Snow - a Sims 3 retelling of Snow White

[Figwit]

I wrote this story ages ago when I was still playing Sims 3.  I am now happily enjoying Sims 4 but have not written any stories for them yet.   

I tried a different approach this time.  I tried to get a semi dream like narrative mixed in with some reflection.  I hope you enjoy it.


Asleep

I dream. I believe it is dreaming and not death as the brothers peer in on me, tenderly arranging a curl or laying yet another jewel on my pillow. I have no use for jewels, my dear friends, no matter how clever their shaping converts the light to fiery brilliance.

My mind soars into the clouds and skims across the land, catching stray thoughts and feelings, experiencing the warm summer breeze through a casual brush with a milkmaid, or the pain of a stubbed toe of a child at play, but it is a poor imitation of life.

Do I age? I feel as though I do. The brothers have aged. I can see the deepening lines around their eyes and the grey hairs in their beards. How can I grow with no sustenance? A mystery to take its place with many more unanswered questions.

The brothers whisper in soft tones when they are near me. In the early days they would wail and wring their hands but now they are accepting, though sad. They blame themselves. I catch their shame and contrition.

 'Folly.' I cry at them but their minds are deaf to me. I would tell them, if I could, that bad decisions run in my family.

'I needed a young wife to give me sons.' My father's thoughts drift across the abyss.

'You chose badly then. She had only a daughter. Did you not know? Perhaps she is not your's.'

'Such malice does not become you, my Isolde.'

My questing mind meanders back through the years to my birth.

I recognize my mother, exhausted and bleeding, disappointed that her efforts but produced a girl and then not caring because she was dying. My father, disconsolate, seeking some comfort in the arms of his mistresses.

'I am sorry, my daughter.' His thoughts reach me again.

'Apologize to my mother.' I think back, 'And apologize for Morganna while you are at it.'

But he is gone. I do not blame him. There are not words enough that could excuse him for Morganna.

[Figwit]

'Why her?' I had asked.

It was my fourteenth birthday and my father had surprised me with his plans to take a new wife.

'A man gets lonely.'

His voice was soft, conciliatory, but I knew his decision was final.

I had many protests which I could not voice. Even a pampered daughter must hold her tongue when it came to mistresses and his many dalliances or potential wives.

'He has spoilt her,' I heard them talk.

'She does not want to share her father with another.'

I was a sneak, of course. I knew how to tiptoe soundlessly in corridors and listen at doors, hiding in the shadows when a servant approached.



A daughter of the nobility learns early in her life that her protection lies in knowledge, hearing secrets whispered in dark corners, observing alliances formed in closed rooms or assignations in the early hours when most of the palace slept. She has no true friends. Even a beloved and doting father is no shield when he is bedazzled by a scheming woman. I saw the evil behind her smile. I trusted not her kisses nor the words of honey that dripped from those scarlet lips. I saw her for what she was and she knew that and hated me further.

'Jealousy on your part or true evil?'

Not my father. Another voice. I have brushed against this one before as my mind skims the meadows.

'Who are you?'

I send out a thought but he has withdrawn.

[Brooke.]

Hello,

Just read your Cinderella story. I like the different writing styles you use 

[Figwit]

Hi Brooke.  Thank you.  I like to try something different now and then.   

[Figwit]

Morganna wasted no time in manipulating my father. He could not see it. He got cross with me if I protested for he had her voice in his ear as well. She told him I was head-strong, undisciplined. Her methods were subtle and sly. They were like water dripping on a stone and eventually wearing a hollow.

'You could exasperate. The fault was not always with her.' My father sounds petulant. Even in death he defends the witch.

A Memory

I awoke to the jingle of harness and the puffing and stamping of horses. Low voices drifted up to my window and the grey light of dawn had softened the shadows. I leapt from my bed. Too late. I cursed my maid, Dorcas, who I had charged with waking me in time.

Was Dorcas now a creature of Morganna? I mulled it over but could see no design in it. More likely, Dorcas did not care enough about my scoldings to heave her own lazy body out of bed.

The servants have no fear of me.

My father was saying his last farewells, his breath a puff of white in the morning chill. I could not dash down there in my nightclothes nor could I call out. My father would be disappointed at my lack of manners and I did not want to give Morganna more reason to chide me. I saw him kissing Morganna, chastely, in front of the servants, before mounting his horse.

She had kept him busy last night. She was desperate for a son.



I had wished my father farewell the night before but our meeting was strained as ever they were these days. I wanted to put it right before he left. He was off to fight alongside the king.



A small skirmish, he said. He would be back before my wedding for I was sixteen now and soon to wed my betrothed, Phillip of Wintersong.

'Phillip the fat?  He was to be your husband?'

I knew nothing of Phillip but it bothered me not at all. I would escape Morganna and, as long as I delivered my lord an heir and a spare, I would most likely have been free to do what I pleased. The Wintersongs were not known for their kindnesses but they treated their wives well.

[Brooke.]

I get the feeling her father doesn't return from the fight 

[Figwit]

Yes, the fate of fairy tale fathers is never a good one. 

I avoided Morganna as much as I could in the days and months that followed my father's departure. I wandered the gardens



or hid in my room.



As time passed, Morganna grew big with child though whether it was my father's or the get of one of her many lovers, who could say.

She no longer pretended any sort of affection for me. It was a relief that at last we could drop the charade.

'Ah the fairy-tale wicked step-mother.'

'Indeed.'

The news was bad.

The King had returned, defeated, chastened and perhaps wiser for his folly.

My father was dead. I sobbed piteously. I was alone now and at the mercy of his wife. My one escape, my marriage to Phillip had been postponed.  It was just and right that we should mourn my father with all decency but I suspect that the uncertainty of my dowry must have weighed heavily on Phillip's advisor's minds.  Should she deliver a son, he would be named heir and Morganna would rule until he came of age.  There was no obligation on her part to honour any of my father's promises.

I was certain she would have a boy. She had taken to concocting potions for herself.

She sent her maid servants out at dawn to collect specific herbs and she brewed them, allowing no other person to touch the implements.

However, even a mind that brooks no argument means nought to Mother Nature and so it was that in time Morganna was delivered of a girl.



She was beside herself with fury.

Unfortunately for her, the birth was witnessed - so confident was she in carrying a son – and that ruled out switching the child.

I rejoiced for I was still the heir. I would rule instead of Morganna or her child. I just had to wait a few more years until I came of age and then I could toss her and her sorry daughter out of my home and my life.

[Brooke.]

Really glad the baby was a girl but don't hate on her yet, she might be a good sibling unlike her wicked mother 

[Figwit]

You never know. 

A Ride to Nowhere

A ride, like any other ride. My usual companion was indisposed so that day I was accompanied by Ivan, who, unlike my father, had returned from the war.

He was dark and silent but rode well and fast.

I had trouble keeping up with him but I was eager for the challenge so spurred my mount ever on. I can smell the field flowers even now as they released their perfume beneath the drumming hooves of my mare.

Eventually we stopped for a rest. He helped me from my horse and then, it seemed, the devil took him. He grabbed at my neck and a wicked glint of silver flashed in his other hand.

'Please, no.' I begged.

I twisted in his grip, desperate to be free, yet thinking I was doomed.

'Lord forgive me but I cannot do it.' His voice was barely audible and he sank to the ground, his head in his hands.

'I cannot harm his daughter.'



He wept now. It was surreal. Unthinking, I moved to comfort him but better sense made me quickly withdraw my hand.

Go.' He looked at me then, eyes blazing and I felt the fear in him.

'Run. Do not look back. Do not return to your home for she has ordered your death. I was to cut your throat...go, foolish girl, before I change my mind.'

[Brooke.]

I'm bursting to know what your version of the dwarves will be. The huntsman is hot 

[Figwit]

Lol, he is too.  Dwarves coming up soon.

Into the Forest

So I ran into the forest.



I ran and ran, oblivious of the tree branches clutching at my clothes or the hard stony ground tearing through my slippers.

Exhausted, I collapsed onto the earth.

Far kinder, I thought, had he cut my throat for I would surely die here of starvation or thirst or serve as the next meal of some hungry forest creature.

Shivering with fear and cold, I burrowed into the leaves.



Somehow, despite the cold and my fear, I dozed off into a fitful sleep only to be woken by the tread of heavy feet. My first dread was Ivan's return but, no, he was a hunter and a soldier. He would move silently. This person, or creature, had no care for stealth.

I scrambled to my feet to run again but my leg muscles had cramped and I could not move.

It was Henri who found me, scratched and bleeding, and pitiful. He picked me up in his strong arms and carried me to the house of the brothers, crooning gently to calm me.

[Brooke.]

Poor Snow. Your updates always leave me wanting to read more 

[Figwit]

Thank you Brooke.  I look forward just as much to your comments. 


The Brothers

How wonderful, the brothers. I love each and every one so dearly. Apple cheeked and hearty and each just a little bit different from the others.

Elmo

Bruno and Ollie

Viktor


Otto


Klaus
and Henri

They lived in their little cottage, working at the mine during the day or chopping wood in the forest for their fuel.

They fussed over me that night, bathing my bruised and bleeding feet, gently brushing the twigs and leaves from my hair, and plying me with fresh baked bread and warm nourishing soup.

They listened to my tale, when I was strong enough to tell it, and bit their nails in fear. I must stay with them. They insisted. I could cook and clean for them and they would hide me and keep me safe.

Sadly, spoiled young ladies such as I know little of cooking or cleaning.

I burnt the bread and boiled the soup. I broke the vases and left smears on the mirrors.

They really didn't mind. They pretended my cooking was the best they had eaten. They told me the vases were ugly anyway, and they knew what they looked like so it mattered not about the mirrors.

'They were kind.' My father's thoughts drifted towards me.

'Kinder than you, papa. You left me at her mercy. Did you not see her blackness or did you love me so little?'

[Brooke.]

I adore the brothers and Snow being a 'true' princess in not knowing how to cook and clean - I doubt even her stepmother would have made her do those chores 

[Figwit]

Thanks Brooke.  I had a lot of fun creating the brothers.  They were originally very good looking sims created my friends and me.  Amazing what you can do with a bit of weight and a pot of rouge.

Discovered

I was happier than I had been in a long time. I greeted each day with a sigh of contentment.

The brothers were happy too. They sang as they marched off to their labours in the morning and whistled when they returned at night. 

We were isolated from the world, or so I thought, but snippets of disquietening news still managed to reach us.

Otto scurried home from market one day.  His basket was overflowing with fruit and ripe vegetables though I swear he must have lost most on his hurried journey home for several apples were jostled free to roll across the freshly swept floor as he puffed his way in through the door. 

His eyes were round and frightened and he locked and bolted the sturdy door behind him.   She was looking for me.

'Stay indoors,' they cautioned. 'And answer the door to no-one.'

'You did not obey of course.' It was him, the stranger, again.

'It was not so simple.' I answer.

I see him – at least I see through his eyes – just for a moment. He stands at a window surveying the lands stretching out before him.

I was wiping the smudges from a mirror one day. My cleaning skills were improving and I was quite proud of the work I had done.

But this day to my horror, the newly shined mirror clouded over with thick swirling smoke. 

I swiped at it with my cloth and soft, unclear at first but growing in distinction, her eyes looked back from the glass.



I threw the cloth over the glass but I knew she had seen me. She knew now for certain that I was alive.

I told the brothers and they broke all the mirrors in the house and buried the fragments of glass and wood deep in the forest.

'You always had a vivid imagination.' I hear the chuckle in my father's thoughts.