The girl with the honey-brown hair sat among the poppies. Red like blood, she thought, there’s a poem about that, isn’t there? Poppies and blood and devotion. She plucked a flower and watched the stem bleed clear fluid. Was is xylem or phloem? She tried to recall biology. She tried to reach through the shards of her memory to the night before, the night before.
She had drunk from a well? No, that was the wrong story. She had climbed a high mountain, that was it. She remembered now. Humming, she had packed food, knotted the strings of her boots, and set off. The climb had been arduous, sharp rocks and slippery, high steps and hazardous, round and round and round…
The girl giggled to herself. That was over now, and didn’t merit dwelling on. She began to chain the poppies together into a crown. A crown for a queen or a princess. Wait—a princess. Was that what she was, before? She forced her thoughts to resume their trail back through the dusty passages of her memory.
She had finally reached the summit, and had set up camp for the night. And what a night it had been. First tempted by love, or lust. It was hard to determine the difference sometimes. In any case, a man had come to her, a man seeming painted with sunshine; gilt skin, black hair, dancing river eyes. He had plied her with kisses, but she would have none of it, turning her back on him, covering her ears as he turned into a shrieking devil and flew from sight.
The crown was big enough to fit on her head, now. She twisted her hair into braids, the way she used to before, and set the flowers on top of them.
The second trial had been money, as it usually is. Piles of gold and jewels, fair-wrought bracelets and diadems, swords like darts of fire. They were laying there on the top of the mountain, and suddenly she was carrying a velvet sack, with which to gather them, she assumed. She had thrown the sack into her small cooking fire and all the beautiful, shining things had turned into maggots.
Poppies were so much nicer than roses, she thought. They had just as much crimson and feeling and extravagance, but without the thorns.
The third trial, the third trial— A scepter and a crown. But that wasn’t the only power she would receive if she accepted, if she left the summit. The power to heal the sick, the power to command the elements, the power to bring the dead back to life. She had glimpsed the face of her sister, paled and hollowed, void of expression. There was no peace like they told you there would be. Only emptiness. Only the coldness of death. Then she had seen her sister open her eyes, color flushing back through her veins, a smile rising to her lips. If only, if only. But of course she had refused. Her sister had returned to death, a rotting corpse.
And then morning had come, and she was through it. It was enough that she had spent a night on the mountain. In all the old tales, if you lasted through the night, you would become a poet inspired. A poet, or, or—She couldn’t remember
The girl with the honey brown hair looked around, dashing tears from her face. Why was she crying? There was nothing to be sad about. What more love could she want, or wealth? She had the love of the earth and the wealth of its bounty, and power. Yes, she had power. She laughed softly to herself, a small girl playing with blood in a field of poppies.
