Once Upon a Dream (19 page)

The closest one was the size of a horse and had horns above its evil yellow eyes. And it was gaining on them.

“THE GATE!” Phillip cried, pointing at a rough stile that marked the entrance to the smallholding. It was certainly not strong enough to keep the demons out and looked rather pathetic. On the fence next to it were tacked strange things Aurora Rose couldn’t understand: garlic, a rope of wolfsbane, a tattered cloth painted with runes.

But the prince seemed to think the gate offered some form of safety, so she let him pick her up and hurl her over the side. He dove after her, landing in a roll.

The giant demon chasing them stopped short of the gate.

It looked ridiculous: this large, black, yellow-eyed, smoky, horned evil thing, swaying hesitantly in front of the comparatively small rustic fence with the bits and tatters on it.

It slowly lowered its head and began to fade.

In moments, it was gone.

Phillip let out a string of curses: the demon clinging to his head was still there, undispelled. He reached up and pulled it off, hurling it to the ground.

It howled, its face splitting almost in half. The teeth that it had sunken into the prince’s flesh weren’t long—but there were
lots
of them.

The prince yanked his sword out of its sheath and drove it into the thing’s head through its wide mouth.

Perhaps many more times than strictly necessary.

It shrieked and hissed and squirmed and bled white bloodlike pus, finally disappearing in a curl of oily smoke.

Aurora Rose watched it all silently, trying to regain her breath. She wasn’t sure why she wasn’t crying.

“Dear God,” Phillip swore, running a hand through his hair and looking at the thick smears of blood that covered it. “I think I would have preferred a dragon. Those things were
horrible
.”

He wiped his sword on the ground to clean it.

“Why did they…why did that tiny gate stop them?” she asked.

“The protective wards. Didn’t you see them hanging there?” he said, pointing at the brightly colored bits and herbs. “It’s a pretty common thing in the more…rural villages. Never believed they actually
worked
, though.”

“Oh.” She decided she would deal with the philosophical implications—dream talismans effectively keeping away dream demons—another time.

A lone woodsman, returning from the forest, ax over one shoulder, looked over at the couple. Maybe it was the blood all over Phillip or the princess’s
extremely
out-of-place dress, but he started walking faster. Away from them.

“Let’s go see if anyone has some warm water. And bandages. And maybe dinner,” Phillip suggested.

She put a hand to her head.

“But…none of this is real. We’re not
really
wounded or hungry. Right?”

“It’s real enough while we’re here,” he said with a shrug. “I don’t know what happens to us in the real world if we’re killed here. And I don’t think I want to find out. So let’s play by the rules until we figure out the loopholes.”

She nodded. That made sense.

They started toward the village.

“So…another trap. Much cleverer this time,” Phillip said.

“Yes. This time with a fancy surprise ending.” Aurora Rose sighed.

“But
you
figured it out and managed to pull us out of it.”

“I suppose I did,” she said, thinking about it. It
was
all her doing. Up to the part with the demons.

“‘Suppose’? You
completely
did. It was
amazing
! Well done!”

He was truly excited for her; his praise was real and enthusiastic.

Little warm waves worked up her body from the tips of her toes to her cheeks. He—
her prince
—was genuinely impressed by something she did. It almost eliminated the remaining apprehensiveness in her.

But not quite.

“What—what’s wrong? We won, Rose. Why are you still upset?”

She took a deep breath and tried to sort her feelings.

“When you told the story of what happened in the real world before, you mentioned the fairies giving me gifts of beauty and grace or whatever, and I just sort of dismissed it. I thought it was poetic license. So when the…
back there
fairies, the demons…one of them said my beauty was a
gift
—a fairy gift—it suddenly sank in. It must have been literal. My beauty isn’t even my own. It was given to me by someone else.”

“Oh, Rose, don’t be silly, of course—”

“The story
said.
The fairy
said.
But that’s not the point. The point is that I realized, standing in front of the mirror, that wherever they came from, my looks
were never actually that important to me
in the real world. Other things were.

“
That’s
when I figured out how weird the situation with those fairies or demons or whatever was. I didn’t even start out caring about my looks in
this
world—the world of the Thorn Castle—not until I was actively encouraged. The fairies were acting exactly how Li—my handmaiden acted around me. With the dressing up and praising my golden hair. And
she
wound up being a spy for Maleficent.”

Phillip frowned. “How strange…It seems like twice now in your dream life she has tried to distract you and trap you with dresses and…I don’t know, your beauty and vanity. Which you don’t really have much of.
Vanity
, I mean. You’re plenty beautiful. But it seems like Maleficent doesn’t have a very large range of scenarios for you. She just goes back to the same old thing.”

“I think she might…underestimate me. I think she has a picture in her head of who I am. Silly pretty princess. I don’t think she actually
knows
who I am.”

“I hope I do,” Phillip said with a grin, taking her hand and squeezing it.

“Do you?” she asked with a wry smile. “I’m not even sure I know myself.”

The breeze turned, bringing the clear, teasing trill of a fiddle to them along with the smell of smoke and the sound of laughter. There couldn’t have been a more inviting combination of sensations in the world.

“That must be the village up ahead,” Phillip said, pointing.

The two picked up their pace and hurried to the center of the tiny village.

It was really nothing more than a cozy collection of cottages, with thatched roofs and smoke drifting from their stone chimneys. There was no bank or church or any more formal building than a smithy and a storehouse. Aurora Rose realized with a start that it might even have been one of the places her aunts—the fairies—went to get supplies. She was never allowed to go on those trips.

A huge red-and-orange bonfire crackled merrily in the commons. Two fiddlers and a jug player enthusiastically belted out high-spirited music. Children ran around in bare feet, mouths smeared with red and purple from the berries they were gobbling down. Adults clapped and danced. Everyone was dressed—well, if not in their
best
, then at least in their
nicer
clothes: big-skirted dresses for twirling, broken straw hats freshened up with ribbon, even the occasional washed face.

Humans weren’t the only ones enjoying the fun, either: dogs and cats chased each other through the crowd. A gray donkey lifted its neck and brayed along with the music. Toddlers worked to keep a small flock of overexcited geese out from underfoot.

A table with a snow-white cloth was laid out with all sorts of pies and tarts along with a pile of bread and pots of dark purple jam. A cauldron of something that smelled like hot wine sat on a smaller fire nearby; a solicitous crone ladled out steaming portions into anyone’s mug.

Aurora Rose’s eyes widened in delight at the scene.

“It’s the Berry Moon festival,” Phillip explained. “If things work the same way here. They’re celebrating the end of summer. I’ll bet that’s hot raspberry mash over there.”

“I know that festival! They have it every year, but my aunts never let me go,” she said wistfully. “Wait—”

Phillip sighed and put his hands out to catch her as she began to sway, hit by another stream of memories.

This time it wasn’t
too
bad or too long. A series of very similar scenes presented themselves one after another: late summer, and despite their seclusion in the woods, the excitement of the festival reaching even the three aunts and Rose. She
begged
to go. If the breeze turned right she could smell simmering raspberries on the wind.

“Never, it’s not safe,” said Flora.

“I’m sorry, dear,” said Fauna. “Maybe when you’re older.”

“How fun can it be, anyway?” Merryweather asked. “All those hu—uh, clodhoppers dancing around to those silly songs and eating pies…”

“YOU NEVER LET ME DO ANYTHING!”
Rose screamed, stomping out of the house. At age thirteen, fourteen, fifteen…

Aurora Rose came to still upright this time, head pounding but buoyed by one clear thought.

“I get to go
this
time!” she said, grinning and walking ahead eagerly.

“Rose, it’s not
real
,” Phillip said, chasing after. “It’s probably another trap. It’s probably danger—”

“Don’t. Even.” She spun around and put her finger to his lips. “It’s
my
dream, and I’m finally going to enjoy it.”

But if the prince was expecting another trap from Maleficent, his suspicions were immediately allayed by what happened next: the music wound down awkwardly, the dancing stopped, and the crowd turned unfriendly stares on the couple.

The princess put a hand to the back of her head in embarrassment. They
did
look pretty strange, an armed prince and a ragged princess, covered in blood and dirt.

“Er. Hi,” she said with a timid wave. She tried to remember who she was, and where she was from, and how people usually looked at her when she walked into a room.

At least in the Thorn Castle.

“Excuse us for interrupting.”

“Where’ve ye come from, just at
sunset
and all?” an old man asked, not bothering to mask the suspicion in his voice.

“Oh, come off it, ye crazy old coot,” swore a woman not dramatically younger than he, rolling her eyes. “That impudent gypsy
Ozrey
came in just a little before them, and ye didn’t give
him
the third degree.”

“We know who Ozrey is,” the old man sniffed. “Never seen the likes of
these
two before.”

There were murmurs and nods of agreement from more than a few villagers.

“We escaped from the enchanted castle,” Aurora Rose explained calmly. “We were prisoners there and managed to escape the evil queen and her servants.”

“We were chased by her demons. All the way here,” Phillip added. “I killed the last one, who did this to me.” He turned and showed the back of his head, torn and bloody.

And at
that
the crowd began to relax.

“I
thought
ye looked royal,” a woman said, nodding her head knowingly.

“’Swhy we have the wards,” piped up an ancient lady, who had few teeth and many warts and a long, pointed chin. “Keeps the witch and her hellfire servants out of the town.”

“For which we are indebted to you. Utterly,” Phillip said with a graceful bow.

“Are there lots of other people in there?” another woman asked, looking worried. “Trapped?”

“Yes. We—we plan to get help. To
rescue
them.”

There was no point in telling the whole story to these dream people who may have been asleep in the real world—or not in the real world at all.

“You’ll need an army,” a middle-aged farmer with a quilted vest said. A long piece of grass stuck out of his mouth.

“Aye. A big army. With siege machines and th’like,” said another thoughtfully.

“You’d better not have your army tromping through my rutabaga patch!” a third farmer cried, pointing down to the ground with his finger like a judge. “I’ll not have your army marching through here and ruining my rutabagas.”

“We’re not—there’s not…All right, we promise,” Phillip said, giving up. “No armies on anyone’s rutabaga patch.”

The farmer settled down, relieved.

“Well, then, come and refresh yourselves, you young heroes!” the crone at the cauldron cackled. “You’re interrupting our party—you may as well join it!”

“We would be delighted,” the princess said with a sigh.

The music started up again. Everyone began to clap, dance, or gossip, not bothering to disguise the curious stares they gave the newcomers. Someone handed them each a heavy-bottomed mug of hot raspberry wine. One sip of the sweet and syrupy drink went immediately to Aurora Rose’s toes. Her foot began to tap to the music. She watched the children form a circle and begin a surprisingly complicated routine.

“Come!” a little girl said, running up to her and grabbing her hand. She looked at the princess with hope and awe; it was unlikely anyone as pretty or dressed-up as she had been to their village. Ever.

The princess, in turn, looked at Phillip.

“It’s another trap,” he said. “Probably.”

“Doesn’t feel like it,” she said with a grin, and she let herself be dragged away by the little girl.

“Neither did the last two!”
Phillip called after her.

The crowd cheered, and the adults joined together to make a larger ring around the children, dancing the opposite direction.

It was the exact opposite of the balls that Maleficent threw: no fancy dresses, no preening, no dissembling, no posing. The children were dancing for the sake of the dance itself. Energy, happiness, and light flew around, and Aurora Rose found herself swept up by it until she was laughing along with the little ones whose hands she held.

Phillip, on the other hand, looked uneasy; he kept smiling and toasting villagers but obviously didn’t like the way that he was now separated from her by the ring of adult dancers.

The music slowed down. The circles paused in their gyres. Phillip moved forward and began to clap, relieved it was all over.

And then the music started up again.

The rings of dancers began their revolutions again.

“Wait now,” Phillip said, to no one in particular.