* means things can be changed
STATUS : Taken by pseudonym-lux
TITLE : Damsel*
FANDOM : Once Upon a Time
LOVE INTEREST : Henry Mills
TIMELINE : Season 3B ━ Season 5*
FACE CLAIM : Millie Bobby Brown
SUMMARY :
Once Upon a Time in the famine-stricken Kingdom of Inophe, there was a Princess named Maeve Grimm, and she never much cared for marriage nor having children. All that resided within her pure heart was to help her people survive each harsh winter and to end their suffering, once and for all. But when a representative from the rich and reclusive Kingdom of Aurea offered her family enough wealth to save Inophe in exchange for her hand in marriage, Maeve accepted without hesitation, if only to save her people.
Swept away to the glistening Kingdom of Aurea, Princess Maeve is quickly taken in by the beauty of the realm ━ and by her handsome betrothed. But when she undertakes the rituals to become an Aurean princess, doubts prick at her mind as cracks in the kingdom's perfect veneer begin to show. But it is already too late when they discover that Aurea's prosperity has been purchased at a heavy cost ━ each harvest season, the kingdom sacrifices its princesses to a hungry dragon. And Maeve is the next sacrifice.
But before you assume, let me assure you now, that this is not another story about a damsel in distress. Princess Maeve doesn't need saving and she never will. The world, if anything, needs saving from her.
Princess Maeve proved her strength and courage when she not only escaped the sacrifice and allied with the hungry dragon originally hell-bent on killing her, but by exposing the royal family of Aurea for who they really are and reducing their beautiful kingdom to ruins and ashes. Not much later, she would even save Inophe and restore the realm to its former glory. Her people would never know starvation ever again, all thanks to their Princess and her dragon companion.
It wasn't much later that Princess Maeve realized her destiny and would go on to travel the world, saving those who needed help. After a while, she found herself crossing paths with Queen Snow White and her handsome King Charming. And although she was hesitate to join them on their quest due to the fact they were traveling with the notorious Evil Queen, Maeve would stop at nothing until she helped them retake their kingdom from the wickedness inhabiting the halls.
What she hadn't expected was to have her memories stripped away and brought to the peculiar small town of Storybrooke, Maine, in a realm without magic where she was known only as a fairytale. With no way to get back home, Princess Maeve, must band together with complete strangers. Along the way, she hopelessly falls in love with a boy destined for greatness.
DESCRIPTION :
❝ She needed a hero, so that's what she became. ❞
━ Torianne Elizabeth*
EPIGRAPH QUOTE :
❝ She's the type of flower that can still grow after a forest fire. ❞
━ Acrewss*
ADDITIONAL NOTES :
━ So this plot was actually inspired by the 2005 movie The Brothers Grimm and the novel Damsel, which was recently adapted into a film on Netflix starring Millie Bobby Brown.
━ The Grimm siblings, Will, Jake and Anna were born in Inophe. However, they did not always live there. When they had reached young adulthood, they left home and began traveling across the Enchanted Forest. They were con-artsists who would go around, lying to people by making up tales of magical creatures and pretending to be false heroes by "vanquishing" said creatures. In return, they'd be paid handsomely for their services.
━ Anna eventually returned home to Inophe when their mother had fallen ill. She began taking care of their mother meanwhile her brothers continued to travel about the realm. At some point, Anna caught the eye of Prince Evon and the two began a courtship before marrying.
━ As time went on, Maeve was born and Anna never went back to being a con-artsist, embracing her role as queen. Her brothers, however, never stopped and continued conning people out of their money. But when Will and Jake eventually faced an actual magical creature and nearly died, they stopped being con-artsists and became actual heroes that never fooled people again. They would document their adventures in a series of journals for their niece, Maeve, to read one day.
━ Maeve idolized her two uncles growing up and would develope a longing for adventure. She would read their journals every night as her bedtime stories and wanted to be just like them when she grew up. A hero. Someone who could save her people.
━ At the start of the story, the Kingdom of Inophe has pretty much gone to ruin after a famine swept through their land. The people are starving, they are low on medicine for the sick, and the farmers haven't yielded a good harvest since the famine began. There's very little money to provide, and despite their efforts, the royal family is unable to help their people.
━ Maeve is not the only one who cares about her people, though. Her mother and father feel the same way she does. They only wish to help their people and stop more from perishing. But there is nothing they can do with what little they have themselves.
━ As stated in the summary, when the opportunity comes to save her people, Maeve doesn't hesitate to accept a marriage proposal from the weathly Kingdom of Aurea. That entire plot follows the novel and movie Damsel relatively closely with some obvious changes here and there.
━ The female dragon in Aurea is unnamed, so I decided to make her the sister of Maleficent named Martavia. But unlike Maleficent, Martavia can't transform back into a human. She was trapped in the form of a dragon by the Dark One/Rumplestiltskin. I'll go into more detail on how that happened privately with the author. But afterwards, Martavia went into hiding and made a home in a cavern where she had three daughters.
━ Eventually, the King of Aurea had come into Martavia's lair unprovoked and killed her daughters for literally no reason whatsoever other than they were beasts that needed to be slain. Martavia then demanded three of the King's daughters in return and so this is why Aurea has been marrying their prince off to every princess they can find and then sacrificing the princesses to Martavia for years.
━ As stated in the summary, Maeve and Martavia become allies. Maeve promises to help Martavia find a way to become human again and the two of them become friends.
━ Maeve travels around for a while, helping people and trying to find a way to restore Martavia to her human form. They at some point go to Maleficent's Castle but it's been abandoned for years considering Maleficent was brought to Storybrooke with Regina's curse.
━ Maeve meets everyone in season 3B and ultimately helps them against Zelena. When she learns from Regina that Maleficent was in Storybrooke, Maeve elects not to tell Martavia that her sister was killed by Emma Swan, knowing that would only bring her more pain.
━ Maeve ends up in Storybrooke with everyone when Snow and Charming cast the second curse, however, she shouldn't have her memories because nobody else does either.
━ Unlike Maleficent, Martavia wasn't brought to Storybrooke as a dragon imprisoned in the caverns below the library. The second curse made her human again, which will be quite a shock to both her and Maeve (and Rumplestiltskin) because not only do they not know where they are, but they can't remember how Martavia was made human again.
━ Now that she is human and has her magic again, Martavia promises Maeve that she will help her find a way to get back home to Inophe.
━ Martavia will eventually find out that Emma Swan was responsible for her sister's death and it won't end well.
━ Maeve meets Henry while in Storybrooke. They should be portrayed as a medium burn. I personally don't see them getting together until Camelot but you can have them get together a little earlier, if you want. Just make sure to run it by me first because I don't want them to get together too quickly.
━ The fact that Maeve's maternal family are the Grimms will come into play later on. I don't intend on including them for nothing, after all.
━ A full cast list will be provided for this story. You are allowed to change some of the face claims. Just make sure to run your ideas by me first.
━ Feel free to mess with the summary a bit and change the title.
━ Also, for the sake of this story, Henry was aged up to 15 in season 3B. Maeve is one year older than him at 16.
━ As always, I have more details. But for the sake of spoilers, I will only share them with the person who adopts this plot from me.
PASSWORD :
Who is your favourite Disney heroine and why?