After the emergency room and the dead-weight leg, I made a promise to myself: no more reading Evander’s book outside my apartment. I told myself I could only read it right before I went to bed, so then I started the part called The Witch and the Fool on Thursday night.

Serissa lived in a glade in the woods. The trees arched around the clearing that was her home and provided shade as well as a cover for her thatched roof and timber walls. It looked exactly like the home of a runaway princess in a fairy tale. Though Serissa's story was not a happy chronicle, because of one unmistakable element: the house was surrounded by a labyrinth of twisted lengths of thorny red roses. There was a small windmill erected next to the house that acted as a watchtower, where anyone who stepped into the prickly maze could easily be spied upon from the safety of the yard. In the woods, the windmill was purely decorative since the trees shielded the area from any possible breeze. Its purpose became known when poor travelers became lost in the paths of thorns, for getting to the house was almost impossible. When such an occasion arose, Serissa or her mother would sit on top of the windmill by the motionless blades and guide the person safely off their land by shouting to them which way to go.

Serissa’s mother had been a witch and not just any witch, but one branded with a title from the high king of the land—King Author. She was known as the Red Thorn Witch. The story was told that the King thought she needed rescuing back when he was a lowly knight and had sought to free her from her prison… only to be lost in the maze and guided out by the tiny witch laughing herself sick from atop the windmill. In his humiliation, he dubbed her the Red Thorn Witch. 

In fact, Serissa’s mother’s real name was Surrey and she wasn’t the least bit terrifying. The roses were there for their protection. Surrey was a powerful witch because she had been able to coax even the weakest stems to grow thick with deep perseverance. 

As her daughter and protege, Serissa was an utter failure. Surrey schooled her and trained her, but Serissa seemed incapable in every form of magic she tried. She could cook, but even if her bread rose to perfection, her potions were about as effective as water. Her thumbs were black instead of green and the rose bushes meant to protect her hated her (sometimes secretly, sometimes openly). The future was a dim fog to her. When she tried to divine anything, the only answer she got from the tea leaves was, “Wait and see.” Pathetic! Surrey encouraged her to try stargazing, but that was a dismal road for Serissa to walk. The stars didn’t look like two-headed goats or unicorns with elephant feet. They just looked like stars.

In the end, when Surrey’s life had almost wasted away, she decided not to trust her rose bushes to protect her daughter. They were losing their life-force as quickly as she was. In her desperation, she tried a different kind of magic on her child. She made her ugly. 

In the weeks that followed Surrey’s burial, Serissa waited. First, she waited for the rose bushes to die, and second, she waited for someone to come who would inevitably take her away. 

I shouldn’t have been surprised when I found myself sitting outside, but I was. The weather in Edmonton had been dreary because winter was coming, but suddenly I was sitting in the shade of a tree taking refuge from the hot summer sun. I smiled. I was going to enjoy the story. It was going to be like going on a vacation to Mexico during one of the worst parts of the year.

Wait… except if I was playing the part of the daughter, wasn’t I supposed to be ugly? The girl in the story’s name was Serissa and I was sitting in a small yard surrounded by a little wooden fence. On the other side, there were rose bushes. I was undoubtedly Serissa, but how was I ugly?

Since I couldn’t see myself, I got up and went into the house, which was only marginally better than an old shed in Emi’s yard used for sheltering tools. Well, the introduction I read made it sound like I wouldn’t be staying in the hut for very long. I went in. There was a washbasin on a stand, a hammock strung across the room, and another one lying idly by the wall. There was a chest, which I opened only to find it full of books, quilts, and hideous clothes—not unlike the nun-like pinafore I was wearing. There was a cupboard in the corner that was full of pots for stewing and hooks and knives I assumed were either for cooking or for trimming back the rose bushes. In another corner, there was a barrel full of cornmeal and another one full of oats. Other than those things, the place was practically empty. How had anyone managed to live in such a place? I didn't know how to cook straight cornmeal.

I couldn’t find a mirror. I went back outside. 

The yard was a relatively simple affair. There was the windmill mentioned in the introduction, a small vegetable garden with a huge raspberry bush taking over everything close to the roses, the house, and a well. I supposed that was the closest thing I was going to get to a mirror. I picked up the bucket and dropped it in. 

As I pulled up the bucket, I wondered why I never realized drawing water would be hard work. Wooden buckets were heavy. Water was heavy, too. One would think I hadn’t hauled four-liter jugs of milk up three flights of stairs all my life.

I set the water down and waited for it to settle. When it finally did, I was shocked to see what Evander meant by ugly. For starters, every scrap of my flaming red hair was tied up in the most hideous knots ever devised. Secondly, my face was covered in warts. Touching my face, I squished one between my fingers to see what it was like. It went flat and I could feel it detaching from my skin. Nervously, I pulled it off. It was clear and it felt like jelly. I tried to stick it back on my face and it stuck. Then I realized that there were a few down my neck also. Ew! But not uncomfortable. If I didn’t touch myself, I couldn’t even feel they were there. I moved my face and made all kinds of strange contortions, but the warts just moved and did whatever my face did. 

In the end, I left them alone. They were obviously part of my character in the story and I didn’t want to ruin it. 

I looked down at my nun habit. It was clearly another part of the plan to make me ugly. No curves could be seen through the thick black pinafore hanging over my front and my back. What a pity! I had such pretty dresses in the last story.

It was then that I heard a sound—loud and long—coming from the midst of the rosebush labyrinth. It wasn’t exactly a scream. It sounded more like a groan with a heavy dose of pain in it. 

Rather than run into the bushes, I did what the introduction said Surrey did and climbed up the windmill. From that somewhat precarious vantage point, I could see someone struggling through the passages throughout the rose bushes.

“Want me to guide you out?” I called.

“I’m quite all right,” a low voice replied cheerfully.

I could see thrashing within an overgrown part of the path and little bits of underbrush flying into the air. The man had cleared that hedge and was in an open passage. Looking at the distance he had to go, I could see he had a pretty good chance of actually making into the yard, unlike the old king. As I looked out, I was confused. Why did Surrey even make a path for anyone to enter into the yard? Wouldn’t it have been easier to leave the prisoners of the maze hunting through it forever with no way in?

A second later, the young man looked upwards and I saw why he needed to be able to get in. It was Evander... with a few subtle changes. His hair was not tied back at all. It was ash brown and fell straight to a blunt cut that was slightly shorter in the back than in the front. He had sideburns that went all the way to his jaw. A swell of happiness rose inside me at the sight of him, but then I realized he wasn't properly equipped to take on the maze. For starters, he didn’t have any shoes on. He was wearing a pair of heavily worn, roughly-woven trousers. They were rolled up to just below the knee and he wore a plain cotton shirt that was probably once white but turned gray through wear. The fastenings were done up to his collarbone. I looked closer and saw that he didn’t just have scratches on his feet, but up his legs and arms. On his neck, there was a cut that had bled onto his shirt.

But even with all that, he grinned broadly at me as I climbed down the windmill and approached him.

“How did you get in?” I asked.

“I’m a magician,” he explained, suddenly showering himself with a handful of gold dust. The dust fell on his nose, in his hair and eyebrows. It clung to the moisture around his lips and the sweat on his face. “So I know how to do things like that.”

“Get through a labyrinth?” I asked as I tried to stop laughing. He looked adorable.

“It’s easy. Whenever you come to a cross-way, you always go left.”

I dropped my shoulders. I should have known that.

“I’m Kalavan,” he said, suddenly stepping forward and taking my hand. 

“And I’m Serissa,” I volunteered as I invariably stepped backward. He was staring at me. The warts were probably repulsive and my face was turning red under his scrutiny.

He didn’t miss a beat. “You’re a witch? I came because I was told a witch lives here and I want to know if you have any wares or spells you can sell me.”

Since it was Evander and it was his story I’d trust him with anything. If the story was going to be another romance, I wanted to take any shortcut to fall in love with him. Giving in to his query seemed like the quickest way to winning him over. I thought about the books in the shed… house. “I suppose you can have a look through my mother’s spell books.”

He looked around edgily. “Will she mind? Is she easily angered?”

“She’s dead,” I said blankly.

He gawked. “The Red Thorn is dead? Pity,” he said sadly. Then he brightened. “And you’re going to let me look at her spell books? Wonderful!”