Becoming Rapunzel

Sixteen Candles

Although girls become women typically around the age of fourteen, Alamann does not recognize them legally as reaching majority until their sixteenth birthday. This gives the young women two years to finish growing into their body, to go to finishing school if wealthy, or to assist their mother if not. This is the time to practice wearing their hair up in fashionable, womanly hairstyles rather than the childhood braids, to enter society and attend balls, to meet people, and to find a match for marriage. That is what their fathers often did in the two years before majority: find a man for their child to marry and a family to make connections with. There are many a sixteenth birth day that turned into an engagement ceremony.

This birthday was the most important of all the birthdays for a woman. This was their official entrance to the world of adults. This was celebrated not just by the family, or of other relatives, but friends and social connections and business partners and all sorts of people. For the nobility, it was usually a ball. It is often called the sixteen candles birthday because of the candles that are lit during the celebration. Certain ones are for the parents, the godparents, the siblings, the friends of the family, and sometimes one is given to the intended betrothed. The last is for the girl herself. They perform a dance around the still girl; it is traditional dance that comes from far, far back in Alamann's history, so far that no one knows when or where it began. After the dance is finished, everyone simultaneously blows their candles out. After cheers, food is served, dancing is opened to everyone, and sometimes at the end a betrothal is announced by the girl's father.

When I turned sixteen, no such celebratory event waited me. I spent my birthday brewing something for Gothel, reading a theory of one type of deep magic being love, throwing Music's waste out the window, and tending to my rooftop garden. I don't know if Gothel knew about it, or if she did, whether she cared. Gothel was wrapped in her own studies and only spent a few hours with me each sennight. I would've gone mad without Music and my garden.

My garden was an escape from the monotony and tediousness of life in the tower. I could breathe fresh air, use my skills in a productive manner, and stare out across the vast forest below me, rising and falling with the steep hills around me. Sometimes I would bring my map up there and try to discover which forest I lived in. I could never say with certainty, but I thought it was one of three in the central or southern parts of Alamann. Of course, I always had to admit to myself that just because I found a map for a certain land did not mean I was in it.

Since it was the end of winter, my garden had lain dormant the past several months. I tended it diligently, hoping that all my plants had made it through the frosts. I particularly cared for my five strawberry plants. I couldn't wait to taste the luscious fruit again in the summer.

As I dug in the dirt of the pots, stirring the earth up to make sure it got the air it needed, I glanced over the wall and down into the forest below. I saw two wolves.

This was not rare--I knew there were animals in the forest, feral creatures that I was both fascinated and repelled by. I had even come to recognize the different wolves by their coats and the stags by their points. But this time I saw two, together. A dark brown one and a gray, smaller one. They ran into the clearing, keeping away from Gothel's now untended garden—I assumed she had put some mode of magical repellant around the area—,and then one was on top of the other, humping. Horrified, I watched. I realized this must mean the aggressor, the one on top, was a male wolf, the one below a beaten female. This was what Gothel meant by brutal and forceful. I almost cried out, to startle the male and scare him away. But to my surprise, the female submitted to the treatment almost willingly. A moment later, when it was over, she turned and licked the male's muzzle, whining. He nipped her ears, but she did not whine in pain. Suddenly, just as they arrived, they left again, running into the darkness of the forest.

I sat back on my heels, thinking about what I had just seen. The whole ordeal did not seem gruesome or brutal to me. In fact, the breeding seemed to be not only a common occurrence, but a welcome one at that. Perhaps breeding done by animals was instinctual, not some malignant force brought on by a male to dominate a female. Maybe that was only with humans. It did seem like humans were the only ones that were foolish, mean, evil, and thoughtless. I didn't think I was any of those things. Gothel was indifferent to me, but none of those. She wasn't foolish.

I finished with my plants and slipped back inside the warmth of my room. With Gothel no longer frequenting the tower, I had grown adept at making fires, cooking, washing clothing, and all sorts of things. Sometimes I wished I had the magic Gothel had—her meals were never burnt, the fires never too smoky, but such was life. Gothel did not seem as attached to me as I was to her, and perchance it was the magic that made her that way, I mused as I went downstairs to begin on my supper. I thought I wanted to be attached to a person. So perchance it was a good thing I didn't have as much magic as she did.

After dinner, I thumbed through a religious text. There is a life and order beneath our feet, beneath the earth, and above the clouds that keeps us alive and the world intact. This is the deepest magic of all, and though we scarcely feel it, we all live through and in it. Its current keeps us awake, and we owe everything to the Maker. Usually I enjoyed theorizing about how deep magic functioned, but tonight it could not keep my attention long. It was past nightfall, so I took my candle and traipsed upstairs. Since tomorrow was the spring equinox, the days were of roughly equal length to the night now. I was staying up later than I had in the past few months. But it was past nightfall at this point, so I undressed for bed. I looked at myself in the looking glass, which I had brought up from Gothel's old room, running my hands down the curves of my hips and cupping my breasts with my hands. My body had improved since I first stared at it two years hence.

Things were curving a little more gracefully now. Goodness, they were finally curving rather than jutting out in awkward jabs! I had grown taller, as had my hair. I kept it knotted in braids usually, so I didn't have to brush it every five minutes. I had even grown some hair down below my stomach, between my legs. Not a lot, but blond curls. When it first appeared I was startled and horrified. I had no idea if this was normal. I couldn’t remember if Gothel had any.

I looked at my body, then my face in the looking glass. Was I pretty? Gothel was. Her skin was no longer smooth, her hair no longer dark, but her figure was still immaculate. The curves were perfectly placed and she moved with confidence and grace. How I wished I looked like that! How I wished I could dazzle someone—anyone—with my mind and my body. But, alas, I was not even smart—Gothel had let me know that—or probably even pretty. If I was, Gothel would have told me.

Rolling my eyes at my fancies, I pulled my nightgown on, turned the candle off, pulled Music into bed with me, and went to sleep.