On the youngest sister Rose's birthday, they all set out to find a place to sit and enjoy the festivities they had planned out. The middle sister, Flora went out searching for the most beautiful place to paint a special present for her sister. She had been searching to find a Rose that matched her sister in beauty for quite some time and hoped that she might paint it to gift her as a birthday surprise.
After searching for quite some time she came across the most beautiful and plentiful Rose garden that she had ever seen. She immediately called for the sisters and they set up camp there in that garden. Flora painted and gazed over the beauty of the garden when she saw her sister Rose running through the flowers and suddenly trip and fall.
"Rose!" Flora yelled with concern, "are you okay? Can I help you up?" Her sister did not respond for a bit and then she watched her hand pop up through all of the flowers.
"I'm alright I'm clumsy as all. Give me one moment and I will be back over," Rose said grasping for any vine to help boost her up. As she was about up she pricked her finger on a thorn and sharply gasped.
The rose bush had started to grow around her hand, and she could not get untangled from the plant. Unable to move Rose started to cry for help. It was at that moment an evil figure came upon her, "it seems like you are a long ways from home, girl." The figure snarled. The mom and sisters pleaded with the figure to help them in some way, but he refused.
"You all decided to sneak into my garden without permission, and for that, you must be punished." The dark figure said looming over Rose. They all begged and begged for forgiveness and finally, the evil figure took off his cloak to reveal his true face. A basilisk with a strangely human voice was revealed to be the owner of the garden, and not a forgiving type of villain.
"Fine, your whining has driven me absolutely insane," the basilisk groaned, "I need some help tending to my garden and my castle. If you want to leave with your lives I will take one of you as my servant."
All of the girls panicked, they did not want to give up their nomadic life to help any man, especially not a basilisk. Finally, Rose exclaimed, "Just take me! For I am already trapped in your garden. This is all my fault anyway."
The girls did not like that statement, for they did not want their youngest sister to be claimed by such an evil beast. "She will do nicely," said the basilisk, "she is young and lively, she will tend to my house quite well."
So the beast vanished with Rose, leaving the mother and two daughters in the rose bushes alone. After several days of serving the basilisk in the castle, Rose began to grow restless. "Can I go for a walk, sir," she asked in a kind tone.
The basilisk agreed, but only if he was able to accompany her on the walk. He had grown quite fond of her company. Rose was alright with allowing him to join her on the walk, she went to go change into pants so her skirt did not snag on the bushes. While she was in her room she grabbed a knife she had hidden from dinner one night and hid it in her outfit.
Halfway through the walk, the basilisk turned to Rose and said, "there is a curse on me cast by an evil witch to make me unlovable and horrifying. That is why I look as I appear before you, a monster."
"Being a monster has nothing to do with how we look, sir. It's what we look like on the inside that creates monsters" Rose said, quite sure he was tricking her.
The basilisk turned toward her and told Rose that he loved her, and tried to kiss her. As he did so, he turned slowly into a human, his love for her was honest and true. Rose, however, had another plan. As the monster forced his lips upon hers, Rose drew her knife and quickly and confidently sliced his head off and sprinted away.
She continued to sprint until she got back to where her mother and sisters were mourning her. Happy to see their beloved sister again, they all danced in the garden, ignoring the recently murdered prince in the distance.
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Authors Note: I chose this story because I feel like the plot is not entirely realistic, of course in the case of the storyline and not the fact that there is a beast in it. If I were to get kidnapped, I would not stop fighting and I think that is the difference between reality and folklore sometimes. I feel like the female protagonist figure deserves more spunk and that is always an issue I have found in stories like beauty and the beast and similar tropes. Why not kill off the man and let the girl continue to live the life she loves? Someone who is willing to kidnap and trick in their own interest is not a redeemable character and therefore gets the ending a villain deserves.
I really enjoyed reading your story. It kept me on edge the whole time. I was not expecting Rose to stab the evil basilisk. I am glad she was able to return back to her family in the end and was never harmed.
ReplyDeleteI do have a few questions though. Why did the basilisk fall in love with Rose? What all did she have to do for him? Also why did Rose not listen to him confessing his love before killing him? Other than those questions, I feel like you did a good job on this story!
This story had me on my toes the entire time! I liked that you set it up to begin with a normal family outing and connected the name with the girl who is basically taken prisoner, you kept it interesting during the whole story and left out anything that might not contribute to the plot. One question I wonder about is how the basilisk turned into a human if he did not get to fully kiss her or if she did not love him back? I also wonder how Rose was able to return to normal life as if nothing had happened?
ReplyDeleteI think it would be interesting to have some sort of connection or engagement where the basilisk is nice to her falls in love, turns into human, but still gets killed by Rose and Rose has to confront the fact she just murdered someone or a twist where rose turns ugly because she killed him. Very interesting story though!