The Hanged Man: Part 5: Imbolc
Post #39: In which a young woman finds a path forward ...
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CHAPTER 17
Winter again woke into spring and Rose Red turned fifteen. The queen proudly laid out a gift of new clothing on Rose Red’s bed. The dresses were elaborate confections of lace and ruffles in pastel colors of ice blue, pink and violet. Rose Red’s heart sank as her mother showed her fine sewing and embroidery and elaborate, fiendishly tight undergarments that held her in a steel embrace and reduced her waist to a stalk. The queen picked up a flowing gown in pale lavender and excitedly led the way to her own rooms. There, a matching gown in a stronger, deeper color of lavender lay ready, and the Queen stripped off Rose Red’s comfortable old clothes and demonstrated how to wear stays, lacing her tight. Carefully, she fastened Rose Red into the gown, then swiftly dressed herself. They stood before the mirror.
Rose Red hardly recognized herself. Only her hair seemed familiar. The stays crushed her ribs and made her breasts swell. The deep lavender color suited the Queen well, with her white skin and black hair, but the lighter shade of Rose Red’s dress stole color from her tanned face. The exposed skin of her throat and neck was brown, as were her forearms, contrasting oddly with white skin revealed by the low cut of the gown. She would have laughed at the sight of herself if she’d possessed breath to do so. Queen Snow White frowned at their reflection.
“You see now what terrible damage the sun does to one’s skin? You must stay out of it, my dear! This dress needs the whitest skin. It makes you look like quite a young lady! I think perhaps…mmm…yes, pearls, I think. Would you like a pearl necklace, Rose? Very suitable for a young girl! You’ll look wonderful in diamonds later, but for now…”
Rose Red looked into the mirror and saw a girl she didn’t recognize moving inexorably into a future she didn’t want. The dress encased her in a cruel grip. She couldn’t breathe well and she could hardly move. Yet her mother sounded pleased and happy as she talked of pearls and dances and shoes to match the dress. This girl, this stiff, uncomfortable doll, was who she wanted Rose Red to be.
She stood obediently, saying nothing, turning this way and that and even taking a few dance steps across the floor to please her mother and show the skirt’s flare. In the mirror, she watched herself smile for her mother, properly pleased and modest, shy at the idea of her first dance. Her heart beat heavily.
My mother doesn’t know who I am, she thought, while the queen prattled on. She doesn’t want to know.
Later, when she went back to her rooms, Rose Red found her old clothes gone.
When a note came from Vasilisa a few days later, Rose Red left the castle in one of her new dresses. It was a day dress, not so fine as the lavender gown, in pale pink. It was completely unsuitable for walking through woods, as were the delicate slippers that went with it. It made the walk she so looked forward to, wandering here and there among trees, watching birds, looking for animals, a breathless ordeal. Even keeping to the path, she felt anxious about tearing or dirtying the dress because she knew it would upset her mother. By the time she reached the stone cottage she was exhausted and near tears.
Vasilisa waited for her, sitting on the sunny stone wall with the cat beside her. She ran to Rose Red, exclaiming in surprise at her dress, and then, when she noted her friend’s face, in concern. Rose Red tried to draw a deep breath and couldn’t — tried to stop her tears from falling and couldn’t — groped for words but possessed no breath to speak them. Blackness seeped into the edges of her vision, she felt her face flush with heat and the ground tilted and came up to meet her.
When she opened her eyes again, she lay with her head in Vasilisa’s lap. The constriction of her clothing was loosened and she could breathe. She took a deep breath and began to cry, turning onto her side and hiding her face in the folds of Vasilisa’s black skirt. Vasilisa’s hand stroked her head and another hand patted her back — Jenny’s hand.
Gradually, the storm of weeping passed and she quieted. It was bliss to be able to breathe! She’d never appreciated freely breathing before. Her nose ran and she sniffed hard. Jenny handed her a handkerchief and she took it and sat up. The unfastened gown fell off her shoulders.
She told them about her birthday and the queen’s presents. “I know she wanted to give me something special,” she finished dully. “I know I’m ungrateful. Most girls would love such fine clothes. But I can’t do anything when I’m wearing them! Nothing I love to do! Can you imagine climbing a tree in this?” The other two laughed and Rose Red smiled sadly and blew her nose.
“They took away my old clothes,” she said, twisting the handkerchief in her hands. “It feels like they took me away, all I love, all I truly am.”
“Rosie,” said Jenny. “We’ve a birthday gift for you, too. It’s inside. Can you stand up, now you’re unlaced?”
Rose Red stood, shaking out her skirt. “Is it all right?” she asked anxiously, twisting and trying to look at the back of the dress. “Did it get dirty when I fell?”
“Don’t worry,” said Vasilisa. We’ll take care of it when we get you out of it. You can put a blanket around you inside.”
The Dwarves weren’t there. “They went out with Rumpelstiltskin. They’ll be back in a bit,” Jenny told her. “Let’s get you out of this dress.”
The dress had suffered no great damage. They shook it, smoothed it and carefully hung it out of harm’s way. Vasilisa produced a neatly folded bundle and gave it to Rose Red. A posy of flowers lay on top. Carefully, Rose Red unfolded the bundle.
She found a skirt of serviceable cotton and hemp, sturdy and tough, light brown in color, and a tunic the same color but embroidered with Vasilisa’s delicate work in shades of green and grey with touches of orange and red. She saw vines and leaves and forest flowers, trees, birds on the wing, a fox peering out of a thicket, a delicate doe and fawn, and a line of rabbits, one following another, through a patch of wild strawberries. Collar and hem were worked in a scalloped interlocking pattern with gold thread. She also found leggings.
Rose Red was speechless. “You made these for me?” she whispered at last, “for me?”
“Yes,” said Vasilisa. “We thought the colors would suit you and you could wander in the woods — and climb trees — in such clothes.”
Rose Red stood up, dropped the blanket, stepped into the skirt and pulled the tunic over her head. She ran her hands down the front of the tunic and then down her sides and over her hips. She looked from Vasilisa to Jenny. “Really for me?” she asked.
“No one else in the world but you! You look beautiful, Rosie, like a tree dryad!” They smiled at her with such pleasure and love Rose Red’s eyes overflowed again.
“Very nice! But not quite complete!” came a voice from the door. The dwarves stood there, Rumpelstiltskin smiling in their midst.
One of them came forward and handed Rose Red a pair of low leather boots, supple and with sturdy soles. Coiled in one of the boots she found a belt of braided leather and a thin strand of gold with a bronze buckle. A light scabbard on the belt held a knife.
Rose Red was simply overwhelmed. Seeing this, Rumpelstiltskin demanded, “What about lunch? I thought you were making lunch?” He fixed Jenny with a severe eye.
She laughed at him. “Oh, all right! But now you’re here you might as well help!” In a moment, the kitchen was full of the sound of chopping, the table outside was being set, salad mixed, bread sliced and cold meat set out. Rose Red went to a chair by the empty fireplace and sat down. The boots fit perfectly. The belt buckled around her slim waist comfortably and the gold in the belt complimented the gold worked into the tunic. She knew this must be more of Jenny’s work — gold spun from straw. The clothes fit her as comfortably as her own skin and she felt completely at home in them. They were clothes for the life she wanted. After a bit, she went to the kitchen, picked up a stack of plates and took them out to the table, feeling self-conscious and beautiful and…proud.
After the meal, Jenny brought out the dress and showed it to the dwarves. They bent over it, admiring the fine work and material. Rose Red sat in their midst, sore and ashamed. She hated the sight of the dress.
Suddenly Rumpelstiltskin said in a loud voice, “Take this frippery off the table! It’s time for the game!” He produced a leather bag, unlaced it and emptied it onto the table. A heap of pebbles spilled out. He reached out a hand and stirred them, spreading them.
The dwarves mined pounds and pounds of gemstones in their caves and caverns and tunnels. In their workroom, they cut and sorted the stones before fashioning the best into beautiful objects. There were always stones left over — too small to cut or of inferior quality in some way. These the dwarves collected and brought back to the cottage. The game arose out of the day Rose Red held the garnet and diamond, and was called “Me! Not Me!” It consisted of picking through the anonymous pebbles one by one, holding them and allowing them to speak. If a pebble didn’t speak in the hand it was discarded. If it did it was kept. At the end of an afternoon each player had collected a little pile of pebbles. The dwarves then identified them, sharing the lore and story of each gem. In this way, Rose Red had collected garnets for passion; agates for strength, courage and protection; jasper for health; and sodalite for healing and wisdom.
After the game, while the others put away stones and cleared the table, Rumpelstiltskin took Rose Red by the hand and led her to where the dress hung from a rafter. He took one of her hands and laid it on the hem of the dress and placed the other on her chest over Vasilisa’s embroidery.
“Me! Not Me!” he said quietly.
She looked at him in surprise but didn’t hesitate.
“Not me,” she said, shaking her head at the dress and taking her hand away. She covered the hand on her chest with the other and said, “Me.”
He smiled at her. “’Me’ is where your power is. Stay there.”
When it was time to go, she put on the dress without protest. Vasilisa laced her up. Rose Red walked home alone, slowly and carefully. She left her own clothes in the stone cottage. Shame and anger were gone, sadness in their place. It was a beautiful dress. But it wasn’t a dress for her. For now, she must wear it, but it could never be hers. No matter how much she wanted to please her mother and make her happy, no matter how much Queen Snow White tried to make her into somebody else, she was always going to be “me.” She could never be “not me.”
Winter came again. Nothing changed but everything was different. Every day Rose Red spent time with her mother, reassuring, coaxing, listening, trying to fill her emptiness and calm her anxiety. It was exhausting. It was draining. Her heart felt heavy with pity, frustration and a kind of resigned love for the queen, but she had stepped back. Rose Red could now discern a boundary between herself and her mother. The queen’s unhappiness no longer felt like her own. Many, many times a day she evaluated her experience through the filter of “Me! Not Me!” The feeling of her own badness weakened. Indeed, when she heard herself think, I’m bad! it sounded childish and rather silly. “Bad” became “Not Me,” a place of no power.
She began to know herself. She knew the queen wanted her to marry a powerful man, have children and live the sort of life Queen Snow White herself lived. Rose Red attended dances and feasts, riding parties, picnics, trips and all kinds of social activities in which the queen proudly presented her to appropriate young men. Rose Red obediently dressed, danced, made conversation, sat with her knees together and observed the conventions. She was young and beautiful, moved with an athletic grace, and looked healthier than the other young women in search of a good marriage, due to her time outside. She had no lack of admirers.
The problem was she didn’t want admirers, wealth, power or a fine marriage. The whole business bored her dreadfully. She hated restrictive clothing, artificial manners and conversation, rigid dance steps. She went along with it because it was easier than fighting her parents and enduring her mother’s recriminations and self-blame. She went along with it, but she knew it was all wrong, all false, all meaningless. Whatever she did with her life, it wouldn’t be a fine marriage!
She waited for another way.
One day late in February she left the castle grounds to go to the dwarves’ cottage. She expected to find Vasilisa there. Jenny and Rumpelstiltskin were not presently staying in the area, though they visited often.
A wild wind blew erratically, as though it couldn’t make up its mind which direction to go, or how hard. The sky was choppy with grey and white clouds pushed quickly along by what looked like more organized bluster overhead. Weak sunlight gave way suddenly to dull cold cloud and a spatter of sleet. Sleet softened to rain for a few moments, and then sun shone again, briefly, making diamonds out of wet drops. Trees were beginning to bud. Birds talked of nests. The forest was waking.
As she walked, she thought she caught a thin thread of music. She stopped, listening. She heard the sound of piping, quite far away. Or was it only muffled by trees? She couldn’t tell. The sound made hairs rise on her arms. There was something haunting about it, something entirely wild. It made her catch her breath and her pulse quicken, but she couldn’t say if she felt excitement or fear. Perhaps both, and something else, too. Something warmer, more urgent. She became aware of the texture of her clothing against her skin. She began to walk again, wanting to be safe at the stone cottage. Trees around her listened…watching…waiting.
Slowly, she went forward. The piping went on, a thin thread creeping into her ears and winding through her body. The birds had ceased their activity. Wind and clouds moved restlessly, but everything else was caught in a strange frozen stillness.
A woman stepped from behind a tree. Rose Red stopped abruptly with a gasp of surprise. The stranger wore a tunic of soft-looking deerskin belted with a wide strip of leather. Her hair was curly and short, blowing free in the gusty wind, a rich brown. She had a bag of arrows slung over a shoulder and carried a bow, a gracefully shaped curve that radiated soft silver light. She wore leather boots on her feet. She looked steadily into Rose Red’s face.
Something moved behind her, and a huge animal took shape in the pale shadows. It stepped to the woman’s side and Rose Red saw magnificent intertwined antlers. The stag shimmered with white light, glowing the same way the bow did.
Without thought, Rose Red bowed her head in submission. She touched the cold, smooth bark of a nearby tree trunk to steady herself. She found she’d closed her eyes and at the same time realized she no longer heard the piping.
“Rosie.” The woman’s voice was deep and clear, commanding response.
Rose Red opened her eyes and looked up.
The woman smiled. “You’re brave,” she said simply.
Thinking of her mother and the daily struggle of her feelings, Rose Red shook her head. “No,” she said sadly. “I only do the best I can.”
“You’re brave,” the woman repeated firmly. “Your life is calling to you.”
Sudden tears welled up in Rose Red’s eyes. Yes. Her own life. A life she recognized and felt at home in. She longed for it, but it seemed so far away.
The stag moved forward, looking at her out of large, dark eyes. She reached out a tentative hand to touch its neck, feel the texture of the strange glowing white coat. The antlers looked immensely heavy. The stag put out a rough, large tongue and licked her tear-wet cheek. The touch was so unexpected she hadn’t time to flinch. The touch went through her, sinking into her deepest, most private self. The stag swung around and stood beside her, facing the woman. She felt the brush of its muscled shoulder.
“My name is Artemis. I need someone to help me,” said the woman. “I need someone who isn’t afraid of wild places; someone who isn’t afraid to be alone; someone to protect, defend and nurture life. I need someone who’ll learn the secrets of each stream, tree and bird’s nest. I need someone fierce and wild who knows how to love. Rose Red, are you the one I need?”
Tears burned in Rose Red’s eyes. She couldn’t speak. A feeling of relief so great she thought she might lose consciousness swept through her, as though a terrible burden had been lifted. She turned her face into the warm coarse hair, slightly oily, of the white stag, and wept.
MIRMIR
“Her mother ate her alive,” said the Hanged Man. “My mother left us when we were still children. Does anyone have a good mother?”
“Your mother ssurrendered hersself to turning the wheel,” said Mirmir. His sibilant words hissed like dry leaves in the wind.
“Hmmph. She surrendered us to the wheel, too. That hardly seems fair.”
“No? Yet you left your mate and unborn ssonss to hang around with me and lissten to sstoriess,” said Mirmir with a sly smile.
The Hanged Man fired up at once. “I had to leave, you miserable reptile! Mary understood. She knew I poured everything I was into harvest.”
“Jusst as your mother poured everything she wass into giving birth to you.”
“Never mind,” snapped the Hanged Man. “Go on with Rose Red.”
“There came a day of weak ssun and dissorganized wind; a day of tentative birdssong and sswift-moving cloudss; a day when winter-bound sstreamss began to trickle and ice thinned to clear glass over living water; a day when the treess’ sslow heartbeat quickened and they began to wake, sstretching out their bodiess, and the green ssound of piping drew ssap up through their flesh like tendrilss of clear fire; a day of relief, of releasse, of recognition; a day when the flute called in a voice of ssilver and bone, ssilver and bone, and the ssound of drip, of drop, of sseep, of sspurt, the ssound of running water, the ssound of life, ressponded.”
“Imbolc,” said the Hanged Man. “The wild maiden returns.”
(This post was published with this essay.)