Not One Damsel in Distress: World Folktales for Strong Girls

  Burd Janet was afraid, but she would not show it. “Hullo, the house!” she called out in greeting. “Tonight I have come into my inheritance. By law I claim what is mine. This house and land belonged to my father’s father’s father, though it was stolen from him by the wickedness of the Fair Folk.”

  There was a sudden rush of wind as if in answer, but nothing more.

  Burd Janet smiled. “I shall take this single rose, the only thing left of beauty here at the hall. And I leave instead my pledge. I shall take back Carterhaugh from the fairies and restore it to humankind.”

  Then she plucked the rose, though the thorns pierced her fingers and made them bleed.

  No sooner had the stalk been broken than the wind blew up again, now wild and angry. The moon was suddenly hidden by a shred of cloud. And when the cloud was past, standing in front of her, where no one had been a moment before, was the handsomest young man Burd Janet had ever seen. He was dressed as if for a wedding, with a fine kilt, a silken shirt, a velvet jacket, a silver-handled skean dhu tucked into his sock, and a silver sporran hanging from his waist.

  “Who pulls the rose?” he said in a voice that was both soft and strong. “Who calls me back from the world of the Ever Fair?”

  Janet laughed. “I pulled the rose,” she said. “And the world of the Ever Fair is but a dream. No one lives forever. We all grow old in time.”

  The young man put his head to one side and looked at her. “So I once believed, too. But as I rode out on a summer’s eve, my horse shied and I fell off. As I lay in a faint on the hillside, the queen of the Fair Folk found me and took me inside the green hill. And I have lived there ever since. Never growing older. Never dying.”

  “How long is ‘ever since’?” asked Burd Janet. “You do not look older than I am, and today is my sixteenth birthday.”

  “I am ten times sixteen, older than the oldest man left outside the hill,” the young man replied.

  Janet laughed again. “I cannot believe that. What is your name, sir?”

  “My name is Tam Lin.”

  And then Burd Janet shivered for the first time, for Tam Lin was the name of a boy who had disappeared when her father’s father’s father was a boy.

  “When I rode off, this house stood upright and unbroken,” said Tam Lin. “The flowers bloomed all across the hill.”

  “They shall bloom here again,” said Burd Janet. “And the towers shall once again stand tall. For I am Burd Janet and this is my house and land.”

  “That I should like to see,” said Tam Lin, and he took Burd Janet’s hand and kissed it.

  “I promise you shall,” she said.

  But at her words Tam Lin shivered, as if a cold wind had touched the back of his neck, though there was no wind at all. “After tomorrow—​All Hallow’s Eve—​I shall see nothing ever again,” he said. “For on that night, when the human and fairy worlds sit side by side, with only the moonlight road between, the queen of the Fair Folk plans to sacrifice me as a teind to Hell.”

  “Never!” said Burd Janet.

  “There is naught anyone can do,” said Tam Lin.

  “There is always something . . .” she replied.

  He shook his head. “We ride over the moors, past Selkirk town, down to Miles Cross, where the holy well stands, as the unseelie court does every seven years. And every seven years the queen sacrifices one of her human captives. For long she has loved me and kept me by her side. But now she loves another and I have been chosen to die.”

  “Can you refuse to ride, Tam Lin?”

  “That I cannot.”

  “Can you run?”

  “That I cannot.”

  “Is there no one to stand between?”

  “Only my own true love,” said Tam Lin. “But all who loved me are long dead, and the grass growing green over their graves.”

  “Then I shall save you!” cried Burd Janet. “For if no one else in this human world loves you, then I must.”

  He grabbed her up in his arms and told her what she must do. Then he kissed her twice, once on the lips and once on the forehead, before he let her go.

  BURD JANET WENT BACK to her house. The party for her majority was still going on. If anyone had missed her, no one said a word. Her mother saw the scratches on her fingers. Her father saw the rose in her hand. But neither saw the mark of Tam Lin’s kisses on her lips and forehead, though she felt them burning like brands.

  She danced with young men who had fair faces and soft hands. She danced with young men who had dark faces and rough hands. But she danced with none who took her breath as did Tam Lin.

  And so she bid them all good night.

  In the morning she slept late, and her nanny wondered at the burrs in her skirts. The rose, which she had set in a vase, had wilted. But when Burd Janet arose, there was a blush on her cheek.

  When evening came at last, she wrapped a green mantle over her head. In her leather pocket she carried earth from the garden, and a bottle of holy water begged from the priest. In her head were the instructions from Tam Lin.

  She crept out of the house and ran down the road to Miles Cross, where she hid herself in back of the well. She knew she had a long while to wait.

  Then, when the bell in the steeple of Selkirk town tolled twelve, she heard the jangling of many smaller bells, and so she made herself smaller still and watched the road without moving.

  There, where the mist parted like a great gate opening, came the fairy troop. The sound Burd Janet had heard before was the horses’ harnesses, for they were bridled in gold and silver, and hung all over with bells. On each horse’s head shone a great jewel.

  Burd Janet remembered all that Tam Lin had told her, and she let the first horse—​the pitch black horse—​pass her by. On its back was a man as fair as a prince.

  And then she let the second horse—​an oak brown horse—​pass by as well. The man on its back was as fair as a king.

  Then the third horse came by—​white as milk, white as snow, white as the froth on the top of a wave. On its back rode Tam Lin.

  Burd Janet leaped to her feet and ran over to the white horse, and with one swift movement, she pulled the rider down, holding him fast in her arms.

  Even swifter was the fairy troop, for in an instant she and Tam Lin were surrounded.

  Burd Janet looked up at the riders and saw that their faces were all beautiful but cold, and the coldest and most beautiful was the face of the Fairy Queen herself. Her dress was all the greens of the forest, and her white hair hung in a hundred braids down her back.

  “Give me Tam Lin,” said the Fairy Queen, “and I shall give you all the gold and silver you see here.”

  Tam Lin had not told Burd Janet what to say, for he had not known the queen would bargain for him. But Burd Janet never hesitated. “I have enough gold in my mother’s hair and silver in my father’s,” she said.

  “Give me Tam Lin,” the Fairy Queen said again, “and I shall give you all the jewels on my horses’ heads.”

  Burd Janet smiled. “I need only the jewels shining in my true love’s eyes.”

  The Fairy Queen stared straight into Burd Janet’s eyes as if reading what was written in her soul. “Give me Tam Lin,” she said carefully, “and I shall give you back Carterhaugh.”

  For a moment—​only a moment—​Burd Janet hesitated. In her mind came images of the beauty of the house, not as it could be but as it had once been. Then she knew that the queen was trying to throw a glamour over her and she laughed.

  “I shall have Carterhaugh whether you will it or no,” Burd Janet told the queen. “And Tam Lin, as well.”

  The queen stood up in her silver stirrups and pointed a long finger at Burd Janet. “You do not hold him even now!” she cried. A great white light poured from her fingertips.

  In Burd Janet’s arms Tam Lin began to twist and shiver and groan. His flesh seemed to melt and then reshape itself into that of a green, sinuous, scaly serpent, with lidless eyes and a lipless smile.

>   But Burd Janet held on.

  The Fairy Queen laughed without mirth. “What do you hold now, Burd Janet?”

  The serpent shape melted in her hands and reshaped again, and now Burd Janet held a lion, whose great mouth was open and whose teeth were bared and whose breath smelled of dead meat.

  But still Burd Janet held on.

  “What do you hold now, human girl?” cried the queen.

  The lion’s body ran like molten gold through her hands and reshaped into a burning brand.

  But heedless of the fire that seared her, Burd Janet held on, running to the well, where, at the very last moment, she threw the brand in. Then she took the bottle of holy water from her pocket and sprinkled it into the well and over her own head.

  The brand went out at once, and Tam Lin climbed out. His fairy clothing had been burned away and he stood in nothing but his human skin.

  Burd Janet threw the green mantle around him to shade him from fairy sight. Then she reached back into the leather pocket and took out the earth from her garden. She spread it around the two of them in a great circle of protection against the Fair Folk.

  Tam Lin took her hand in his, and they turned to face the queen.

  “If I had known what I know now, Tam Lin, I would have plucked out your human eyes and given you eyes of wood!” cried the Fairy Queen. But as she spoke, the sun was just rising above the rim of the world.

  “Your power is over,” Burd Janet cried out. “For here is the daylight and Tam Lin is mine!”

  The queen turned to look at the sun creeping down the road like some unearthly beast on the prowl. “We must be gone!” she cried in a voice that trilled with terror.

  “Be gone!” the unseelie court answered her.

  Then the queen and court rode silently away through the gates of mist, leaving Tam Lin and Burd Janet behind.

  BURD JANET AND TAM LIN were married. They took back the great castle of Carterhaugh and lived there with their children, and their children’s children, for many long and happy years. As happy and as even, it is said, as the bones of the herring on either side of the spine.

  ROMANIA

  Mizilca

  Young women disguising themselves as men to go off to battle are popular in folk stories as well as in history

  THERE WAS ONCE in far-off Romania a good old knight who was skilled at sorcery, but alas, he was failing in health. He had three beautiful daughters and no sons.

  Now, the old knight loved his daughters mightily, but the youngest daughter, Mizilca, he loved the best.

  One day the far-off sultan sent word to all the knights in his kingdom that they must, on pain of death and dishonor, come with horse and arms and serve him for a year and a day. Or failing that, they must send one of their sons to do the sultan’s duty.

  The old knight himself was too sick to travel. And, as has been said, he had no sons, so he did not know what to do. Day and night he worried about it, sighing deeply and refusing to eat. Soon his ill health became no health at all, and there came a day when he was all but on his deathbed.

  His eldest daughter, Stanuta, came to him. She put a hand to his head, and the skin there felt hot and dry. “Dear father,” she said, “what is wrong? Why do you sigh and fail to thrive?”

  The knight sighed deeply, and the sides of his great mustache fluttered like wings. “The sultan has commanded me to come myself or send my son to serve at his court for a year and a day. If I cannot do so, I shall be dishonored, executed, and all my lands confiscated. Then what will happen to my dear daughters?”

  Stanuta rose from his bedside and stood up tall. “I will be your son and go. Let my hair be cut off like a man’s, give me a man’s shirt and pants. Then I will ride astride a horse like a man and serve the sultan well.”

  The old man was horrified at the thought. He forbade his daughter to go to the sultan’s court alone. The sultan’s reputation with women was known throughout the land. But there was no dissuading Stanuta. So at last the old man had to agree.

  Stanuta’s maids cut off her long dark hair and dressed her like a boy. Her father gave her a suit of the finest armor and his sharpest sword, and had her mounted on his finest warhorse.

  “Fair weather and fine roads, my son,” the old knight said as she rode away.

  But then the old knight did a very strange thing. He cut across the fields, though he was still very weak from his illness, and went as fast as ever he could until he came to a bridge at the very boundary of his lands. There, using a secret signal with his hands and a few magic words, he changed himself into a blue boar and hid in the woods by the river.

  Stanuta came riding along on the warhorse and the blue boar charged out at her. He blew blue smoke through his nostrils and grunted a warning.

  Stanuta’s horse would have stood its ground, but Stanuta screamed in terror and pulled on the reins till it turned around. She galloped back to the castle so quickly, the old knight had barely time to transform himself and make it back ahead of her. The trip nearly finished him, and he lay down on his bed and barely moved for a week.

  NOW, THE OLD KNIGHT’S second daughter, Roxanda, saw him lying and sighing in his bed, and she put her hand to his cheek. It was hot and dry. She asked, as had her sister before her, what was the matter. And, as her sister before her, she begged to go to the sultan’s palace as the knight’s own son.

  “No blue boar shall turn me from my path,” she swore.

  So, her maids, too, cut her hair and dressed her as a man. She put on the suit of armor and mounted her father’s good warhorse. Then off she went down the road.

  But her old father arose from his bed of pain and was there ahead of her at the bridge, changed into the shape of a red lion.

  When Roxanda reached the bridge, the red lion leaped forward and roared, its great teeth gnashing.

  Roxanda, too, screamed in terror, pulled on the reins, and galloped home. Her old father had barely time to change back and make it home ahead of her.

  NOW, OF COURSE, it was Mizilca’s turn. She asked, as had her sisters before her, for her father’s blessing to go to the sultan’s palace as the knight’s son.

  “Dear Mizilca,” her father said. “Your sisters, who are older and stronger than you, have failed. Stay home. Keep your long, lovely hair, which is truly your crowning glory.”

  “Father, I will not fail. Neither lion nor boar shall frighten me.”

  “No. Absolutely not,” the old knight said. He worried less about the lion and boar, and more about the sultan. But if he thought that would be the end of it, he was wrong. Mizilca kept begging and begging until at last—​to have a little peace—​he let her go. But all he gave her was a rusty old sword, a broken old lance, and an old swaybacked horse that had done nothing but pull the farm cart for years.

  As soon as Mizilca had cut her hair, put on armor, taken up the sword and lance, and started off, her father was across the fields and by the bridge in the magical likeness of a green dragon, waiting for her.

  The minute Mizilca got to the bridge, out charged the dragon, snorting and roaring and blowing flames.

  But Mizilca was not like her sisters. She put her spurs to the old swayback’s flanks and galloped forward. She lowered her lance to pierce the dragon’s breast.

  At that the dragon turned and ran off, back across the fields and out of sight. The poor old knight barely made it to his bed that day.

  MIZILCA RODE STRAIGHT ON to the sultan’s palace, which was three days and three nights away.

  When she arrived she bowed low before the sultan and said, “I am my father’s son, and I have come to serve you for a year and a day, and thus discharge his debt to you.”

  The sultan checked her off in his great book of names, but then he looked her up and down, and thought to himself, I know men and I know maidens. This is no youth, but a maiden disguised. Yet, he was not entirely sure. And he did not dare say anything in case he was wrong. So he welcomed her to the company of his knights with open arms.
>
  DAYS PASSED. WEEKS. And the sultan watched Mizilca closely. But she rode as well as any man. And she shot the bow as well as any man. She handled sword and lance as well as any man.

  Yet still, he was not certain. He fretted about this, day and night, night and day, till his old mother asked him what was wrong.

  “There is a knight among my knights whom I suspect is no man,” he said. “How can I discover the truth without dishonor?”

  His old mother smiled. “Ask me a harder question, my son. This one is too easy. Have merchants come to the palace and let them place rich cloths on one side of the great hall: embroidered silken shifts, intricate laces, long flowing veils, and velvet robes. On the other side of the great hall, have the merchants spread out armaments: fine two-sided swords, ivory-handled knives, carved lances, ebony spears.”

  The sultan nodded.

  “Then,” his mother continued, “if the knight is a maiden, she will be drawn to the cloth and pay no attention at all to the weapons.”

  The sultan did as his mother said, and all the knights were called into the great hall. But when Mizilca entered and saw what goods were laid out, she suspected at once what the sultan was about. So she ignored the embroideries, the silks, the laces, the veils. Instead she went straight to the weapons and hefted the swords.

  But the sultan was still not convinced. Once again he asked his mother. “How can I discover whether Mizilca is a man or a maid without dishonor?”

  His old mother smiled again. “Ask me a harder question, my son. This one is too easy. Have cook prepare kasha for dinner and mix in it a spoonful of pearls. If the knight is a maiden, she will pick out the pearls one by one and save them. If he is a man, he will throw the pearls away.”

  So, the knights were all invited to a grand feast, and the first course was kasha, and in each bowl were pearls mixed with the buckwheat grains.

  Mizilca again suspected the sultan was testing her. And she picked out the pearls and flung them under the table as if they were nothing more than stones.