When Wishes Still Came True by Kelly Jarvis

The princess hurried through the deep, dark forest. Wolves howled in the distance. A flock of finches, nesting in the branches of large oak trees, screeched and took flight, showering the ground with falling leaves.

Shadows spread like spilled ink, and the princess pulled her silk cloak across her body. The golden sun that warmed the terrace of her father’s palace could not penetrate the forest’s thick canopy, and the cool breath of early autumn chilled the princess to her bones.

She did not stop running until she reached the spring beneath the ancient linden tree. In the warm weather of her childhood, when the tree used to burst forth with fragrant nectar, the princess and her sisters had cooled themselves in its shade. They had taken off their slippers and splashed in the shallows. They had chased after frogs and whispered their wishes to the unseen Lady of the Linden Spring.

“Stay close to me,” their mother used to caution them when the princesses had wandered too far away from her side, “the spring is so deep you couldn’t even begin to see to the bottom.” The older sisters had always dutifully returned to the queen’s side, but the youngest sister used to scan the surface of the dark water, wondering what mysteries lurked in its depths.

Now the youngest princess, all alone, dropped to her knees beneath the heart-shaped leaves of the tree. Her golden ball felt heavy in her hands. A ray of sunlight glinted off the smooth surface of the ball, filling the forest clearing with a shimmering glow.

In the last few weeks, the princess had offered the Lady of the Linden Spring expensive dresses, strings of pearls, jewels, and even her own golden crown, all to no avail. The golden ball, which had been a gift from her mother to celebrate a prophecy that the princess would grow up to marry the richest man on earth, was her last chance. She set it on the ground and rolled it toward the water.

The princess followed the ball with her eyes until it disappeared beneath the waves.

The queen had died long before her daughters had come of age, and when she had passed away, the king had forbidden the princesses from playing in the woods. Not one of the princesses would have thought to disobey the king, for his word, in all matters, was law.

Although the queen’s death had left its mark of sadness upon the palace, the princesses had continued to live a charmed life, especially the youngest, for she was so lovely that everyone regarded her as a wonder. Her older sisters had doted on her, and the palace staff had fallen over themselves to please her. Her father had rested all of his hopes and dreams for the future of the kingdom upon her narrow shoulders.

By the time the richest man on earth, a prince from a far off land, had arrived, the princess had grown into a beautiful young woman with blue eyes and hair the color of sunlight. She stood solemnly with her father on the steps of the palace as the prince’s coach, drawn by eight white horses wearing golden harnesses, had crossed through the gates. The white ostrich feathers attached to the horses’ hoods had quivered as the animals pranced over the cobblestone path.

When the coach had stopped, a tall young man with three iron hoops circling his chest hopped down from his place at the back. He opened the carriage door. The prince emerged, wrapped in a green velvet cape. He bowed low to the king, and kissed the princesses’ hand.

His fingers were cold and clammy, and his lips left a trail of slime on the princesses’ skin.

The prince had tried his best to woo the beautiful young princess who had been promised to him. He had gifted her the finest silks and jewels. He had commanded the kitchen staff to bake her the most sinful delicacies. But, although her father had already signed a marriage contract uniting the two wealthy kingdoms, the princess recoiled each time the prince splashed into the dining hall with his entourage, helping himself to food from her golden plate. When the orchestra played dancing music after dinner, the princess twirled across the floor in the arms of other noblemen, and, one night, when the jealous prince had followed her up the marble staircase to her rooms and demanded to lay in bed with his betrothed, the princess had pushed him against the wall with all her might and slammed the door in his face.

No amount of persuasion from her older sisters or threats from the king had worked to warm the princess to her suitor’s attentions, and no amount of protests or tears would soften the iron wills of the king or the prince, who both believed the princess was theirs to command.

So, for the first time since her mother’s death, the princess had returned to the deep, dark forest.

She had no other choice.

The princess had expected the magic of the linden tree spring to work immediately, as it had when she was a child making silly wishes for chocolate biscuits or strawberries with clotted cream. But, when the grown-up princess first returned to the spring and whispered her desire to be freed from the prophecy that bound her to the wealthy prince, the murky water had remained still.

“The Lady of the Linden Spring is nothing but childish nonsense,” her eldest sister had chastised her when she had learned that the princess had been visiting the forest again. “You have been promised to the prince, and you must marry him for the good of the kingdom.”

The princess had nodded in acquiescence, even though she knew that her sister was lying about the Lady of the Linden Spring. The princess remembered the taste of magic, bright and metallic on her tongue. She remembered how its sulfur smell curled in the air and crackled against the lapping waves of the spring when she was a child.

The princess had retreated to the palace library, reading her mother’s ancient books which held the forgotten wisdom of the old ways. Here, she had learned that magic requires a payment, a sacrifice, a submission of one’s will to a greater force. So, she had returned to the forest as often as she dared, offering the Lady of the Linden Spring handfuls of precious jewels stolen from the palace coffers, but her glittering payments had done nothing to stop the prince’s bid for her affections or temper her father’s steadfast expectation that she become an obedient bride.

The princess had first realized she was being followed into the forest one sunny morning when she saw a glint of iron through the trees. She had been dragging a heavy satchel filled with expensive shawls woven of fourteen carat gold thread, thinking perhaps the Lady of the Linden Spring required a payment more artful than loose gems and pearls.

“Show yourself!” the princess had commanded to the iron shadow behind the trees, and though her voice was loud with regal power, her body shook with fear.

A tall young man had stepped from the trees and met her gaze. Three iron hoops, symbols of his servitude to the visiting prince, circled his chest.  

“Why are you following me?” the princess demanded.

“Forgive me, your highness,” he said, dropping to one knee. “My name is Heinrich. I heard you crying in your room this morning.”

The princess realized this was the same man who had opened the carriage door when the prince had first arrived at the castle. She had seen him standing in his servant’s place against the wall of the banquet hall while the nobility dined, and she had felt his eyes follow her as she twirled across the dance floor.

“Why would you care about my tears?” she asked.

He had looked at her for several moments before he answered, his soft, brown eyes full of warmth.

“Even stones would be moved by the sound of your tears, your highness.”

It had been strange, this meeting between a royal princess and a poor servant in a forbidden forest, but strange things are wont to happen where enchantment lurks. Though the princess should have probably suspected that the footman was a spy who would report back to his master, she had known, in the same way she knew that the linden spring pulsed with the old, deep magic, that this man would remain faithful to her. This man would keep her secrets. The princess had heard his loyalty in the deep tremor of his voice, and she had felt it, vibrating like the plucked strings of a harp, when his hand had brushed against her fingers.

“I cannot marry a man I don’t love,” she had sobbed as Heinrich held her in his arms. The water had rippled, as though it was listening, and the linden tree’s heart-shaped leaves had seemed to writhe in sympathy.

Now, the solitary princess, who had just rolled her most precious possession, her golden ball, into the water, gasped as the Lady of the Linden Spring finally emerged from the mists.

A film of water clung to the deity’s body like a translucent gown. Tufts of moss trailed from her shoulders like a cloak. She did not speak, but she guided the kneeling princess to stand before her. Then she leaned close to the princess and inhaled the scent of her deepest desires.

The Lady of the Linden Spring smiled and closed a vial of thick, brown liquid into the princesses’ hand.

“Drink this before you go to sleep tonight,” she lisped, her voice sliding over every word, “but do not drink unless you are sure.”

The next morning, the princess awoke to the sound of rain, but when she opened her eyes, she was not in her father’s castle. The air smelled of soot and cedar. Embers simmered in a grate, and a single candle flickered in a ceramic dish on a table, making shadows dance across the walls of a meager one-room dwelling.

She pulled a threadbare sheet around her as the door creaked open and a tall man entered, carrying a handful of logs to feed the dying fire. Smoke filled the air as he adjusted the damp logs, but, under his direction, a roaring fire soon began to dance. He pulled off his rain-soaked shirt, crossed the room, and sat down on the edge of the bed.

“I’m sorry if I woke you,” he whispered, brushing the golden hair off her shoulders. “I wanted to bring in more wood before the storm gets worse.”

In the quivering candlelight, she thought she could see three iron colored rings circling his naked chest, but when she blinked, they were gone. There was a metallic taste in her mouth. She swallowed, letting her saliva drip, bright and burning, down the back of her throat.

“I had the strangest dream,” she said, her hands shaking.

The warm flames of the fire reflected in his brown eyes.

“I dreamed that I was a princess,” she continued, “and that my father was forcing me to marry the richest man on earth.”

The tall man slid beneath the sheets and took his wife in his arms. He lifted her face to his and kissed her. The patter of rain and the distant call of the frogs in the creek faded against the sulfur-scented crackle of magic released by the touch of their lips.

“We may not have royal titles,” he laughed, loosening the ribbons of her cotton nightgown. “But when you married me, you made me the richest man on earth.”   

“Well,” she smiled, pulling her husband’s body against hers as she offered a silent prayer of gratitude to the Lady of the Linden Spring, “I guess that means wishes still come true.”

Kelly Jarvis works as the Assistant Editor for The Fairy Tale Magazine where she writes stories, poems, essays, book reviews, and interviews. Her poetry has also been featured or is forthcoming in Blue Heron Review, Mermaids Monthly, Eternal Haunted Summer, Forget Me Not Press, The Magic of Us, A Moon of One’s Own, Baseball Bard, and Corvid Queen. Her short fiction has appeared in The Chamber Magazine and the World Weaver Press Anthology Mothers of Enchantment: New Tales of Fairy Godmothers. You can connect with her on Facebook (Kelly Jarvis, Author) or Instagram (@kellyjarviswriter) or find her at https://kellyjarviswriter.com/