Once upon a time

 Once upon a time there was a beautiful and clever princess. As a young girl she saw beauty everywhere and paid attention to tiny miraculous details all around her. She noticed colors and patterns and found things that others had lost. She invented imaginative games to play with her sisters and sang and drew pictures and read books.

One night after the young girl had become a lady, she wandered into the painted desert, for the evening sky was such a magnetic shade of purple and the sagebrush sent such sweet scents wafting through the cool night air. The world was so beautiful in the waning light that she walked farther and deeper into the wilderness than almost any of the villagers had ever been before. As darkness fell, she became weary. She lied down upon  a soft patch of earth and, taking in the gentle evening sounds of the desert, she fell asleep and began to dream beautiful, colorful dreams.

Some time later, the townspeople realized she was missing from the castle and they were alarmed, as she was very well loved throughout the land. They sent their bravest knights to all four corners of the kingdom to search for her. They called for her and searched for her in every hill and hollow, leaving no stone unturned. They searched and searched. 

Finally, one of the bravest knights, Janira, riding through the farthest reaches of the desert lands, noticed a small lump behind a rise in the land. Could it be...? It was! It was her! She called out to the princess, but the princess did not respond.  

The princess would not awake. In truth, she couldn't. As the brave knight called out again to the princess, Scorpion appeared from a hole in the ground.

"I have injected her with my magical venom. She is mine now! I have claimed her as my own!" Scorpion hissed, swinging his mighty tail menacingly. "She will only awake from dreaming when I allow her! Wherever she goes, my venom will go with her, and her clever mind shall be mine ever more!"

The knight was very afraid, but stood her ground. "Scorpion, you have no right to the princess, our kingdom's daughter! She belongs with all of us, and most of all, she belongs to herself!  She is clever and kind, but also fierce. Do not think that you can get away with this!"

Enraged at the knight's audacity, the Scorpion swung its mighty tail. With a loud CRACK, the razor-sharp pincers whizzed so close to Janira's cheek that she could feel the wind pass between them. 

"I'll be back with my army!" Shouted Janira over shoulder as she galloped away on her chestnut brown steed. "Just you wait. You don't stand a chance against our people!"

The next day, the princess awoke at last to the sound of the desert songbirds in the distance. She was alone. Disoriented, she slowly came to understand that whenever Scorpion was near, she would be overcome with groggy weariness. Sleep felt nearly impossible to resist. It was as if her body had been paralyzed. Her eyes would close partway and she would begin to see colors and shapes flickering around her and hear sounds and voices, clear as day. Strange and beautiful stories would begin weaving themselves together in her mind's eye. It was mesmerizing, but also terrifying. She was unable to move.

But, she also noticed that in the high heat of the bright day, Scorpion had no choice but to hide in the shade of a cool rock on the far side of the hill, or else he would be scorched. The farther away Scorpion was, the more clearly she could think. She realized that, when Scorpion was distracted in his hiding place, doing whatever it is that Scorpions do in the underside of rocks, his power over her weakened. Her mind was sharp again. 

She knew this was her chance. She knew what she must do. Although the sun was blazing and the sand burned her feet, she ran quickly and silently back towards home, as quickly as her feet could carry her.

When she was safely inside the castle walls, there was great rejoicing, but also great lamenting. What horrible thing had happened? Where on earth had she been? 

The princess tried to explain, but as she began to open her mouth, that powerful weariness overtook her and she began drifting away. Her body remained safe in the castle, but her mind was pulled back to the colorful, mysterious dream-domain of the Scorpion. The voices of her family and the townspeople became farther away, and she was consumed by the dreams sent to her by the Scorpion's venomous sting.

The devoted townspeople cared for her as best they could, cooking for her and procuring for her the softest bed in the castle. They wondered why she no longer talked with them about books she had read or things she had seen and learned about in the kingdom. They were sad that her eyes no longer lit up with questions and ideas to discuss. Even if they were in the same room, it sometimes felt as if the princess didn't even know they were there.

Days turned into weeks turned into years. Much of the time the princess remained in her dream-like state, wandering from room to room or resting in her chamber upon her soft goosedown mattress. 

The townspeople often wondered what the princess dreamed about all day, but even if anyone dared ask, they rarely got much of an answer. Although the princess rarely left the castle anymore, it felt quite different from how it used to be. They missed the jolly times they used to have together when they were younger.

But every now and then, (on the very hottest desert days when the Scorpion had no choice but to hide under its rock), the power holding her captive would diminish and the princess would awake. A faint smell of sagebrush would waft in on the breeze, and suddenly the princess would smile and laugh with the townspeople as she used to. They would make conversation as if no time had gone by. Sometimes on these days she would even go out to pick flowers in the meadow or walk to the town square with her sisters and go to the market.

Sometimes she would be awake like this for days at a time, sometimes only for a few hours.

The townspeople missed her when she fell back asleep (when the Scorpion, back out in the desert, crawled out from under his rock). But they learned to love those moments when she was awake and enjoy them when they came. She was still their beloved princess and they would always be devoted to her, asleep or awake.