The Lost Sisters

Power is much easier to acquire than it is to hold on to.

If wishes were horses, my mortal father used to say, beggars would ride.

Perhaps it is just hiding in plain sight.

I suppose that’s one good thing about being obedient and faithful and good. People think you will never surprise them.

“Sometimes it’s easier to be mad at the people close to us,” Vivi said, “than to be mad at the people who deserve it.”

This will be over quickly, he’d said. But not everything is better for being fast.

Be bold, be bold, but not too bold, lest that your heart’s blood should run cold.

Fairy tales have a moral: Stay on the path. Don’t trust wolves. Don’t steal things, not even things you think no normal person would care about. Share your food but don’t trust people who want to share their food with you; don’t eat their shiny red apples, nor their candy houses, nor any of it. Be nice, always nice, and polite to everyone: kings and beggars, witches and wounded bears. Don’t break a promise.

The wicked are slain, with swords no less. Vengeance is had. Boldness is rewarded.

Fairy tales are full of girls who wait, who endure, who suffer. Good girls. Obedient girls. Girls who crush nettles until their hands bleed. Girls who haul water for witches. Girls who wander through deserts or sleep in ashes or make homes for transformed brothers in the woods. Girls without hands, without eyes, without the power of speech, without any power at all.

But then a prince rides up and sees the girl and finds her beautiful. Beautiful, not despite her suffering, but because of it.