The Beastly Bride

* * *

“No,” said Rosina. “I’m a woman, but
I’ve been a snake.”
“You have?” said the princess.
“What was it like?”
“It was cold,” said Rosina,
“cold and dark in the cave at night,
but in the morning the sun would heat the rocks
and I’d lie there soaking up warmth through my skin,
and when I was limber and loose and warm,
I’d move over the earth like a wave.”
The two women walked off, talking,
and the prince stood there,
looking after them.
There was no wedding that day.
The princess and Rosina left the palace together.
No one knows where they went,
but there are rumors
of two shining women
who live in the heart
of the forest.

NAN FRY is the author of two collections of poetry, Relearning the Dark, and Say What I Am Called, a selection of riddles she translated from the Anglo-Saxon. Her poems have appeared in a number of magazines, including Lady Churchill’s Rosebud Wristlet; in anthologies such as The Year’s Best Fantasy and Horrorand The Faery Reel, both edited by Ellen Datlow and Terri Windling; and in The Best of Lady Churchill’s Rosebud Wristlet, edited by Kelly Link and Gavin J. Grant. Some of her other poems can be found online in the poetry archives of the Journal of Mythic Arts(www.endicott-studio.com) and in The Innisfree Poetry Journal. (www.innisfreepoetry.org). Her first published story appeared in Gravity Dancers, edited by Richard Peabody.

She teaches at The Writer’s Center in Bethesda, Maryland.

Author’s Note

Since my favorite animals are dogs and their wild cousins — foxes, coyotes, and wolves — I was surprised to find myself writing about a snake-woman. This poem is a reworking of “Rosina in the Oven” from Italo Calvino’s Italian Folktales. At the time I discovered that story, I had been reading a lot of fairy tales and had learned that some of them, such as “The Frog Prince,” were often used to reassure young women about marriage, often to an older man not of their choosing. That inspired me to try to write an original fairy tale that did not end in marriage. As you can see, I both did and did not succeed.

As I wrote, I had fun imagining what it would feel like to be a snake and realized, by the end of the poem, that Rosina would be transformed — and strengthened — by her experience even after she had returned to human form. As my friend and fellow writer Robert Hiett said, she still had “scales beneath her soft skin.”

FURTHER READING

FICTION

NOVELS

Daughter of the Bear King by Eleanor Arnason

Lives of the Monster Dogs by Kirsten Bakis

Sharp Teeth by Toby Barlow

The Innkeeper’s Song by Peter S. Beagle

The Jaguar Princess by Clare Bell

Swim the Moon by Paul Brandon

St. Peter’s Wolf by Michael Cadnum

The Bloody Chamber by Angela Carter

In a Dark Wood by Amanda Craig

Wilderness by Dennis Danvers

The Dreaming Place by Charles de Lint

Forests of the Heart by Charles de Lint

Greenmantle by Charles de Lint

Medicine Road by Charles de Lint

Someplace to be Flying by Charles de Lint

The Bad Blood Series by Debra Doyle and James Macdonald

Murkmere by Patricia Elliot

The Antelope Wife by Louise Erdrich

Sun and Moon, Ice and Snow by Jessica Day George

The Seventh Swan by Nicholas Stuart Gray

Bearskin by Gareth Hinds

Second Nature by Alice Hoffman

The Silent Strength of Stones by Nina Kiriki Hoffman

Blood Trail by Tanya Huff

The Fox Woman by Kij Johnson

Fudoki by Kij Johnson

Dogsbody by Diana Wynne Jones

The Limits of Enchantment by Graham Joyce

Owl in Love by Patrice Kindl

Blood and Chocolate by Annette Curtis Klause

The Fall of the Kings by Ellen Kushner and Delia Sherman

When Fox Was a Thousand by Larissa Lai

The Wandering Unicorn by Manuel Mujica Lainez

The Earthsea Books by Ursula K. Le Guin

The Claidi Journals by Tanith Lee

The Dragon Hoard by Tanith Lee

Brother to Dragons, Companion to Owls by Jane Lindskold

Through Wolf ’s Eyes by Jane Lindskold

The Gray Horse by R. A. McAvoy

Once Upon a Winter’s Night by Dennis McKiernan

The Book of Atrix Wolfe by Patricia A. McKillip

The Riddlemaster Trilogy by Patricia A. McKillip

Something Rich and Strange by Patricia A. McKillip