Sleeping Beauty: Part 2

The dusting took Rhlan until mid afternoon to finish. Once he was done, he shook his dusting cloths out in the wind and put them into his small pack that he had. Then he went back to the Princesses room, wondering what would happen next.
Princess Amora was sitting up on her bed when he entered the room.

“I'm leavin’ now,” he told her. “The dustin’ is finished an’ I got to get home before dark or me Ma will worry.”

Amora sniffed at him and said nothing.

“What will you do?” he asked her, not sure if he was supposed to leave the Princess who had been asleep but was now awake alone in the museum.

“Unfortunately,” Amora told him in a distressed sort of way, “I see no other option but to accompany you to your village and continue to the palace from there.”

Rhlan wondered if he should tell her that he didn’t live in the city, but decided against it. He didn’t think he should leave her here and if she didn’t come with him there was no way else she would leave. Nero and Ma would know what to do, he decided.
“Alright then,” he told her. “We’d best be going.” He turned and walked out of the room. A quick glance over his shoulder told him that the Princess had slid off her bed and was hurrying slightly to catch up with him.

Rhlan lead them through the museum and out a side door which he locked behind them with the key his Ma had given him. Then he started to walk down the unused path to the trail through the forest that would lead them home.

“What is this?” Amora demanded, puffing slightly as they entered the forest. “Where are you taking me?”

“Home,” Rhlan answered. “This is the only way.”

“My goodness,” the Princess said, “the state they have let things get to with out me. It’s terrible! If all the roads are like this going to the Palace it will take longer than I expected to arrive there. I will be complaining at once.”

Rhlan wondered if he should tell the Princess that the trail they followed was not a road. That indeed, there weren’t many roads around this area of the kingdom because not many people lived here, but again decided against it. He didn’t think she would like to know that getting to the Palace would take longer than she would ever imagine.

Meanwhile, Amora was having a hard time walking along the trail behind Rhlan. She seamed to be stumbling over every tree root and small stone there was. “You shall have to wait a moment,” she called to him after a while. “I need to rest.” At which point she stopped completely and looked around. “You will need to make a suitable seat for me,” she added.
Rhlan turned back to her. “What?” he asked.

“I can not possibly sit on this ground,” Amora told him as primly as she could. She was losing her touch though, her golden hair had stray leaves in it and the hem of her pink dress was now stained and torn in places.

“Well ya don’t have to,” Rhlan told her. “We’ve got to keep going or else we won’t get home before dark.” He turned around and continued walking down the trail. Amora stood for a moment with her hands on her hips, trying to decided weather she should protest, but the thought of the forest in the dark and Rhlan’s fading figure told her not to.

“Wait wait!” she cried, trying to catch up with him. To his credit Rhlan stopped and waited for the Princess to catch up before setting off again. For the rest of the way, though, Rhlan wondered why he had bothered. Amora seamed to be able to criticize everything imaginable and more. She spent the rest of the trip complaining about everything from the trees around them to the mattress she had spent the last few centuries sleeping on.

Rhlan was incredibly relieved when he saw his home through the trees. It was growing dark, and he wasn’t sure he could take much more of the Princesses’ endless chatter.

“Here we are,” he told Amora as the trail came out of the forest and his house came into view.

“Well thank heavens,” Amora started following him out of the forest. “Really I—” she stopped. Rhlan, who was half way across the clearing that made the garden of his house in the forest, turned back and looked at her. Princess Amora seamed quite speechless. Rhlan shrugged and continued to on.

“This is where you live?” came the incredulous voice of Princess Amora from behind him. She hurried across the grass. “This is where I am expected to stay the night? I simply can’t. I thought you were taking me to your village, instead you have led me here. What is this place anyway? I can’t believe you would live here, it’s not even half a house!”

Rhlan ignored all of this. Even though she was incredibly snobby, she was a princess and had just spent the last few centuries asleep. Maybe she had forgotten what it was like to be alive. Amora kept chattering away as Rhlan turned the doorknob and pushed it open, entering the house.

It was a three-room wooden house, the main room being a kitchen, dining and general living room. The other two rooms were smaller and to the back of the house. Rhlan and his brother slept in one and his Ma and sister slept in the other. Aside from sleeping, they didn’t use those rooms for much else, as they were far too small. The privy was outside the house near the woodpile. On the other side of the house was a small vegetable garden and a pen for the few chickens and a goat that they owned.

“Ma, I’m home,” Rhlan called as he entered the house. His Ma was where he would have expected her to be at this time of day; crouched at the fire, stirring the broth that simmered in the pot. She was a short woman, with dull brown hair that she had given all her children, she had blue eyes, and a sharp nose. Rhlan could see his sister, Akita, through one of the two windows in the main room, in the garden weeding the vegetable patch in the dimming light.

“How was the museum?” Monisha, Rhlan’s Ma, asked. She always asked him how the museum was after he had come back from the dusting, even though he always gave the same answer.

“Dusty,” Rhlan replied. “But Ma—”

Before Rhlan could continue to tell his Ma about Princess Amora who was wrongly named Aurora and who was asleep but was now awake, the subject of his thoughts walked directly into his house and announced:

“I must have a bath immediately.”

Monisha turned from the pot on the fire and raised an eyebrow at the Princess and then looked at her son. “Why is she here?” she asked plainly, ignoring the Princesses request.

Rhlan smiled slightly at his mother, knowing things would be all right now. “Well actually—”

“I demand to have a bath drawn up for me now!” demanded Amora. “I have just been forced to walked miles and miles though a dirty forest and I wish very much to have a bath.”
Monisha was slightly taken aback. She stood, wiping her hands on her apron.

“Beggin’ your pardon Princess,” she said facing Amora, “but we don’t have enough water here for a bath. Please sit,” she gestured to the chairs that stood around the table. “I’ll get you somethin’ to drink.”

Amora was shocked that she wouldn’t be getting her bath, but sat in a chair none the less. Monisha went to the set of shelves that held all the wooden crockery they owned and took out a cup. Filling it with water from a bucket in the corner of the rooms she took it to the Princess.

“I’m Monisha,” she told her, “I’m pleased to meet you at last Princess Aur—”

“Amora,” Rhlan finished loudly for her. “Princess Amora,” he repeated firmly. Monisha looked questioningly at her son but accepted what he said.

“I'm sure we would all love to hear about how you came to be awake,” Monisha continued, “but right now, I need to be finishing dinner,” she turned back to the fire. “Rhlan, go and tell your sister that she’s done enough, we have company for dinner and she needs to bring in some basil for me.”

Rhlan nodded and put his sack down against the wall and went outside to the vegetable patch to tell Akita about the princess.

Akita was fifteen years old and was presently being courted by the son of the weaver in the village. She was taller than average, with the same dull brown hair as Rhlan. She wore it braided around her head when she worked but loose and free when she visited the village, so that everyone, especially Tarak, the weaver’s son, would see how long it was. Her nose was sharp, her eyes were brown and her skin was a light bronze from helping her mother in the garden.

When Rhlan told her that the Princess was awake and actually named Amora and allergic to carrots, she didn’t particularly believe him. He was only twelve and quite subject to pulling jokes like this. But when she walked into the kitchen with the basil for her mother and found the beautiful young princess in her pink dress brushing out her golden blond hair at the table, she stopped and stared.

Rhlan, who was behind her, trying to get through the doorway with little success, prodded her until she moved. “It’s not polite to stare,” Rhlan reminded her with a saying their Ma often told them.

Monisha looked up from the fire. “Akita, I need those herbs here please,” she told her daughter. Akita went to Monisha, glancing over her shoulder to make sure that the Princess really was there.

“What am I to be served for supper?” Amora asked primly, flipping her golden hair over her shoulder. “I haven’t eaten for quite some time you see. I would dearly love though, some roast pork, or poached quail.”

“We don’t have any of that here, Princess,” Monisha calmly told Amora. Rhlan started putting bowls and spoons onto the table for dinner.

“Well what am I to have then?” asked a worried Amora, thinking that maybe it would have been better if she had stayed asleep. Certinatly, if this was the wake up reception she knew she was going to get, she would have much preferred to stay asleep.

Having finished putting things for supper on the table, Rhlan picked up his sack from the door and took it outside to hang out his dust cloths.

Monisha bought the pot over to the table with cloths wrapped around her hands to protect them from the head. Setting it on the table she replied; “What the rest of us are having.” She started to ladle the broth into the bowls Akita held for her. “Rabbit stew and bread.”

Amora looked at the stew and sat back further in her chair away from the table. “That is not fitting for a Princess to be eating,” she informed Monisha. “I don’t think it even looks fitting enough for you to be eating, but if you wish to subject yourselves to such poisoning then I can only sit by and watch helplessly.”
Monisha bit her tongue as Akita replied.

“Really it’s not that bad Princess Amora,” she said earnestly. “We get by with it. I'm so sorry we don’t have anythin’ else for ya, you that its, but I put the best herbs in. It should be alright an I don’t think you’ve eaten nothing for a while, so maybe its best to start simpler than you’re used to, just until ya, you, get back into things like.”

Amora thought over this for a moment before inclining her head slightly. Akita, encouraged, continued talking.

“We’ve never had a Princess for supper before,” she told Amora, “so its not like we know what you’d be used to an all.”

Monisha interrupted her daughter before she could continue. “If either of ya want supper, then you’d best be going outside to wash up.” Turning she took the pot back to the fire so that the left over stew would stay hot while they ate.

“Pardon me?” Amora asked.

“Oh come with me, Princess,” Akita said readily, leading the Princess out side to the bucket of water they would wash their hands in before they ate. Rhlan came back in just as they had left, his hands still wet from their wash.

“Oh Ma,” he remembered, “did ya put carrots in the stew like always?”

“Aye,” Monisha replied, filling the cups at the table with a pitcher of water, “Why’s that my son?”

“She’s allergic to ‘em,” Rhlan explained quickly. “Which bowls her’s? We’d better fish ‘em out before she comes in.”

Monisha pointed out the bowl that was Amora’s and handed Rhlan a spoon. Quickly fishing out the large chunks of carrot, he told his Ma what had happened at the museum. Monisha raised an eyebrow when he told her the real reason she had fallen asleep and was tempted to leave a piece of carrot in so she would fall back asleep. They had just finished when Akita and Princess Amora returned from washing their hands.

Akita was still fusing over the princess like there was no tomorrow (“Here I’ll get ye, ya, you, a fresh cloth to wipe your hands, Princess. Oh they’re so beautiful an’ soft. Oh Princess sit in my chair, its closer to the fire, ye’ll be warmer there, it gets awful cold at night sometimes. Oh Princess your hairs just lovely.”) but Rhlan and Monisha were well over the princess and her bad manners (“What is this I am eating out of? You call this a dish? Well I suppose you don’t work hard enough to afford better.”).

They were about half way through their meal, and Akita had just given the princess the rest of her bread when there was a knock at the door and it opened. A tall young man strode in to the room and threw off his hat, revealing the same dull brown hair that Monisha, Akita and Rhlan all displayed.

“Nero!” cried Rhlan standing up and running to his brother. Nero smiled at him and ruffled his hair as he took off his cloak. He had intelligent brown eyes and high cheekbones. A wide smile on his face told everyone he was happy to be home.

“Goodevenin’” he greeted everyone. “I hope you’ve got some supper spare for a lonely traveler, or am I too late?” Monisha picked up her bowl, still only half finished and took it to the fire place, stopping on the way to kiss her son on the cheek.

“It’ll be ready in a moment,” she told him filling her bowl with more stew, “take my chair, I was done anyways. What are you doin’ home?”

Nero strode across the room and sat in the chair. “Finished work early,” he replied. Rhlan filled his cup with some more water and bought it for his brother to drink. “Thought I’d come home early too.” He looked at his sister, “Your Tarak says hello,” he told her, at which Akita promptly blushed and ducked her head.

Nero’s eyes rested on Princess Amora, who was trying to decided weather she was more offended by the fact that this strange young man didn’t recognize her presence before or that he had taken her spot light as guest for the evening. “And you’d be the Princess,” he stated. “Have you found your true love then?” he asked, ruffling Rhlan’s hair again. “Don’t tell me its you little brother,” he said playfully.

Monisha bought him the bowl full of stew and a bit of bread, which he promptly started eating with out waiting for a reply from Amora at all.

“Ahem,” Amora coughed stiffly, looking expectantly at Nero, who only continued to eat his stew. “Ahem,” Amora coughed again, slightly louder this time. Nero looked up,

“Did you want some water?” he asked. Akita promptly jumped up and grabbed the Princesses cup. Unfortunately though, in her good intentions she failed to realize that the cup was already half full. The water flew out of the cup as she turned away from the table and directly onto the Princess. Amora shrieked, Rhlan giggled slightly and Monisha hid a smile. Akita turned back around to see what she had done and promptly dropped the cup.

“Look at my dress!” wailed Amora, trying to fan dry the wet patches on the front of her gown. “Look what you have done!”

Both of Akita’s hands covered her mouth for a moment before she again tried to help. “Oh, I'm so sorry Princess!” She picked up a hand cloth from the table and tried to blot the wet patches, but Amora swatted her hand away.

“You stupid stupid girl!” she cried, and raised her hand again to slap Akita across the face. But her hand stopped in mid air. Nero stood behind Amora, a towering figure in the dim candlelight.

“You will not hit my sister,” Nero told her, his voice deadly calm. “Nor will you call her stupid. Princess or not, you are a guest in this house, and this was a accident.”

Monisha opened her arms for the frightened Akita, who promptly ran into them. Amora was breathing quite hard, her hatred for Nero growing.

“You will release me, now,” she told Nero, her blue eyes seething with fury. Nero held her arm a second longer before releasing his grip. Amora rubbed her arm where he had held her as if it was hurting incredibly. Monisha gave Akita a last squeeze and then released her daughter. She passed Amora a dry cloth to wipe her dress with.

“There now,” she said, “it’s only water and will dry fine. If ya like ya can borrow some of my clothes and we can dry your dress by the fire,”

“Borrow some of your clothes?” Amora repeated indignantly, “I should think not, one can only think what that would do to my skin. Of course for you its fine, but I have standards to uphold. I am a Princess you know.”

Nero’s eyes flashed, even as he finished eating his stew, but Monisha only nodded.

“Well then, have a seat by the fire so you can get dry, now,” she said. Drawing the Princess away from the table she seated her near the fire while Rhlan and Akita started to take the plates and cups from the table to the bucket they would wash them clean in.

“How have things been then?” Nero asked Monisha as he finished his stew.

“So so,” she replied, seeing that Rhlan and Akita were fine doing the washing, she took up some sewing and sat on the floor by the fire. “We’d rain a few days ago, but nothin’ bad, just normal spring rains.”

“I cut the fire wood,” Rhlan called proudly from where he was washing dishes.

“Only one day,” Akita replied, “I did the rest.”
Nero smiled at them. “Well, Ira,” he named the carpenter in the village, “said that I will be finished my apprentice ship in a few days.”

“Will ya be coming home then?” Rhlan asked eagerly.

“Ira wants me to stay on,” Nero told them, “but I don’t think I will be.” Smiles lit the faces that had been sorrow filled at the news that Ira the carpenter wanted Nero to stay on. “I think he wants me to take on the shop after him, but I think I’d prefer to do what Da did.”

“Me to, me to!” Rhlan told everyone. “I'm gonna be like Nero an’ Da. Livin’ in the woods an’ making stuff to sell in the village.”

“Should I tell Ira that he has another apprentice to train then?” Nero asked Rhlan, though he was looking at Monisha. Monisha looked at both her sons, noting the eagerness in Rhlan’s eyes.

“Yes!” Rhlan exclaimed, then he turned to Monisha. “Can I Ma?” he asked. “I'm old enough now an’ if Nero comes home then he can help ya around the house an’ I can go into town an’ work.”

“We’ll see,” Monisha told her younger son. “Nero has to finish his apprenticeship first. And ask Ira if he will take on another boy.”
Rhlan turned to Nero excitedly. “Ye’ll ask him won’t ya Nero?”
Nero smiled. “The works hard,” he said seriously. “You’ll need to be good and once you say yes you can’t change your mind.”

“I know, I know, I’ll be good,” Rhlan promised enthusiastically, “I’ll work hard, you’ll see.”

Akita flicked some of the wash water at Rhlan. “Ya need to work harder at washin’ up first,” she told him, bringing his attention back to the dishes.

Nero looked at Monisha. Her face told her she was sad that she was loosing her youngest child, but also proud of him. They would talk about it later.

The silent princess now coughed again, drawing attention to herself. “I should like to know,” she told them, “how I shall be getting to the capital tomorrow.”

“So you’re wanting to return to your castle and reclaim your kingdom then Princess?” Nero asked her. He stood and took his empty bowl over to his brother and sister to wash up.

“Of course,” Amora told him indignantly. “It is my kingdom.”

“Even after all the time you have been asleep?” The tone of Nero’s voice irritated Amora. Who was he anyway, to be questioning her.

“Yes!” she snapped at him. “It is not my fault I am allergic to carrots.”

Nero raised an eyebrow. “Allergic to carrots are you?”

“Yes,” Amora told him sharply. “You certainly don’t believe all that nonsense about me being cursed by a witch at my christening do you?” Her tone implied that if he did, he was obviously very stupid.

Nero seemed unperturbed by Amora’s tone and all it implied. Instead he took a calm drink and asked politely. “And how will you be explaining that to our present rulers when you turn up at their castle and demand that they will step aside for you to regain your kingdom? Perhaps,” he added wickedly, “you intend to eat some to prove your story is true?”

Rhlan let out a burst of laughter and Monisha and even Akita hid smiles. Amora though, was clearly not amused.

“Why you… you…” she fumed, seemingly unable to find the words to describe exactly how she felt about Nero. She stood up and raised a hand to Nero. “You horrible young man! How dare you say such things to me! I will remember your intolerance when I am on the throne, and rest assured I will not stay my hand when punishing you!”

“Aye, when you are on that throne, Princess,” Nero affirmed, his deep brown eyes dancing with laughter.

“Argh!” was all the Princess could come up with and with that she sat back down in her chair hard and refused to look at or speak to Nero for the rest of the evening. Rhlan smothered his giggles and Monisha and Akita hid their smiles.

The evening continued with out problems, the family talking about the past week. Nero told them news of their friends in the village and Rhlan and Akita eagerly told their much loved older brother what they had been doing in his absence.

When Amora decided she had had enough of being left out of the conversation, she promptly informed everyone that she was tired and needed a bed prepared. Monisha disappeared with Akita for a moment and reappeared with bedding, which they put in the corner of the room. Monisha then lead the princess into the room she would be given for the night. Rhlan, Akita and Nero, could here her protests (“How can I be expected to sleep here? It is barely warm enough! I might die from the cold! And you call this bed soft? Well I suppose you don’t have standards.”) from the main room by the fire, but eventually silence came and Monisha reappeared.

“Rhlan, Akita, its time for bed,” she told them. The looks they gave her said they wanted to protest, but a firm look on her face said she had dealt with enough protests for one night and they went with out a word.

When they were settled, Monisha took a seat by the fire with her eldest son. They were silent for a moment before Nero asked. “Why is she here?”

The fire flames burnt down as Monisha told Nero what Rhlan had told her had happened in the museum.

“So I suppose we’ll have to take her to the village at least then,” Nero commented after she had finished.

“Yes,” Monisha replied. “Do you think you’d mind goin’ back after the walk today?”

“Well we can’t have her stay here,” Nero said. “She would drive all of us mad.”

“Nero,” said Monisha reproachfully. “Be nice to her, she’s spent a very long time asleep.”

Nero looked at his Mother. He knew she was right, it wasn’t really the Princess’s fault. “Alright Ma, I’ll apologize to her. And I’ll take her to the village tomorrow. She can get someone to take her to the castle from there.”

“We may as well all go to the village tomorrow,” Monisha told him. “Akita wants to see Tarak again an’ we can take Rhlan to see Ira.”

“If we leave early, we can get back before dark too,” Nero added. “What’d you think will happen with Akita and Tarak?”

Their conversation drifted into the night before they grew tired. Eventually they decided to turn in and while Nero banked the fire, Monisha swept the floor again. Then taking out the spare bedding she had taken from her room, she lay it out on the floor and they got ready for bed.