There once was a beautiful young princess who fell madly in love with a charlatan. Everyone could see that this man was a liar, a trickster, and a thief--at best. Everyone but the princess, that is, and the charlatan knew it. He also knew he had to get her away from everyone else before they impressed the truth upon her. So he suggested a secret marriage to her and she agreed. Late one night, she stole out of her parents’ castle disguised as a maid and met the trickster at an inn. There they stayed the night, and in the morning they departed early to begin their blissful life.
But I am afraid that everyone was right about this man. He turned out to be very abusive and cruel,
and it was too late then for the princess to escape for he had taken her to a
remote home by the sea and kept her prisoner.
There she was his servant and did all of his cooking, cleaning,
laundering, and animal care. The animals
were the only joy she had in her life, and they were her only friends. No one had been able to find her, and
eventually everyone believed she was dead, including herself. He beat her daily until she wished she really
was dead.
One day while she out doing chores, she came across a small
cave in a cliff face near the ocean.
Upon investigating, she was terrified to find the skeletons of eight
young women in the cave. They were all
still clothed in drab, gray dresses exactly like the one she was wearing. In fact, all her evil husband allowed her to
wear were ugly gray dresses that were already in a closet when she arrived at
his home. He threw all of her finery
into the ocean and said she had no need for it anymore. The terrible truth was beginning to dawn on
the princess, and she knew that all of these dead women in the cave had
suffered the same fate that she had--and worse, that she would suffer the same
fate that they had.
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| Bright red blood berries (holly). |
She left the cave terrified, screaming wildly and wanting to
escape, but there was no one in this isolated place who could help her. At length, after crying for an hour, she felt
that she was being watched. She looked
up to see a very large, very ugly black crow staring at her. She was about to leave when she heard the
crow say, “So you found the other women?
You will join them soon.”
“Can you get me out of here?
Please help me!” she yelled.
“I know the way.”
“Then show me!
Please!!”
“But I am hungry,” he said, “and there’s not much to eat so
late in the year. Will you give me some
food?”
“I don’t dare take a crumb the house,” she said.
“Then I don’t dare show you the way out. I am hungry.”
“If I find you food, will you show me the way out?” she
asked.
“Feed me first and then we’ll talk.”
“No,” she said, “I will feed you as we go, bit by bit, and
you will lead me out or you shall have no food.”
“You will be in the cave soon,” he said, “and then there
will be plenty to eat.”
This horrified the princess, but she put on a false face and
said, “Yes, but that won’t last long. I
am a princess, and I can give you food for a lifetime.” The crow thought about it for awhile, and because he was a greedy crow, he
finally agreed.
“You will feed me as we go along?”
“I will,” she said.
And with that the crow flew off and the princess
followed. When they had gone some way,
the crow stopped and said, “What will you give me?” The princess cut her wrist with a small knife
she carried and dripped many droplets of blood on a bush, which the crow
devoured. He flew on and she
followed. Eventually he stopped again,
and the same scene occurred. The
princess cut her wrist again and spilled forth many drops of blood on a
bush. And so it went. The crow flew on and on and the princess
followed, although she was becoming weaker with each stop.
Finally, after traveling for a very long time, the crow
stopped again and demanded more blood.
The princess gave it to him but could not get up after doing so. She was too exhausted and weak and had lost
too much blood.
“Then you are of no more use to me,” the crow said
matter-of-factly.
“Not true,” she said.
“My blood is royal blood and can regenerate on all of these bushes if I
so command it.”
“Then command it.”
“I know we are not far from help. You will fly and get help for me, and then I
swear by my royal blood that you shall be fed for life.”
The crow considered it for awhile and finally decided to do
it, so sweet had the blood of the princess been that he could not resist. He flew off, telling her he would bring help.
He stayed true to his word and brought help back to the
princess, who was nearing the end of her life.
Fortunately, those had come were able to save her. The crow kept squawking loudly from a tree,
“Pay me! Pay me!” So loud was his squawking that one of the men
took out a gun to shoot him, but the princess stayed his hand. Then to everyone’s amazement, she stood up on
wobbly legs and walked to a bush. There
she cut her wrist and spilled out a few drops of blood, over which she made a
secret incantation, murmuring, “Blood red, blood sweet, berries for the crows
to eat.” And then she collapsed. Her puzzled saviors gathered her gently and
placed her in a carriage. She was still
alive and they quickly left for the town and a doctor.
After they had gone, the crow flew down to the bush where
the princess had spilled her blood. To
his surprise, the bush was covered with bright red berries, which were very
welcome at this cold and barren time of year.
As he flew he saw these bushes everywhere covered with bright red
berries on stark twigs. They were easy
to find because there weren’t many leaves.
True to her word, each year these brilliant red berries grew back for
the crows to eat, formed from the blood of a grateful princess.
Back safely with her parents, the princess instructed the
guards to follow the bright red berries all the way to the sea. She told them that there they would find her
captor, and she instructed them to bring him back alive so he could be
hung. She also told them about the cave
with all of the dead women. She
instructed them to bury the women, and she gave them eight red silk handkerchiefs. Each woman was to be buried with one of these
handkerchiefs so that she did not have to take only a gray dress to her grave
but a bright red cloth of love and remembrance.
