[she will accept these awkward pats in the wake of a traumatic memory, true stepdad energy happening here. she doesn't quite know what to make of this reaction to it. she's told him a few times she blew her family away but it's sort of different to see it.]
But Gerard, you act like I should think you deserved to be a frog, but what does that say about me?
[ the pats stop while he tries to figure out what she's saying here (he is playing dumb) but then start again. ]
I don't know that my frogging says anything about you and your situation. Remember what I said before? I was cursed because of my actions. I don't think you were cursed for the same reasons. You've always been a kind person.
[does she even have to protest. her actions were to kill her family, the woodsman, lambda. her actions are scary.
she can't make sense of it. she doesn't think she "deserved" this, really. she was a cute, innocent little girl before this. she knows on some level she was out of control here. but what happened in this memory was so bad, it makes her unable not to wonder if there's just something generally bad about her. maybe bad in a way that's useful, that can be important, that can help good people.]
I do think you're a good person. You're protecting us, for example.
[ i think maybe he understands now a bit more than then, that the first frogging was a bit undeserved. but this one, where he's turning back, becoming a creature again, feels right. a punishment for the way he's been in this life, as this sort of beast. ]
[she swallows and nods her head. she is protecting them, that's true. that's something she can use all this for. it doesn't necessarily make her feel good, to think of it that way, to think that this was actually necessary, but even if it doesn't always feel good it helps. it maybe feels a bit less good to think he sees that as the tradeoff, too.]
It's okay, Gerard. I appreciate you being nice to me over it. It's just that I've already accepted that it had to happen.
[it's not quite that he fucked up badly it's just that sometimes being told over and over again that the reason you're worthy of love is your bravery starts to make you feel like you have to be brave to be worthy of love.
since she's been here, it's felt like everything has been leading her to realizing that the wolf in her can help but the little girl in her can't. every act of kindness she's tried to show, every time she's tried to let someone else view her as a little girl, it's just gotten them hurt.
she knows she can't control the wolf, that what happened wasn't necessarily her fault, just a cost she has to pay. and fortunately a wolf wouldn't necessarily care about the damage it did when it was wounded and angry. and a wolf probably would not have tried desperately to get into a cottage crowded with humans who own silver daggers anyway. but there is a part of her still somewhere that has held onto a little girl who was scared and wants her mom to fix it. more and more it feels like that's what's dangerous. to have the wolf's fury and strength, but to still have needs like a scared child. to still want badly to come inside, where the people who can be hurt by you are, where they could set a trap to drive a silver dagger into you and awaken the wolf.
but good luck fixing any of this if you still insist on believing that children who are imperfect and human beings who are afraid deserve to turn into frogs.]
but, fine, hearing her say that again just reminds him of the rest of that conversation they had, about being a monster. it has its benefits. he won't argue it doesn't. he's not as good at this as other people - maybe because he never did have anyone who gave him kid words as a child other than Elody, and maybe because he's only just now learning how to be a human being in the world who has to interact with people, instead of frogs, and princesses.
... ]
... You're right. It's actually insane to go around turning children into frogs for yelling. And I don't think it made me a better person, in the end.
[it's the same problem now as it was then - he is good at kind words and getting to the heart of the matter, but it's hard to avoid seeing that the advice he's giving he doesn't necessarily seem to believe in. hard to hear that it's okay to be monstrous from a man who wants desperately to turn back into a prince, hard to hear that it isn't your fault from a man who thinks being turned into a frog helped him grow.
so the admission does help, at least, to get at the inner conflict.]
It seems pretty insane. [...] I don't really think this made me a better or a worse person. I don't know if I was good before so much as I was obedient, and I didn't have anything going on important enough to be good or bad over. And I don't know if I'm good now. I'm just braver, because nothing that could happen to me would really be that scary to me anymore.
[that feeling she'd had, in her grandmother's house and again at her mother's, that she was just a little girl (and a nice one at that) and none of this should happen to her, is a feeling she will never have again. she saw herself as a monster then, and bad things are meant to happen to monsters.]
[The thing is, he doesn't want to turn back into a prince, anymore. or doesn't think he can. whatever happens now, elody was right. there will always be the part of his story where he was a frog. ]
I think you're good now. But I don't know if it has anything to do with being a wolf or being a girl. You care about people.
[ even if sometimes that caring involves beheading someone in a tornado because you're hyperfocused on getting enough Murder Points to bring back a cool teen you knew for a week. but he gets it. ]
Caring about people never seems to do them any good, though.
[her voice cracks a little as she says it, voicing a small, childish fear. caring about rin, caring about rang lee and buzen and matsui, caring about shenhe, caring about livio and amelia and simon, caring about kaveh - all of those impulses, leading her to decisions that again and again only hurt someone. to kill like a wolf, like a monster, like a heron, to eat because it is prey and feel nothing about it, and in doing so to only eat what is needed to live, might be better. maybe her mom was right to drive her away, to recognize her as a thing wearing the skin and clothes of her daughter and to recognize the danger inherent in the creature belonging in the woods still trying to hold onto this disguise.
but she did want him to say it, to hear him say it. the truest friends will love the wolf in you, her grandma said, but that isn't quite it, either. she needs them to love both the wolf and the girl.
she reaches to take his froggy hand in her paw, leans her head against him.]
I know. That's okay. I think you're brave for trying.
[ he doesn't know quite how to tackle "caring about people never seems to do any good" - it doesn't, does it? everyone ends up hurt somehow. but you've probably got to keep trying anyway.
as she reaches to take his hand, though
You move down the path, keeping your bearing through the forest. You arrive at a lake, and you can see some of the lines coming in. There are these wicker fish traps. They sort of are little baskets that fish swim into and can't get themselves turned around to swim back out again, a couple little clusters along this icy lake surrounded by thick conifer trees. You see some of them have some sort of trout in them, this is the chore you were assigned to do. It seems simple enough. Flying overhead, you see a white shape, and landing a little ways along the beach, you see a heron land.
How big? You can’t really tell from here. Are you worried about it being larger than normal? You’re not scared of herons anymore. Not at your size.
But this one - it’s pretty big.
“Fuck, fuck, fuck!”
You throw yourself into the rushes by the edge of the lake, going to lay low, and you can feel yourself kind of hiding, and you look around. You still seem like your normal - human - size, but you see other frogs around you hiding here by the side.
“You guys got to get the fuck out of here. You see that heron? I could fuck it up, but you guys are toast.”
You hear a voice of sort of tittering laughter coming from the water. `Hello, Gerard.` You hear a familiar voice. Your eyes are big enough that you can literally turn them down without having to move your head to look into the water. Peering out from the reflection of the water is someone who immediately looks like, from their reflection in the water they should be standing right behind you, but swiveling your eyes to see, you see they are just a reflection in the water. You see the Princess Rapunzel - long, long, long blonde hair, dark eyes, cold expression behind a drawn smile - looking at you. You look frightened.
“What are you doing here?”
She laughs again. “Spying on you. You struck me as one of the less magical of your companions.”
“Okay, well, there's a huge bird over there, and he's kind of freaking me out, so go fuck yourself? See, I'm hiding from the bird. I'm spying on the bird. What you're doing is not spying. You told me what you're doing. I don't need to be magical to see you.”
“No, I don't believe you do. Is the bird sort of magical, or is it doing any spells?”
“He's big.”
“That was a nice trick, getting the book away from us. How much did it cost?”
“It cost a new friend.”
“You're a prince. Friends are probably pretty expendable, right? How many friends have you really had, other than Elody?”
“I mean, overall, not very many, but recently, like, seven or eight?”
“That's miraculous. Your friends seem to really value you as a person. I'm sure it's a comfort to know that they're not just sort of putting up with you because you'll tag along and swing your sword, prove a little bit useful.”
“I like to think that we have a rapport. We have snowball fights and whatnot.”
“Well, I'm not sure what your plans are. I was hoping to get an image of you up to some kind of scheming rather than hiding from a bird on the edge of a lake, but I suppose I can't be too surprised. I have seen some titanic feats of strength from my companions, the Beast, Cinderella, Snow White. Truly impressive acts of heroism.
I do not think I have seen any of my sisters strain more greatly than the Princess Elody to find something kind to say about you.”
You look up at the bird from where you’re hiding, and not at her in the reflection in the water anymore. “ I don't... I don't doubt that. But I haven't seen the Princess Elody in a while, and I think it's telling that I'm seeing you in this lake and not her or any of the other princesses. I think you're manipulating people, or not telling them the full truth.”
““Truth. You have a sword that tells the truth, right? …. Why don't you take the sword out and ask it if Elody still loves you?”
You don’t know if it works like that, but … you reach to take it out anyway. My master!
You see the heron whips its head around and starts to walk over.
You retreat further into the rushes. Bravely.
“Okay, Sword of Truth, settle a bet. It doesn't have to be you know, love love, but does the Princess Elody love me?”
“My master. The Princess Elody cares for you deeply.”
You hear a sort of chuckle from the water. “Not quite the same thing.”
“It's not, but seeing as the last thing she saw of me was me running away after I had already done that, I'm grateful that she still cares for me at all.”
The water shimmers, and looking towards Rapunzel, you see your reflection. You are at the most froglike you have ever been, and Rapunzel's words become almost like a hissing in your ear, and it's almost like you wonder if Rapunzel's somehow reading your mind or there's something deep in here that she has some ability to know, or perhaps more frightening, something that Elody has confided in her.
“Gerard, what do you think the odds are that it got into Elody's head that the virtuous thing to do was to fall in love with a cold and slimy frog, and that every kindness she has paid you in your life has been a testament to her charity rather than anything about you that would bring her joy?”
“I don't know that I can answer that.”
“It doesn't seem very fair to Elody that you can’t.”
“I agree.”
As you say, "I agree," you feel a sort of quaking of the Sword of Truth in your hand. You almost feel some kind of knightly sorrow coming from the sword, as though it feels like it's been manipulated into hurting you. You feel the stalking of this bird coming nearby. You're looking at your reflection and just wondering. You know that the way your fairy tale is supposed to go is that love is greater than all these other things, and true love comes, and you don't look like a frog anymore. You wonder, there's a deep convenience to the fact that the moment that the person looks past your curse, they are rewarded by you no longer being under the curse, and suddenly you're handsome, and suddenly you're not a frog anymore. How very convenient that in the moment of learning the lesson, you no longer need to have learned it. You hear on the wind, and it breaks it up so that Rapunzel's connection to you is severed because the water ripples across, you hear, Oh … the bird is getting very close.
A voice. Not Rapunzel’s. The Baba Yaga. What would you be willing to give for what you seek, and would you give it to me?
“I would give it to you. I would give you my name, my humanity, for hers, for her name.”
You feel, somewhere within you, a book moving. You've accepted your own story. You don't even have a name in your own story. You're just a frog who becomes a prince. And you feel a change, and somewhere out beyond the edges of the Neverafter, you have asked that Elody's story be hers. Ribbit. You become enormous, much bigger than a frog. much bigger than a man. You split out of your armor, and the heron, frightened, flaps away.
You try to snatch it up.
A whole bird into your massive, frog mouth. It’s gone.
[im so sad i and ylfa both hate rapunzel so fucking much. i do think when this memory ends he gets the dreaded staring and not knowing how to respond but worse because it's accompanied by the face of a very sad little girl who loves him very much but knows that loving him just isn't enough to heal everything that this memory brought up.
they did have a rapport. they did have snowball fights. gerard isn't even that useful, swinging his sword around, it couldn't have ever been that. they were a little family, and they all loved each other. but caring about people - sometimes it just isn't enough.
maybe that's the difference between caring deeply and true love. maybe true love is the love that does fix you, heals every broken and damaged part of you and makes all of your flaws beautiful. she's on the cusp of thirteen and she still doesn't understand and rejects the idea that there's some sort of lesser quality to the love she has for her grandma, for mother goose, for their friends, for gerard versus the love between two people who fall in love, but she's beginning to see that true love may be another matter entirely. if she knew how to love all of the people she loves truly enough, she would, but that seems like a princess and prince thing, not a wolf thing. not a frog thing.]
Gerard...
[what does she even say? even if she knew, it's too late, he already gave himself up. and she can't blame him for it. elody does deserve her own story. it's a beautiful thing to do, a true love thing to do, a prince thing to do.
but she doesn't care about elody. she kind of hates elody. she'd give almost anything to be someone who could be loved the way elody is loved and elody doesn't even fucking want it.]
[ she's on the cusp of thirteen but she probably has it right here actually. that there is no lesser quality to any type of love, that true love itself is an impossible, undefinable standard that exists only in stories. love isn't something that just happens to be true. you don't magically fall in love and never have to work for it ever again. ]
You'll have Tim and Rosamund, and also Tom Thumb will hopefully be sticking around? He's-- a very solid guy. You'll be able to, um, lean on him as well.
No, I don't - nevermind. This is so stupid. I'm just going to be sad in a pond forever alone. No! Why! You don't deserve that! I'm going to come with you to your pond and we're going to hang out every day, so there!
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[she will accept these awkward pats in the wake of a traumatic memory, true stepdad energy happening here. she doesn't quite know what to make of this reaction to it. she's told him a few times she blew her family away but it's sort of different to see it.]
But Gerard, you act like I should think you deserved to be a frog, but what does that say about me?
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I don't know that my frogging says anything about you and your situation. Remember what I said before? I was cursed because of my actions. I don't think you were cursed for the same reasons. You've always been a kind person.
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[does she even have to protest. her actions were to kill her family, the woodsman, lambda. her actions are scary.
she can't make sense of it. she doesn't think she "deserved" this, really. she was a cute, innocent little girl before this. she knows on some level she was out of control here. but what happened in this memory was so bad, it makes her unable not to wonder if there's just something generally bad about her. maybe bad in a way that's useful, that can be important, that can help good people.]
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[ i think maybe he understands now a bit more than then, that the first frogging was a bit undeserved. but this one, where he's turning back, becoming a creature again, feels right. a punishment for the way he's been in this life, as this sort of beast. ]
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I'll do my best.
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Ylfa ...
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[it's not quite that he fucked up badly it's just that sometimes being told over and over again that the reason you're worthy of love is your bravery starts to make you feel like you have to be brave to be worthy of love.
since she's been here, it's felt like everything has been leading her to realizing that the wolf in her can help but the little girl in her can't. every act of kindness she's tried to show, every time she's tried to let someone else view her as a little girl, it's just gotten them hurt.
she knows she can't control the wolf, that what happened wasn't necessarily her fault, just a cost she has to pay. and fortunately a wolf wouldn't necessarily care about the damage it did when it was wounded and angry. and a wolf probably would not have tried desperately to get into a cottage crowded with humans who own silver daggers anyway. but there is a part of her still somewhere that has held onto a little girl who was scared and wants her mom to fix it. more and more it feels like that's what's dangerous. to have the wolf's fury and strength, but to still have needs like a scared child. to still want badly to come inside, where the people who can be hurt by you are, where they could set a trap to drive a silver dagger into you and awaken the wolf.
but good luck fixing any of this if you still insist on believing that children who are imperfect and human beings who are afraid deserve to turn into frogs.]
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but, fine, hearing her say that again just reminds him of the rest of that conversation they had, about being a monster. it has its benefits. he won't argue it doesn't. he's not as good at this as other people - maybe because he never did have anyone who gave him kid words as a child other than Elody, and maybe because he's only just now learning how to be a human being in the world who has to interact with people, instead of frogs, and princesses.
... ]
... You're right. It's actually insane to go around turning children into frogs for yelling. And I don't think it made me a better person, in the end.
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so the admission does help, at least, to get at the inner conflict.]
It seems pretty insane. [...] I don't really think this made me a better or a worse person. I don't know if I was good before so much as I was obedient, and I didn't have anything going on important enough to be good or bad over. And I don't know if I'm good now. I'm just braver, because nothing that could happen to me would really be that scary to me anymore.
[that feeling she'd had, in her grandmother's house and again at her mother's, that she was just a little girl (and a nice one at that) and none of this should happen to her, is a feeling she will never have again. she saw herself as a monster then, and bad things are meant to happen to monsters.]
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I think you're good now. But I don't know if it has anything to do with being a wolf or being a girl. You care about people.
[ even if sometimes that caring involves beheading someone in a tornado because you're hyperfocused on getting enough Murder Points to bring back a cool teen you knew for a week. but he gets it. ]
... I'm scared. I'm scared all the time.
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[her voice cracks a little as she says it, voicing a small, childish fear. caring about rin, caring about rang lee and buzen and matsui, caring about shenhe, caring about livio and amelia and simon, caring about kaveh - all of those impulses, leading her to decisions that again and again only hurt someone. to kill like a wolf, like a monster, like a heron, to eat because it is prey and feel nothing about it, and in doing so to only eat what is needed to live, might be better. maybe her mom was right to drive her away, to recognize her as a thing wearing the skin and clothes of her daughter and to recognize the danger inherent in the creature belonging in the woods still trying to hold onto this disguise.
but she did want him to say it, to hear him say it. the truest friends will love the wolf in you, her grandma said, but that isn't quite it, either. she needs them to love both the wolf and the girl.
she reaches to take his froggy hand in her paw, leans her head against him.]
I know. That's okay. I think you're brave for trying.
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as she reaches to take his hand, though
]
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they did have a rapport. they did have snowball fights. gerard isn't even that useful, swinging his sword around, it couldn't have ever been that. they were a little family, and they all loved each other. but caring about people - sometimes it just isn't enough.
maybe that's the difference between caring deeply and true love. maybe true love is the love that does fix you, heals every broken and damaged part of you and makes all of your flaws beautiful. she's on the cusp of thirteen and she still doesn't understand and rejects the idea that there's some sort of lesser quality to the love she has for her grandma, for mother goose, for their friends, for gerard versus the love between two people who fall in love, but she's beginning to see that true love may be another matter entirely. if she knew how to love all of the people she loves truly enough, she would, but that seems like a princess and prince thing, not a wolf thing. not a frog thing.]
Gerard...
[what does she even say? even if she knew, it's too late, he already gave himself up. and she can't blame him for it. elody does deserve her own story. it's a beautiful thing to do, a true love thing to do, a prince thing to do.
but she doesn't care about elody. she kind of hates elody. she'd give almost anything to be someone who could be loved the way elody is loved and elody doesn't even fucking want it.]
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It will be okay, Ylfa.
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[this all sounds very silly but her voice is sad, like the silliness of the fear is just covering up bigger worries.]
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[ dark. he squeezes her hand though hopefully she's still holding his. ]
She'll help you too. When you get back. I'm sure she will.
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[she is still holding it sure.]
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[ but that's not who he meant. ]
Elody. I'm going to need your help convincing her, though. I think. If we can get a hold of them in time.
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I'll convince her. I'm not great at it, but I'll find a way to do it.
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Alright. And then, I don't know. Help me find a nice pond.
[ dark ........... ]
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Or I'll just go live in the pond with you...!
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[ not his crush on tom thumb again. ]
... It really will be alright.
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[no he seems nice she immediately regrets that.]
No, I don't - nevermind. This is so stupid. I'm just going to be sad in a pond forever alone. No! Why! You don't deserve that! I'm going to come with you to your pond and we're going to hang out every day, so there!
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