The Dance of the Gypsy Queen
For as long as time could remember, there had always been gypsies. Gypsies had come to build up a wide and colourful culture which revolved around folk tales, music and dance.
These became more of a religion to the small wandering tribes of ornately painted caravans that travelled the earth. Gypsies, who were mainly godless people bar a few lords of music and dance which had been given a religious stance due to the popularity of their stories, believed in stories.
One of the most important stories to the gypsy culture was that of the Gypsy Queen, Alaino. The story is a long one, and shall no doubt be put to paper at a later date, but the rough-cut version goes something along the lines of :-
There was once a gypsy named Larbuaco, who was quite the stereotype of all that was loathed about gypsies. He was a vain, moraless vagabond who wandered from town to town, stealing what he needed to survive and also what he liked the look of.
One day he awoke in the doorway of a shop in Ashmoor to see several brightly painted caravans passing along the main street. He recognised them as Romany houses and, out of curiosity, went to inspect them more closely.
Whilst he walked alongside the second caravan, a young gypsy woman, the beauty of which he had ne’r seen before, looked out of the door and smiled at him.
And with that, Larbuaco fell in love with Alaino.
Being a wandering gypsy with no claim to a home, Larbuaco was welcomed into her family with open arms, although it was not suspected that his only interest in them was Alaino.
After a year or so, the caravans set up a stable home in a valley under the shadow of a huge castle which stood at the peak of a vast mountain range that rimmed the land. The castle belonged to a sorcerer named Haiden Guldirian. His magic was powerful and people were pretty certain that he was of a good nature, although very little was actually known of him as he rarely ventured out.
In the two years the family had spent travelling, Larbuaco and Alaino had become very close. Although Alaino had refused his proposals several times, she felt strongly for him and believed a time would come when she found herself unable to refuse him again.
Once they had settled, Larbuaco soon became bored of the same scenery and the lack of amusement. He had never been one for sitting by the fire telling the tales of old, so he decided to make Alaino his wife and steal her away back to the towns. But first he would need her to agree to his proposal. It was not long before curiosity got the better of him and he set off towards the castle on the mountain top.
Guldirian agreed to see him. After a long time of talking, he agreed to make a ring for Larbuaco – a magic ring that would steal Alaino’s heart away. Only, in return, he wished for Larbuaco to hand over his soul when he died, so that Haiden could experiment his magic on him.
Larbuaco agreed and was told to return in a week to claim the ring and allow Guldirian to initiate the spell that would return his soul to the castle when he died. Only, Larbuaco had no intention of allowing his soul to be used as a slave to Guldirian’s magic. So, the night before he was supposed to meet again with the sorcerer, he hiked up to the castle and found a way in. He stole the ring and returned to Alaino’s caravan just before dawn, where he proposed again, offered her the ring, and she accepted. He took two horses and they made their way back towards town with haste.
When Guldirian awoke to find the ring missing, and learned of what Larbuaco had done, he screamed with rage and vowed to wipe the gypsy race from the face of the earth.
Alaino was three cities from the valley she had left weeks before, when she learned that her entire family had been destroyed by fire and slaughtered by a magical army of creatures sent by Guldirian to reap revenge on the gypsy people. When she learned that Haiden had been robbed by a gypsy man who broke into his castle while he slept, it did not take Alaino long to realise what had happened, and what would happen unless she acted fast.
She removed the ring Larbuaco had given her and took it to a mage who dwelt in the town. She persuaded him to change the curse, so that it would release her heart from Larbuaco’s grip and instead, hand his heart into hers. When the charm was complete, she baked the ring in a cake and fed it to Larbuaco so that he could not remove it and break the spell. Now willing to do anything for her, he mounted his horse and followed her back to the castle on the valley mountains.
Alaino made a deal with Haiden, that he may have Larbuaco and take his revenge on him if he allowed her people to live. In doing this she had made the ultimate sacrifice. She had given up her lover in order to save her people. Being a fair man – when he was in level mind – Guldirian agreed to this, on two conditions. One was that Alaino was to be the one to kill Larbuaco, and the second was that she also had to hand over her own soul to him when she died. Reluctantly, and with great pain, she agreed to this. After Haiden had placed the curse on both of them, Alaino stabbed Larbuaco through the heart and then immediately turned the blade on herself.
This was why Alaino was heralded as the Queen of all Gypsies. She had saved her people by sacrificing herself and her love.
Now, of course, true to gypsy tradition, there were several variations on this story and uncountable musical pieces dedicated to her, such as Larbuaco’s Downfall, Alaino and Larbuaco and Alaino The Gypsy Queen, but the most famous tribute to her was a dance called, imaginatively, The Dance of the Gypsy Queen. It was a tradition that when young gypsy girls came of age to bare children, they should learn this dance. So it had been passed down from generation to generation, and now it was Gratia’s turn to learn the dance of her predecessors.
Gratia, like her mother, had a natural talent for dance. It was a deep love of hers. Of course she could play the old fashioned gypsy flute and a few folk jigs on the fiddle, but her heart lay in dance. She took to the new steps with surprising speed. Even her father was impressed, as it was one of the most complicated dances known.
As she swirled in a bright collage of coloured ribbons and sashes, he made up his mind. Walking to his caravan, he removed a small square of floorboard from under his bed and carefully pulled out a delicate parcel wrapped with brown parchment. Undoing the string with exaggerated caution, he gently folded back the paper and gazed down at the bundle that lay in his lap.
A small tear trickled down his cheek, landing on a patch of deep crimson silk, creating a dark circular patch on the fabric.
Ever so carefully he reached down and clasped the soft, luxurious dress, pressing it to his face and inhaling shakily. It still smelt of her. The scent of her musky, sweet perfume filled his nostrils. His cheeks washed with a flood of warm tears as he wept for his dead wife, so cruelly snatched from him.
With a shaky sigh he replaced it in the brown paper and placed it upon his daughter’s bed. It was time that it saw the light again.
Gratia wept that night as she hugged her mother’s gown. It was a perfect fit. She had not seen her father since dusk fell, though she knew it must have hurt him to have seen the dress again.
That evening she made up her mind to visit the gypsy Etruschan, an old man who lived in a rickety caravan in the woods, refusing for some reason to join the rest of the family in the open. He was well respected throughout the family as he could predict things, and no one could remember a time when he had ever been wrong.
It was tradition that each child should have their cards read at birth, but should not ask again for any insight until they came of age to bare children, sixteen years later.
Now, Gratia had come of age. Although the memory had faded slightly, she could still remember with hazed clarity all that had happened with the mage that clear spring morning over a decade ago, and she was deeply curious.
For reasons she did not know, her father had told her that she had not had her fortune read when she was first born. Unknown to her, it was also a long-standing gypsy tradition that, should the mother die during birth, the child’s future should not be read until it was grown. It was believed that the mother’s spirit had passed back into the baby and was not settled enough in its new form for the future to be accurately visible.
As Gratia made her way past the branches that seemed to be trying to reach out and ensnare her, she could see the light of the caravan in the clearing ahead. Yet there were two silhouettes in the window. One was Etruschan, and the other was... the other was... her father!
He was towering above the old man, shaking his fist and head. As she crept closer to the caravan, she could make out the conversation more clearly. Crouching down out of sigh, she began to listen.
“I tell you old man, do not cross me!”
“I do not cross you, Wroguard! It is the fates. You cannot change the fates!”
“Enough of your foolish talk! If she leaves, it shall be you who will be fated!”
“Do not threaten me, Wroguard. I would have thought you should have wanted to see your daughter fulfil her proper destiny–”
“I do, and her proper destiny is to stay here and live out her life in peace!”
“And you believe you are the best judge of this, do you?”
Her father’s figure made as if to hit Etruschan, but instead he clenched his fist and began trembling with rage.
“Her mother is dead, old man. She is dead. Do you not hear me? Her soul is in heaven now, not in my daughter. Not any more.”
“I should also have thought you would have wanted to acknowledge your wife’s existence!”
“What existence? What do you talk of, old fool? She is dead. You know that as well as I.”
“And you know as well as I, Wroguard, that when a woman dies giving birth, her spirit flows back into that child.”
“And what of the child’s spirit, Etruschan? You are wrong I tell you! My daughter is her own soul. Chalice is dead, her soul is in heaven now.” Wroguard pointed a shaky finger to the sky. “Gratia is my daughter, and her own soul! Do you not see that?”
“It is you that is wrong, Wroguard. She is her mother’s spirit in another form. Do you not see that? She has the same temperament as her mother, the same charm and wit. She is Chalice, I tell you.”
“She is Gratia, old man!”
“I know how it will pain you to see her go Wroguard, but it is her destiny. You know as well as I that one spirit may not live two lifetimes in the same area in such a short space of time. It is the way of the world, Wroguard. It is her destiny to leave here. That is what the great lords are trying to tell us, Wroguard. It is her time to leave, just as it is for any other child who possesses its mother’s soul.”
“You foolish man! You would turn away my daughter as some cards tell you?”
“Some cards? Some cards? They are not just some cards. They are the fates themselves!”
This time Wroguard’s hand did not show the restraint it had a moment earlier. It swept through the air towards Etruschan, the final impact having the strength of granite. Gratia was unable to keep the shriek of terror from escaping her lips.
Immediately, Wroguard tensed. He recognising the scream with deathly certainty, but by the time he reached the door the bushes outside the caravan were empty.
Gratia was running with the speed and agility of a wildcat, her heart thumping in her head so hard she believed her skull would burst at any moment. She tripped on a tree root, catching herself against a trunk and pushing herself upright with amazing speed. Not even stopping for breath, she set off again, reaching the door to her caravan in minutes. Flinging open the door, she grabbed a small patchwork bag from the shelf. Without stopping to think what she might need, she began stuffing hunks of black bread and a canteen of milk into it. As she turned for the door, she paused momentarily. There was something she knew she had forgotten... ah. Quickly, she reached over to her bed and grabbed the brown paper parcel that lay on it.
With lightning speed she shot out of the door and began running in the direction of the hills that skirted the valley. She had no clear idea where she was going, only that, where ever it was, she must go.
