PRINCESS BEAST (6 page)

Without thinking, Rune reaches out to touch Helga's shoulder.  Blue sparks fly and she quickly draws back her hand.  Helga seems not to have noticed, her sad stare remains fixed on the horizon.

"The swan who brought me here said my outside is ugly, but inside me is a beautiful girl, probably an enchanted princess.  We both saw her when I looked in a magic mirror.  Creechy, I wish I'd brought that mirror.  He said coming to this land would help me transform. Do you think it will; do you think I'm ugly?" Rune drops her head and bites the corner of her lip.

Helga shrugs her ghostly shoulders.  Having been called ugly three times, especially when Rune had believed herself beautiful, could be overlooked considering the sources were a swan, a stork, and an elf. However, if Helga thinks she's ugly then it must be true, for here, everything is real and true. Her stomach rumbles, an obscene series of growls, and the elf in the next tree flies out of his leaf.

“All night with the snoring and now its beastie gut growls—away with you both—Bonsai,” the elf screams and dive-bombs the princesses. Helga floats to the bog moss below and beckons Rune to follow. “I know where lingonberries grow.”

Rune hesitates, her paw raised to flatten the obnoxious elf with his next maneuver. Why should I stay and listen to Helga? I know she transformed from a frog to a princess, and the birds said Copenhagen is the best place to transform, what else do I need to know? I’m wasting precious time here.

“The most important part of my story is that I did it all for love, for the love of Michael I was transformed,” Helga says and Rune jumps from the tree like a spring peeper.

She follows Helga to a slight mound above the Bog Lake. The lingonberries are just past ripe, red, plump juicy balls in clusters of five or so, and Rune digs in like a shoat at the trough. Helga bends in a stand of bulrush and yanks a dozen plants out by the roots, She snaps the roots from the leaves and tosses the roots onto the mound for Rune’s consumption. Then she picks off all the long slender leaves and begins weaving them together. "In the autumn of my fourteenth year, Worick returned from the raids with prisoners and among them was Michael."

 A bell sounds from afar and Helga's aura flashes red as the lingonberries.  "Michael was a Christian priest as handsome as the god Balder.  The men put him in the cellar and bound his hands and feet."  Helga moans, "Oh, it is too horrible to repeat the words I spoke, if only I could take them back, if only I had never been born."

Rune stops chewing, tucks the mass of root into her cheek and says,  "You don't have to repeat anything.  I'd like to ask you about how you transform and . . ."

"No!  I must . . ."  Helga interrupts . . . "I told Worick that the priest's legs should be pieced, a rope pulled through them and tied to the tail of a bull so I might have the fun of following on horseback."

Rune gapes,  "Why would you want to do that?"

"Because I was evil by day; the evil child of the Bog King.  And I couldn't stand his handsome face, a face that looked upon me with disdain."

"Like you were something smelly he's stepped in," Rune murmurs, chewing a mud ball from her armpit.

"Worick refused me.  Because the priest had offended the gods, he was to be offered to them at dawn.   Illa dragged me, kicking and screaming into her chamber and locked the door.  When I transformed she said,
Great is a mother's love, but you have never felt love for anything.  Your heart is made from the black cold mud of the bog!  Why did you ever come to my house! 

"Mothers sure are mixed up around here," Rune says. 

Far away from the bog, Beauty hears her daughter's words speak through the mirror and hope rises in her hirsute chest.  "Stay--stay where you are Rune.  Mother is coming."

 

* * *

 

 

Chapter Six

Judas Priest

 

"What did I tell you, Gumby head?  The first sign of disillusionment." 

Elora the enchantress has showered and changed into a Mongolian cashmere sweat suit.  She and Croesus have moved to the palace salon where they're watching Rune and Helga in the crystal ball.  "Half an hour more with halogenated Helga and Rune will be backtracking fast as her beastie feet can run."

Within the glass they see Helga has woven a small male figure from the bulrush leaves. “Illa's words touched the part of my soul that longed for love and I wept great tears,” she says. “ Once Illa had fallen asleep, I hopped to the cellar when Michael slept.  He was even more beautiful in slumber, and I touched that perfection with my cold green hand."

Rune stops in mid-chew.  "What happened?"

"He woke, pissed his priestly robe and shivered like wet dog.  I cut the ropes that bound him and motioned for him to follow, but he stood there mumbling holy names and crossing himself."  Helga's aura turns smoky gray and her ghostly chin trembles.

"He said,
Why have you, who are so filled with mercy, the shape of a monster
?"

"Boys are stupid," Rune scoffs, but she moves closer to Helga in a gesture of comfort.

Elora curses
Bricklebrit
and catches the three gold coins before they hit her black lacquer Erte table.  She snaps her fingers and mutes the sound on the crystal ball.  "I can't take a minute more of this stroll down memory lane, and before you start whining and force me to zap your mouth clean off your furry face, I intend to tell you the rest of Helga's tale sans the histrionics."

Croesus lays his head in his mistress' lap and licks her fingers.  Elora opens a silver case on the table and lights a clove cigarette with her Statue of Liberty lighter.

"Helga, as frog-girl, finally got the priest outside where she jumped on a horse and pulled the priest up behind her.  Off they rode across the heath, clippitey-clop.  When they were miles away from the Viking hall, the priest starting singing hymns and now it was Helga's turn to tremble.  Michael thought this was because he'd touched her pagan soul with the goodness of god, but she was freezing her webs off, thin skin, night air, and all that.  So, after spying a mound of hay where she could get warm and transform, Helga reined in the horse.  But the priest wrapped his arms around her and held tight, and because her skin was dried from the ride, she couldn't slip away.  Then the sun rose."  Elora blows three smoke rings and Croesus lifts his head and woofs.

"Frog turns into beautiful, naked but for a leather belt, girl, and priest jumps off the horse as if his wool underwear's on fire.  Helga draws the knife from her belt and goes Xena on him.  They wrestle around, tree root trips her, she loses the knife, he dips fingers in stream, baptizes her, and she stops struggling.  Now, Michael is all full of himself and the holy spirit, and he god-talks to her saying she could be free and learn to love the eternal light of god.  While he's talking, she's checking out his god-bod, his golden hair and his green eyes, thinking he's a real hunk."

Croesus' tongue lolls out of the side of his mouth.

"Yep, she was hot for the holy man.  He said he'd take her to Hedeby where Ansgarius the most holy would break the spell.  Cha--as if!  Helga jumps back up on the horse and Michael says,
You must sit behind me for your magic beauty comes from the Evil One, I fear it.
  After taking the reins, he raises a fist in the air and shouts,
But the victory is mine, in Christ!
"

Croesus groans and Elora scratches his head.  "Exactly--five yard penalty on the frock jock for spiking the ball.  So they ride deeper and deeper into the forest while Michael recites the litany of Christianity and Helga listens as if she's hypnotized. Just before sunset, a band of robbers jumped them:  horse takes an ax to the neck, priest takes a hammer in the head, and the robbers jump Helga.  But just as they do, the sun sets, she transforms and the robbers bail, screaming like teenage campers in a B horror movie.  Helga threw her froggie body on the priest, sobbing like crazy.  She cleaned what was left of Michael's face then covered the bodies with sticks and stones and moss so wolves wouldn't eat them, worked till her webs bled and broke.  When the sun rose and she transformed to a beauty, she was still totally freaked, so she shimmied up a tree and stayed there all day." 

Elora snaps on the sound and within the crystal ball Helga stands, walks to a swamp oak and wraps her ghostly arms around the tree.  "After spending all day in the tree, I realized that at last I was loved.  Michael had loved me as both of my selves, accepted the good with the bad, and he died for that love . . ."

“Well, actually, he didn’t love both of your selves because he wanted to break the spell . . . ," Rune interrupts, but Helga does not notice.

“I slid down at sunset, and when I transformed, my webbed hands were still torn from night before.  Bloody with my own blood at last rather than the blood of others!" Helga exclaims and twirls about, her translucent hands held before her face like an offering.  She picks up two twigs and crosses them.  "I made a border of crosses around Michael's grave, and as I did so, my webs fell away.  I went to the water to wash and saw my hands restored. I made the sign of cross over his grave and I spoke the words Michael had spoken over and over,
Jesus Christ
.  My frog skin slipped from my body and I stood as a girl in the dark for the first time."

Elora pauses and raps her nails over the crystal ball.  Croesus noses the palm of her hand, his doggy eyebrows drawn up with perplexity.

"Is it not reasonable to assume that Helga, after spending centuries as a glorified light bulb, would be short circuiting?  Maybe I should send her back now, in case she tries that conversion routine on our young beast.  Girls that age are groping for something to give themselves over to, something that seems to answer all their questions.  Brother, does Christianity ever do that, one answer for every problem--simple.   Sure worked well for the girl saints."  Elora counts off on her fingers:  "Agnes, thirteen, sent to a brothel then beheaded; Faith, twelve, scourged and beheaded; Joan of Arc, thirteen when she started seeing vision and hearing voices--burned at the stake; Lucy, fourteen, brothel, burned, stabbed through the throat."

Croesus sits up on his hind feet and rapidly paws the ball.  Within, Rune picks up two twigs and bites the corner of her lip.  "Do you think that would work for me?"

Helga's aura turns violet and her ghostly form trembles.  "Wait!" she cries.  "There's more.  I lay down by the stream to sleep, and I was awakened at midnight by a bright light.  Before me was the dead horse, flames playing in his neck wound and Michael was riding him."

Helga begins to pace.  "His face was sad and serious--oh, so beautiful.  I knew I was being judged, this time justly."

"Judged for what?  You saved him from being sacrificed, you . . ."

"The time, the time is slipping away," Helga interrupts.  "Listen to me.  I understood then that the struggle within me had been a struggle of love.  I had followed a will greater than my own and had not been the maker of my fate, but guided and led."

"Your love for Michael," Rune whispers.

Helga stops pacing and stands before Rune, her dark eyes sparking neon blue.  "Yes!  And I thought he loved me too.  Why else would he come back to me from the grave?  I bent my head, tears falling on the ground, and I felt a flame burn within me."

Rune clasps her hands over her heart, and if she had proper eyelids, her expression would be dreamy.  "I know that feeling."

"I said to Michael,
I'm on fire
.  He smiled, such a pleased smile, and told me it was the flame of the Holy Ghost."

"What did you say?" Rune asks breathlessly.

Helga wrings her ghostly hands and resumes pacing.  "I just nodded.  I thought he
was
the Holy Ghost.  I would have agreed to anything to keep him by my side.  Then he said: 
Of earth were you made and from the earth you shall be resurrected.  The sunbeam within you shall return to its maker.  No soul is doomed, but earthly life can be long and the flight into eternity can seem endless.
  When will mine end?"

Helga howls mournfully as a banshee and Rune can't help clicking.

Helga's light changes from violet to crimson and she drops to her knees before Rune.  "Michael said: 
I come from the land of the dead where the radiant mountains are, and where all perfection lives.  You too shall one day travel through the dark valleys to that land.
 Take me with you now, I pleaded, and he smiled again, that pleased smile.  He said he would take me to the great bog where I must break the shield of water that covers and hides the living root from which I grew.  Then he swept me onto the horse, and I reached my arms around him, wanting to lay my cheek against his strong back and ride with him forever, but a force repelled me, burned my face and fingers.   He drew a golden censer from his robe and the horse flew on the winds to the bog.  We flew in circles above the water while Michael held high a cross, chanted mass, and sang a hymn.  Reeds shot forth blossoms and the dark waters became covered by a tapestry of water lilies.  In the center lay a sleeping woman, young and beautiful. I thought I was seeing my own reflection, but it was . . ."

"Your real and true mother," Rune whispers.

"Michael lifted the woman onto his horse and flew us both to shore.  When we touched ground, a cock crowed, and Michael and the horse disappeared into mist.  I watched his image fade and I thought surely my mouth will stop breathing, my heart will stop beating.  Then the woman said:
Is this my own image I see reflected in the deep waters? You must be my daughter, flower of my heart! 
She embraced me and I knew for certain that she was my real and true mother."  Helga's reaches into the water, picks up a lily, kisses it, and her aura turns golden.

“This is a bit too precious for me to stand,” Elora smirks, “better check on the real and true mother."

Hearing Rune's words speak from the mirror, Beauty stops and collapses in a patch of cotton grass.  She's been running for ten hours, without food, without water.
Her real and true mother--could Rune possibly think she's not my daughter?  When I catch up with her, I'm going to make her wish I wasn't!   After I hug her till my arms fall off.

Her ears twitch with the sound of water running over rocks.  She follows the sound to a nearby stream, plunges her enormous head beneath the surface and inhales three gallons of icy cold water, as well as four trout.  She shakes her head vigorously and again lifts the mirror to her face.  Helga is now seated beside Rune, her aura grows brighter and she speaks in a rush.

 

* * *

 

“I have got to stop here—how could I have forgotten the most cloying sex story ever told, more precious than babies growing under cabbage leaves or flea-infested storks dropping a diapered bundle on the doorstep.” Elora says. “Only in Andersen Land can sex be turned into flowers and birds and God, well maybe in a nunnery. Elora snaps her figures and shape-shifts into Helga’s mother, the Egyptian princess, from her golden snake headband to her leather jeweled sandals. “In a swanskin I came here and I shed it by the dark lake, then I sank down into the deep mire of the bog and it closed around me,” Elora wraps her arms around her body and Croesus lays at her feet.

“Something drew me down and down, I felt a pressure on my eyes, and I slept and dreamed I was back in Egypt. I was in a stone chamber and in front of me stood the trunk of an alder tree. I looked closely at the cracks in the bark and they became the hieroglyphic writing on sarcophagus of royalty. As I stared, it opened and out stepped a mummy black as pitch, glittery like the black slugs that creep in the forest.”

Croesus raises his hackles and growls as Elora shifts again into a black mummy, bandages dangling like old wallpaper.

“Was it a mummy or the Bog King?” Elora asks in the sweet voice of the Egyptian princess. “He flung his arms around me and I felt I would die, but life did not desert me. I felt a warmth in my chest,” Elora says, switching back to the princess form, and places her hands on her breasts. Croesus jumps to his feet and wags his tail.

“The king was gone and a little bird was singing and flapping its wings,” Elora says, lowering her hands to make bird wings over her mound of Venus. “Up up it flew toward the dark ceiling, a long green string connecting the bird to me, and it sang Freedom! Sunshine! A longing for the father of all things!" Elora squeals breathlessly. "And I cut the string and fell into a deep heavy sleep. Bricklebrit,” Elora says and kicks the humping Croesus off her thigh.

 

* * *

 

The stork that had found me as a baby in the bog brought my mother and me two swan skins. We flew to Egypt where there was great joy in our return,” Helga says.  “You see, I was the flower of the north needed to heal my grandfather, the flower of my mother's heart. Egypt is beautiful with tamarisk and acacias in bloom, temples and pyramids reaching into the blue sky, the vast white deserts and the Nile, mother of all rivers."

"Wow," Rune murmurs reverently.  "The swan told me there were castles and beaches and flowers . . . "

"I should have been happy, but night after night, I stood on my balcony looking at the stars, thinking of Illa and how she had cared for me, and of Worick and his pride in my fierce nature, and of Michael, mostly of Michael and that I might join him.  But where?  In Valhalla as the Vikings taught me?  In the afterlife as the Egyptians taught me?  In paradise, as Michael said? I was so confused," Helga wails.