«Is she the treasure or the dragon?»
unknown
The Grimm’s fairy tale «The Sea-Hare» («Das Meerhäschen») has some nice elements, but a rather stupid ending. The princess had killed his two brothers, so marrying her does not make that much sense. So I did an adaptation.
Interestingly, a «Meerhäschen» («Sea-Hare») is not a sea-slug, but a small rabbit. It comes from the Transylvanian Saxon dialect form «Mierhäsken», commonly known in Germany as a «Kaninchen».
There was once a princess who had a room with twelve windows, high beneath the battlements of her castle. These windows looked out in every possible direction, and when she climbed up to that room and looked around, she could inspect her whole kingdom.
When she looked out of the first window, her sight was keener than that of any other human being. From the second she could see still better, from the third more distinctly still, and so it went on, until the twelfth, from which she saw everything in her kingdom, whether it lay above the earth or beneath it. So nothing at all could be kept secret from her.
The king had grown old and had placed the seal and judgment of the realm in his daughter’s hands. She was his only heir, and so beautiful that suitors came from kingdoms near and far. But she craved courtship and admiration more than she desired any husband. So she proclaimed that no man should ever become her husband unless he could conceal himself from her so effectually that it would be quite impossible for her to find him. Yet with her twelve windows she could easily discover the cleverest hiding place, and thus reject one suitor after another and be courted again and again.
However, failure did not end in the shame of being found and rejected. She decreed that every man she discovered was to have his head struck off — and stuck on a post.
Ninety-seven posts bearing the heads of dead men already stood before the castle.
No one had come forward for a long time when two brothers appeared before her. They announced that they wished to court her. Both were handsome and rich, and sons of a king.
The eldest believed he would be quite safe if he crept into a lime-pit. But she saw him from the first window and made him come out.
«I made the rule, and you agreed to it, so I shall see it carried out,» she said, and watched as his head was struck off and set upon a spike.
The second crept into the cellar of the palace, but she perceived him also from the first window.
«I have never had a man killed who did not first consent to the consequence,» she said. And she watched as his head was struck off and placed upon the nine-and-ninetieth post.
She wondered how many months would pass before another suitor came to court her. Yet only a few days later, a young man rode toward the castle. He stopped before the heads upon the spikes and bowed to the last two.
«Brothers,» he said, and then rode on.
When he announced that he was a king’s son and wished to speak with the princess, she received him graciously. She looked beautiful and commanding, radiant in her robes, with not a fold or glance amiss. He could see why his brothers had sought to court her. But when he remembered their heads upon the posts, her smile put him in mind of Mercy, the great mouser in his father’s castle. She never killed at once if she could first let a mouse believe it had escaped.
He kept that thought before him, bowed deeply, and entreated her in the sight of all the court:
«Gracious Princess, I wish to try my skill in your contest the day after tomorrow. However, if I win, I would ask one wish of you, one that is within your power to grant. And because my two brothers have already failed and I grieve for their loss, I entreat you to allow me three trials in their honor.»
The princess stood graciously before her court and replied:
«Your grief speaks well of you, and I would not have it said that I denied courage a fair chance. You shall have them.»
And indeed, he was a beautiful young lad, and his earnestness pleased her. But she was certain that three failures would be as safe for her as one. Privately, the thought of his mounting fear and desperation amused her — how he would be found once, then twice, until not one attempt remained.
The next day the prince thought for a long time about how he should hide himself. But no matter how much he racked his brains, he could devise no safe hiding place. At last, he took his gun and went out hunting.
He saw a raven, took careful aim and was just about to fire when the bird cried:
«Do not shoot, and I will make it worth your while.»
So he lowered his gun, nodded, and went on.
When he came to a lake, he surprised a great fish that had risen from the depths to the surface of the water. When he aimed at it, the fish cried:
«Do not shoot, and I will make it worth your while.»
So he lowered his gun, nodded, and allowed it to dive down again.
He went onward and met a fox limping in pain. The prince thought to put it out of its misery and took aim, but the fox cried:
«Do not shoot. Come here and draw the thorn out of my foot, and I will make it worth your while.»
So the prince lowered his gun, nodded, drew out the thorn, and let the fox go.
By then evening had come, and he returned to the castle without having found a hiding place.
The following day he was to hide himself. But howsoever much he thought, he still did not know where to conceal himself. So he went into the forest to the raven and said:
«I let you live. Now tell me where I may hide so that the princess will not see me.»
The raven cocked his head this way and that and thought for a long time. At length, he croaked:
«I have it.»
He fetched an egg from his nest, split it into two halves, and shut the prince inside. Then he joined the shell so neatly that no seam could be seen, placed the egg high in his nest, and seated himself upon it.
When the king’s daughter went to the first window, she could not discover the prince. Nor could she see him from the second, or the third, or those that followed. She began to grow uneasy, but from the eleventh window she saw him.
She ordered the raven to be shot and the egg to be fetched and broken open, and the prince was forced to come out.
She laughed and said:
«A worthy attempt, but not enough. I saw you clearly from my windows, and found is found. Yet you make the game interesting.»
Then she prodded the dead raven with the tip of her shoe.
«What did you promise him?»
«Nothing,» the prince replied.
The next day, the prince went to the lake and called the fish to him.
«I let you live. Now tell me where I may hide so that the princess will not see me. But be wary, for the princess found me in a raven’s egg and the raven paid dearly for it.»
The fish thought for a while, blowing bubbles upon the water. At last, it cried:
«I have it! I will shut you in my belly.»
So the fish swallowed him and sank to the deepest part of the lake.
The princess looked through her windows, and even from the eleventh she could not see him. She was alarmed, but at last, from the twelfth and final window, she discovered him.
She ordered her fishermen to cast their deepest nets. The fish was caught and killed, and the prince was taken from its belly, pale, dripping, and scarcely able to stand.
The princess smiled graciously and said:
«Twice you were seen before the appointed time had run out, and after your next failure your head shall be set upon the hundredth post. Still, no man has made better use of his chances, and I understand why you asked for three.»
But privately she thought, ‹I should have given him only one.›
Then she prodded the dead fish with the tip of her shoe.
«You command strange servants.»
«They are not servants,» the prince replied.
On the last day, the prince went with a heavy heart into the countryside and called the fox.
«You know how to find all kinds of hiding places,» he said to the fox. «I let you live. Now tell me where I may hide so that the princess will not see me. But be wary, for neither high in a raven’s egg nor deep in a fish’s belly was I safe, and both paid dearly for it.»
«That is a hard task,» answered the fox, walking thoughtfully around the prince.
«Yes,» said the prince. «I cannot fathom any farther place.»
«Then we must seek a nearer one — a very near one. The windows look out, never back into the chamber behind them; and she who sees the whole kingdom sees herself least clearly,» replied the fox and grinned.
He led the prince to a spring. «The first touch of this water gives every creature its appointed disguise,» said the fox. «The second restores its proper shape. A fox goes from it as a man, and a man as a rabbit. And the princess is very fond of pretty things.»
Then the fox dipped himself into the spring and came out in the form of a man. The prince dipped himself likewise and came out as a small rabbit.
Thus disguised, the fox went into the town as a merchant and displayed the pretty little rabbit. Many people gathered to see it. At last, the princess herself came by, and she liked the pretty little rabbit so well that she bought it for a great sum.
But before the fox-merchant gave the rabbit to her, he whispered to the prince:
«When the princess goes to the windows, creep quickly beneath the braids of her hair.»
When the appointed hour came, the princess went to the room with the twelve windows. She went from one window to the next, but from the first to the eleventh she could not see him, and at every window her unease grew.
When she looked from the twelfth and could not see him even then, she was filled with such anger and fear that she slammed the window shut. The panes in all twelve windows shivered and burst into a thousand pieces, and the tower shook.
Then she turned from the broken windows and felt the small rabbit beneath the braids of her hair. She seized him and threw him to the floor.
«Away with you! Get out of my sight!»
The small rabbit ran back to the merchant, and together they hurried to the spring. When they touched the water for the second time, each regained his proper shape.
The prince thanked the fox and said:
«You have found the hiding place that neither height nor depth could give me. You are indeed the cleverest of beasts!»
The fox grinned and nodded toward the spring.
«Then heed me once more and take some of the water with you. It may serve you well.»
So the prince filled his flask before returning to the castle.
There the princess received him privately in a chamber at the foot of her tower. She appeared more radiant than before, and once again not a fold or glance was out of place.
«Nearly a hundred men have died for the chance to ask for my hand, and you alone have prevailed. You have proved wiser than I, and so you may now ask for my hand,» she said sweetly. «I have had time to imagine what our life together shall be.»
And truly she had imagined quite a fate for her husband.
The prince, however, said with some effort:
«I thank you, Princess, but no. I did not come for your hand or your kingdom, but to bring my brothers home. The wish you promised me, and which lies within your power, is this: let me leave with the heads of my two brothers.»
The princess stared, for never had she imagined that the man who had overcome her might ask for anything but her hand. Then she laughed, and for one moment relief passed over her face, for her throne and her rule would remain her own.
But then her laughter died. He had beaten her and would not have her. So her face grew hard and cold.
«Very well,» she said, in a voice lower and colder than he had yet heard from her. «The heads shall be returned to your father’s kingdom.»
Her voice, unaccustomed to such open harshness, caught in her throat, and she began to cough.
The prince noticed that she had promised the heads would return, but not that his own would remain upon his shoulders. In her face he saw Mercy watching the hole into which a mouse had escaped, humiliation hardening into cold fury.
«Thank you, Princess,» he said, for now he saw her even more clearly.
But she merely tossed back her head and coughed again.
«Water,» she said.
There was a golden cup upon the table. The prince filled it from his flask and placed it before her.
She snatched it up, drank deeply, and her coughing ceased. Then she threw the cup upon the floor, and what little water remained ran between the flagstones.
«Your wish is granted — use the time you have. And now away with you! Get out of my sight!»
But the final words came strangely from her mouth. At once she began to shrink, and in another moment she had become a small rabbit.
The prince took her by the scruff of her neck, opened the window, and set her down in the high grass outside. She caught the scent of a fox and heard the beat of a hawk’s wings overhead. Her panic and desperation mounted, and she fled to hide.
The prince picked up the empty cup, set it back upon the table, and left the chamber. With the quiet authority of one for whom the matter is already closed, he ordered the servants to take down his brothers’ heads and wrap them in his cloak. Then he asked that the other suitors be given a proper burial.
The servants knew he had won the contest, and now that no voice forbade them, they obeyed gladly.
Only after he had ridden away, bearing his brothers’ heads home, did the servants discover that the princess had apparently gone into hiding after losing her own contest.
She must have learned something from the hundred contestants, for though they searched everywhere, she was nowhere to be found.