Second Night: More Fairytales Retold

by Caroline Aubrey

We all know the fairy stories from childhood…beautiful heroine meets handsome mysterious hero; they fall in love, marry, and live happily ever after…or do they?

Even though times have changed, we still have the deep longing to be desired above all by a demon lover, the bad boy, the vampire, the one whom we are not supposed to find ultimate happiness with. In these retellings of The Goose Girl, East of the Sun, West of the Moon, Beauty and the Beast, and a Selkie Legend, Caroline Aubrey re-imagines these stories for a modern world; the same horrors facing women in the old world face them in the new one, but this time there is a twist: to survive the horror of the Bloody Chamber, we must keep our wits about us and rely upon the strength of women to do so.

From “A Fox’s Tale”:
As he kissed her, he placed the keys in her hand. They were heavy and cold to the touch. Parting, he smiled. “These will open every door. Explore to your heart’s content, dearest, however,” his eyes shone with a bright light as he gazed upon her, “the room at the topmost height of the house, at the tip of the stairs, please do not enter. It is the one thing I ask of you. Can you do that for me, my darling girl?”
Nodding, Miranda put the keys on the table. “Of course.”
Pointing to the keys, Kitsen separated them, until the lightest one stood out. “This is the key to my room. You will have no need of it, but it is here.” Standing, he placed his hands on her shoulders, and kissed the top of her head. “My dearest love, I shall return in two days,” he said.
And then, he was gone.