RACHEL POLLACK

THE FOOL, THE STICK, AND THE PRINCESS

Rachel Pollack is an international expert on the Tarot, with more than a dozen
books to her credit. She has also written for numerous comic books, including
Doom Patrol and Tomahawk. More to the point (perhaps), she is also the author of
five novels, including Unquenchable Fire, Temporary Agency, and Godmother Night,
which won the World Fantasy Award last year. She writes short fiction much too
infrequently, so it's always a real treat when we see a new story from her, as
in the case of this delightful fairy tale.

THERE WERE ONCE THREE brothers who lived in a poor country far away. The two
older brothers were very clever and everyone said they would do well in the
world, even in a land with so few opportunities. But the youngest was nothing
but a fool. He had never learned to read, and even the simplest tasks eluded
him. Told to fetch wood, he would set out determined to get it right, but before
he got to the back of the house and the woodpile he might see a rabbit and try
to imitate its hop until he fell over laughing, the woodpile long forgotten. Or
worse, he might see a rainbow and fling the wood in the air as he lifted his
arms in happiness. The Fool, as everyone called him, simply loved rainbows.
Whenever he saw one he would throw his arms high above his head, no matter what
else was happening. People would shake their heads and worry what would become
of him.

As time went on, the family became poorer and poorer, despite all the efforts of
the mother and father and the elder brothers. Finally, the oldest brother
announced that there were just no opportunities for an ambitious young man in a
country where people told legendary stories about eating more than one meal a
day. He must leave home and seek his fortune. He kissed his parents, told his
second brother to take care of the Fool, and set out on a sunny morning across
the cracked clay of their poor farm.

He had gone no more than a day's journey when he spotted something along the
side of the road, half hidden under a burnt-out bush. At first glance it looked
like a plain stick, about waist high, but the sharp-eyed brother noticed a glow
of light all around it. "A magic staff!" he cried excitedly and seized it. Power
surged through him and he shook the stick at the sky. "Now nothing can stop me!"
he cried. "I will make my fortune and return home to rescue my family."

Just as he was striding off, he heard a terrible roar. He turned and saw an ogre
about to rush at him. The ogre stood ten feet tall, with shoulders like rocks,
and thick scales for skin, and teeth like sharpened iron stakes. Though he shook
with fear, the eldest brother told himself he had no reason to worry. He pointed
the magic stick at the ogre and shouted "Stop this monster from devouring me!" A
blast of light streaked from the stick -- but instead of striking the ogre it
ran all through the eldest brother. In an instant his entire body had turned to
stone. Furious, the hungry ogre lumbered away.

A year went by. When Spring came once more, the second brother looked one day at
the scraps of bread on the table and shook his head. "It's no use," he told his
parents. "Something terrible must have happened to my brother or he would have
returned by now. We have become more wretched than ever. I must go seek my
fortune." His parents begged him not to go. If he didn't come back, they said,
and they died, who would take care of the Fool? But he only kissed them and
shook his head sadly at his younger brother. Then he left.

Three days from home he came upon his petrified brother. The magic stick still
lay at his stone feet. "Oh my poor poor brother," he cried. "He must have found
this magic stick and tried to use it and it turned against him." He picked up
the stick. The power in it made him tremble all over. "Well," he said. "Luckily
I am much cleverer than my brother. Besides, he always wanted glory. I just want
to feed my family. As long as I don't make any mistakes I can use this stick to
make my fortune."

He had gone no more than a day's journey when he heard a roar. An ogre was
rushing at him. Its mouth drooled with thick black slime. The brother raised his
stick. He could see fire run along its length in its eagerness to unleash
itself. "Prevent this creature from devouring me!" he ordered the stick. Just as
the ogre reached him he turned all to stone.

Another year passed. One day the Fool said "Didn't my brothers leave some time
ago? I remember something about that." His parents nodded. "They haven't come
back, have they?" His parents shook their heads. "Oh," said the Fool, "I guess
that means I'll have to go seek my fortune."

"No!" his parents cried. They knew he could hardly find his way out the door.
But nothing they said could dissuade him. Maybe he'd forget. They tried to
distract him, with stories, and games, and a bunch of flowers that his mother
begged from a neighbor who had managed to grow a small garden. The next morning,
however, the Fool tied a change of clothes in a large cloth and set out.

No sooner had he left the house than he saw a rainbow. "Oh look!" he cried, and
raised his arms, flinging his bundle away from him. His poor father had to run
after it or the Fool would have forgotten it entirely. As the Fool wandered up
the road, his parents held each other and wept loudly.

The Fool had traveled several days, with detours to follow various small
animals, when he came upon his petrified eldest brother. "How wonderful," he
said. "Here we all thought something terrible must have happened, but instead
someone's made a statue of him. He must be famous. How nice. He always wanted to
be famous."

Several more days later, he discovered his second brother. "Now our family has
really done well," he said. "Statues of both my brothers. Won't my parents be
happy. Maybe someone will make a statue of me someday." As soon as he said it,
the idea struck him as so ludicrous he bent over laughing. With his face close
to the ground like that, he discovered the stick at his brother's feet. "Oh
look," he said. "Just what I need to carry my bundle." He tied his cloth to the
end of the stick and lifted it to his shoulder. A tickle ran all through his
body. "What a nice breeze," he said to himself.

That night he used his stick to dig up some roots for his dinner. To his
surprise they tasted like a marvelous feast, with flavors from roast quail to
wild strawberries creme de menthe. "What amazing roots," he thought. "I'll have
to tell my brothers about this." With the stick he drew an outline of a bed on
the dirt. When he lay down on it he found it as soft as baby goose feathers. He
smiled and fell asleep.

He had hardly set out the next morning when the ground shook with a great roar.
"Thunder," he said to himself. "I hope the rain falls on something else and not
me." Behind him, a sudden burst of rain like knives fell on the ogre who had
just opened his mouth wide to bite off the Fool's head. As the rain hit him the
ogre screamed, for ogres cannot stand water. He thrashed about but it was no
use. The scales cracked, the skin underneath sizzled and burned. Finally the
creature fell down dead.

"I wonder what all that noise was," the Fool said. He walked away without
turning around.

For several weeks he wandered. Each day his stick dug up banquets in the form of
roots, and every night he slept peacefully in his outline of a bed, untouched by
animals or storms or even damp.

One day he came to a river. Beyond it he could see houses and fields, even a
city, and somewhere near the city what looked like a tower of light. He wondered
how he could get across. It was too far to swim and he could not see a bridge.
"If only I was clever like my brothers and not such a fool," he thought, "I
would know what to do." In a rare burst of annoyance he struck his stick against
a tree. "I wish I had a boat!" he said. He heard a crackle, and when he turned
around the tree had gone and in its place lay a fine rowboat. "How nice," the
Fool said, as he got in and began rowing. "Someone just left this for strangers.
What a generous land. Maybe here I can find my fortune."

When he reached the other side he found signs posted up and down the riverbank.
Since he could not read he paid them no attention, and began walking toward the
tower of light which shimmered and flickered in the bright sun. In fact, the
signs were all about the tower.

The king and queen of this land had a daughter who was so beautiful that princes
from lands as exotic as Cathay, Persia, and England all sent delegations asking
for her hand in marriage. Some even came in person and bowed down with great
flourishes land expensive presents) to press their case. Her parents considered
the princess a gift from heaven itself, for they could pick a husband who would
bring even more wealth and power to their kingdom. Empire, they told each other.
Through their daughter's marriage they would change from mere king and queen to
emperor and empress.

Unfortunately, when they had calculated the best possible match for the
princess, they discovered that the gods had played an awful trick on them. Their
daughter refused to marry! At first, they thought they might have gone a little
too far in their choice. The prospective husband was not exactly young, and the
warts on his bent nose and saggy chin ruled out any suggestion of handsome. So
they found a prince whose good looks caused young women to faint any time he
walked down an open street {newspaper editorials suggested he wear a veil, or
simply stay home, but the prince only laughed}. Again the princess refused.

"What do you want?" her parents shouted at her. "Just tell us."

"I want to study," she said.

They stared at her. Study? They knew she spent a great deal of time with her
books, rather odd books, in fact, but study? They'd always assumed she'd read
all those books because she was bored and waiting to get married. Study rather
than a husband?

They arranged one match after another. The princess refused to see them. Now
they became truly angry. They told her they would choose a husband for her and
she would marry the man, even if the palace slaves had to drag her from her
precious library.

For the first time the princess became frightened. Until now she'd thwarted them
by her will and by the good sense of prospective husbands who knew how miserable
an unwilling wife could make them. But suppose her parents chose some brute who
would relish forcing his wife to obey him? Suppose he took away her books?

Usually the princess did not study anything very practical. She preferred
instead to ponder the mysteries of creation and the secret discoveries of
ancient philosophers. Nevertheless, some of her books did contain a few magic
formulas, if only to show the writer's disdain for such ordinary concerns. For
days she searched through her books {she'd never gotten around to putting them
in any order) until at last she came upon something truly useful.

While the palace slept the princess secretly borrowed a wheelbarrow from the
gardener and carted all her books out to an open field. Standing in the middle
of them, she cast a spell. A glass tower rose up beneath her, so steep and
smooth that no one could possibly climb it. On top of it sat the delighted
princess and all her books. Safe! She clapped her hands in joy. A moment later,
she had opened one of her favorite works, a treatise on creation told from the
viewpoint of trees instead of people.

Several hours later a noise disturbed her. She peered down the edge of the tower
to see her parents there, waving their arms and stamping their feet. They
screamed, they cursed, they threatened to tear down the glass mountain chip by
chip. She paid no attention. Finally, her mother pointed out that she had taken
no food with her. If she didn't come down and obey them she would starve.

Not so, the princess knew. As part of her years of study, she had learned the
language of the birds. In a pure voice she sang out to them and they brought her
whatever she needed. When her parents heard her song and saw the birds deliver
her fruits and fish eggs and delicacies stolen from wealthy tables they finally
knew she had beaten them.

Still they would not give up entirely. They sent out messages to all the princes
and kings they could reach that whoever could climb the glass tower and bring
down the princess could marry her on the spot. They even put up signs all about
the land to announce this challenge. Secretly they hoped some lout would be the
one to get her. It would serve her right, they told themselves.

The Fool knew none of this, for signs meant nothing to him. Music, however --
Just as the Fool started toward the glass tower the princess began her song. The
Fool stopped and closed his eyes. Tears spilled out from beneath the lids to
slide down into his wide smile. Never, never, had he heard such a wondrous
sound. When it ended, and he opened his eyes, he saw birds of all colors and
sizes, condors, parrots, humming birds, all of them in a great swirl around the
top of the tower. Quickly he walked toward the light and the birds.

As he approached it he saw men, more and more of them as he got closer, most of
them injured in some way, and all of them miserable. They hobbled about on
crutches, they held bandaged heads in their hands, a few lay on the ground in
the middle of broken contraptions. One man had strapped giant wood and cloth
wings to his back, then jumped off a tree, hoping to flap his way up the tower.
He'd only fallen on his head. Another had made shoes with wire springs so that
he might bounce high enough to reach the princess. He'd only crashed into the
side of the glass..

The Fool looked around at all these sad figures. "What happened to all of you?"
he asked.

One of the men stopped groaning long enough to look up at the Fool's cheerful
face. "What are you?" he said, "Some kind of fool?"

The Fool nodded happily. "That's right," he said. He thought he might have found
a friend but the man only groaned more loudly and turned away.

"Well," the Fool said to himself, "if I want to climb to the top I better get
started." He set the stick down on the base of the tower in order to brace
himself. A step formed in the glass. He placed the stick a little ways up and
then another step formed. "This is easy," he said. "I don't know why all those
men made such a fuss. I'm just a Fool, but even I can find my way up a bunch of
steps."

When he reached the top the princess stood there. She was furious! She pulled at
her hair, she twisted her face in anger, she hopped up and down. Even so, the
Fool thought her the most wonderful being he had ever seen.

"What are you doing here?" she shouted. "Why can't anyone ever leave me alone?
How did you get up the tower?"

Her fury so startled the Fool he could hardly speak. "I...I just climbed up the
steps. It wasn't very hard. Really it wasn't."

Now the princess stared at the glass steps. Then she looked at the Fool, and
then at his stick, which shone with a soft pink glow. She nodded to herself.
Again she looked at the Fool. She could see a light in him purer than the magic
of his stick.

Still she refused to let go of her anger. "So," she said. "Now you expect me to
marry you?"

"Marry you?" the Fool said. "Marry you? I could never think to marry someone as
wise and wonderful as you. I'm just a Fool. I only came here because of the
singing. I just wanted to hear you sing with the birds." He began to cry.

The princess felt her heart dissolve and flow out of her body. No, she told
herself, she would not allow any tricks. "Right," she said sarcastically. "And I
suppose you didn't see all the signs my father has planted everywhere."

The Fool said "I saw them, but I don't know what they said. I can't read."

The princess's mouth fell open. She stared and stared at him. How sweet he
looked, how kind, how honest. "Will you marry me?" she blurted.

"What?" the Fool said. He looked around at the piles and piles of books, some as
high as a house, some arranged like a table or a bed. "Marry you? I .... How
could I marry you? I just told you, I can't read."

"That's so wonderful," the princess cried. "I read more than enough for any two
people. We will be perfect together." She began to sing the song a partridge hen
sings when she has found the perfect mate. The Fool closed his eyes and became
so swept up in joy he would have fallen right off the tower if the princess had
not held on tightly to him. She stopped singing finally and kissed him. "We will
be so. happy," she said.

"Oh yes," he told her. "Yes!"

Before they went down from the tower, the princess looked at her beloved Fool
and his ragged clothes. "Hmm," she said. To her he was perfect in every way, but
she knew what her father would think of such a husband, and even though the king
had said he would marry her to whoever climbed the tower she feared he would try
to stop them. "Do you have any other clothes?" she asked him.

He looked at the bundle on the end of the stick. "Well," he said. "I did bring
an extra shirt and trousers, just in case I had to give these to somebody who
needed them more than me. But I'm afraid my other clothes have just as many
holes as the ones I am wearing." He reached down and untied the bundle for the
first time since he'd placed it on his stick. Then he gasped in surprise. His
ragged clothes had vanished and in their place lay the softest and most elegant
tunic and leggings anyone had ever seen, softer than silk, stronger than wool,
with a river of colors woven into the fabric. The Fool scratched his head. "Now
where did this come from?" he said.

Once the Fool had dressed, the princess called the larger birds, the condors and
rocs and vultures, and asked them if they would carry her books down to the
ground. Then she took her sweet Fool's hand and together they walked down the
steps of the tower.

The king and queen were delighted to see their daughter married at last, and to
such a fine prince -- or so they thought, for when they asked him his kingdom he
just waved his stick and said "Oh, over there," and each of them saw a vision of
fields of diamonds growing like berries, and castles as large as mountains. They
offered to have the Fool and their daughter live with them, but their new
son-in-law said "No, thank you. I promised my mother and father I'd come right
home as soon as I made my fortune." He wondered why the king and queen laughed,
but he thought it rode to ask too many questions {he so rarely understood the
things other people said anyway), so he said nothing. They set out with seven
horses, one for the Fool, one for the princess, one for the treasures the king
and queen were sending to the Fool's parents, and four for the princess's books.

Just as they approached the river, the ground shook and they heard a roar like
the earth itself breaking in two. The princess turned around and saw a whole
army of ogres racing toward them! Word had gotten to the creatures of their
brothers destruction and now they wanted revenge. They'll tear us to shreds, the
princess thought. We have to do something. But what could they do? There stood
the river, too wide for them to swim across, and besides, what would happen to
her books in the water? She looked up at the sky but there were no birds near
enough to come to their rescue. Knowing that the ogres would reach them in just
a few minutes, she began frantically to search through her books for the ones on
magic. If only, she thought, as she raced from horse to horse, she had paid more
attention to practical issues.

The Fool meanwhile paid no attention at all to any of these events. He did hear
the noise and felt the ground shake but thought it might be a herd of animals
running back and forth to enjoy the day. And he did wonder why his bride kept
dashing from one horse to another, but trusted her totally, for after all, she
was so much wiser than he. He might have wondered how they would cross the
river, for someone had taken away the rowboat, except that right then, on the
other side of the river, he saw his favorite sight in all the world (after his
wife, of course}. A rainbow!

The Fool did what he always did when he saw a rainbow, he raised his arms above
his head to greet it. This time, however, he held the stick in his hand. The
moment he lifted his arms, the entire river separated before him. The water rose
up on either side, huge walls of water high enough to block the sky. You see,
the Fool's stick was a very old magic stick, and it knew some very special
tricks.

"Hurry," the princess urged as she spurred her horse, and the pack horses,
across the passageway between the walls of water. The Fool laughed, thinking his
wife wanted to exercise the horses, and so he galloped alongside her.

The princess looked over her shoulder. There came the ogres, filling the path,
coming closer and closer. By the time she and the Fool and their horses reached
the other side the entire army of ogres raced between the watery walls. What can
we do? she thought. They'll swallow us.

The Fool glanced back, curious to see what his wife was looking at with such
distress. All he could make out was a cloud of dust. "Now that's not right," he
said to himself. "People depend on this river. What will happen if the water
just stays piled up like that/ I sure wish the river would come back down
again." The moment he said it, the walls of water crashed down in a furious
whirl of Waves. The entire army of ogres washed away and was never heard from
again.

Now they set out happily for home. Anytime the Fool got lost (at least four or
five times a day} the princess called a hawk or a raven to look ahead and return
them to the path. They were two days from home when they came upon the Fool's
second brother, still fixed in stone in the act of trying to cast a spell.
"Look," the Fool said to his wife. "Not everyone in my family is a fool. My
second brother has become so famous someone has made a statue of him." With his
stick he tapped twice on the shoulder.

Instantly his brother came to life, falling to the ground where he looked up
confused. "What..." he said. "Where am I?"

"Brother!" cried the Fool and gave him a big hug. "What a nice surprise. Look,
this is my wife, she's a princess, imagine that. Your foolish brother married to
a genuine princess. And look, here's our treasure, a whole lot of it, or so my
wife tells me, and here are all her books." He helped his confused brother onto
his own horse and walked alongside, caught up in a happy chatter. Just as the
path turned around the side of a hill, the Fool glanced back. To himself he
said, "I wonder what happened to that statue?"

A day later they came to the first brother. Once again the Fool tapped the
shoulder with the stick, and once again his brother came to life. Now they all
traveled together, and when the Fool's parents saw them they wept with joy. With
one of the jewels from the treasure chest they bought food and laid out a feast.
Just as they all sat down to eat, the oldest brother suddenly remembered what
had started them all on their adventures. "The staff," he said, "what happened
to the magic staff?"

"Do you mean my walking stick?" the Fool said. "When we came close to home I
realized I didn't need it anymore, so I threw it away."

"You threw it away?" both brothers repeated. "Where?"

The Fool shrugged. He saw his wife look at him with laughter and love and smiled
back at her. "I don't remember," he said. "I just tossed it in some bushes."

And there it remains to this very day.