.
You must break the curse. But every memory except for the voice of her fairy protector had been wiped away when she entered the dream. Why should she break the curse when life was so wonderful?
In the afternoons Rosa went to work in the village of Slumber. It was on the eastern side of the river whose water was poison to touch.
The town itself was laid out in a maze of cobbled streets. The thatched rooftops of quaint shops and buildings stood like little mushrooms on the side of the hill on which the town rested. Rosa made her home outside the village, in an old, dilapidated cottage far from prying eyes.
Beside her walked her little dog who foraged with her for the mushrooms that they needed to bring into town. Puff was small and white, with floppy ears and a perpetual smile in his dark eyes. Rosa smiled at him as they walked in the warm summer sun, happy that winter was still distant.
"Good afternoon, Rosa!" the baker shouted from his window. A fresh batch of gingerbread men and women danced and twirled in the display.
"Afternoon, Mister Hatch!" On days like this where the sun felt so real and the earth so solid beneath her feet, she wondered if the fairy who had spoken to her was the real dream.
"Does Puff want a treat?"
Puff stopped beside her; ears alert at the word treat. He looked up at Mr. Hatch with a wagging tail and a tongue lopped out of his mouth.
"I think he does." Rosa smiled fondly.
"Good! Bring him on over."
It wouldn't hurt to spend a few minutes at the bakery before her shift began, she was sure. Rosa led Puff over and watched the dancing ginger cookies.
She longed to dance. But it was not the done thing in Slumber. Dancing was for the 'enchanted' tools and items, but not for people. She looked at them wistfully as Mister Hatch gave Puff the meaty treat he had set aside for him.
"Did you hear about our newcomer?"
"Newcomer?" There hasn't been a newcomer in Slumber since...
"Yes indeed! A right handsome fellow. Poor bloke doesn't know the sky from the ceiling though. He's been on and on about all kinds of art and paintbrushes, but nobody can get him to even give us a name! They've taken him in over at the parish and are having Doctor Lyle look at him. What they want with a quack like him I don't rightly care but the poor bloke is right confused about...well about everything!"
"That certainly is strange, I'll stop by and talk to Sister Adelaide on my way home from work then. Thank you for telling me! I wouldn't want her to have to tend to everything herself."
"'Course not. You get along now. I don't want to make you late for work again! I just hope that new fellow can liven things up around here," Mister Hatch said his mouth opened wide and his eyes closed and then his face went back to normal again.
Rosamund did her best not to stare, gave him a polite goodbye and turned to leave with Puff following at her heels.
What was that he did with his face? Rosamund was searching her memories and something strange and blurry came out. It's called a yawn! Where have I seen that before?
After her shift serving lunch at the Duckling Dive Rosamund headed over to the parish.
It had a tall white steeple and the building (it was the tallest in town at two stories) was made of red brick. There was a small white fence around it and inside the fence was a beautiful garden of daffodils in every color of the rainbow. Pink, purple, yellow, daffodils danced and turned their faces up towards the sun whispering sweet songs into the wind.
Puff ran up to the daffodils who swatted at him good-naturedly with their leaves. Rosamund smiled at him and shook her head. "I'll be back in a minute." She followed the yellow path markers up to the front door of the church.
"Sister Adelaide, are you in?" Rosamund let herself in, pushing open the large dark wood doors that were all carved and gnarled by age and wind.
"Hello?" A man's voice greeted her instead. Inside the church, towards the altar, a man stood with an easel and a paint brush in his hand. "Is it you?"
"Is it who?" Rosamund responded.
The strange man had broad shoulders and freckled skin. He looked wise but also naïve, tender but also strong, a wealth of contradictions danced across his form making him the most beautiful and interesting looking man Rosamund had ever seen.
"I was told there would be a woman here."
"Sister Adelaide isn't here at the moment—"
"No, no," he said and shook his head, as if he was trying to remember something.
"Someone told me something about a woman and she was important." He seemed to be getting more and more frustrated. His brown eyes were filled with confusion and a touch of something that Rosamund almost couldn't place. Fear.
Rosamund had never seen fear before. It was a hazy word that didn't fit with the idyllic world around her, but it was plain in his eyes. Part of her wanted to leave the church, forget she had seen the strange new comer and just go home.
But something else, something stronger, pushed her towards him.
"Do you know her name?" Rosamund was doing her best to be helpful, but this situation was sending a strange sensation through her. Déjà vu...
"I don't even know my name."
"Well, that could be a problem. Why don't we just call you..."
Just as Rosamund was trying to think of a name for the stranger a gust of wind blew open the church door and on the wind was a name. Floating like gold through the air until it rested and landed on the man's chest, just over his heart. Peter.
"Look at that!" Rosamund approached him, he flinched back but she paid no mind as she examined the letters that were slowly melting away into a fine gold dust. "The wind picked your name for you. You must be Peter!"