RECIPE FOR EVER AFTER
A DRARRY AT-520B TALE
i. vid vassen av den krökta ström
If you think that love is only for the lucky and the strong, think twice or thrice. Intense feelings can be found in the unlikeliest of places.
This is the story of a prince in lov... wait, of a lordling in love. And of the... obstinate and astute ragamuffin who put him to the test.
This is a new look at a classic tale, retold with exquisite sensitivity.
Dressed in his nightshirt of white tulle and covered in a coarse burlap sack, Harry got on the carriage that his guardian Sirius had sent him; a cabin mounted on two great cogwheels that immediately started moving. The vehicle crossed the kingdom at breakneck speed. Crossing a bridge, then another, then rolling across a lake and entering a thick forest of pines, birches, willows and chestnut. The young lad had fallen fast asleep. He did not awake until the end of the day, when the carriage stopped at the edge of the woods, not quite far from a village. Upon seeing the colours of the flag that waved atop the windmill, he knew he had left the kingdom his father had died to defend. He got off the carriage, which instantly disappeared.
Day flew by after day, each day identical to the previous and to the next; it seemed that time had frozen.
Whenever Harry finished his workday, he liked to return to his shack on the estate grounds, flick the wand in the palm of his hand and make appear the invisible trunk which contained his uniforms and his suits, full-body mirror, hairbrush, gold-rimmed spectacles, and everything else. He had even brought along a little musical box to play melodies that reminded him of his childhood. The cottage in Godric's Hollow, the deer in the woods around his village, his father Ser James standing tall and strong ere he left for the wars, nevermore to return... How far everything seemed to be!
One afternoon at the close of evening, while Harry was wearing his scarlet uniform and was playing his favourite tune on the musical box, singing to the tune in a dulcet tenor voice, a fair lordling passed by. He was the son of the leaders of the land, trying to explore new paths through the woods. Since he had a passion for speed, he had had a great lark leaving behind his entourage until he came to stop there, alone and breathless. The crystalline notes of music and, afterwards, the dazzling light shimmering off a sash and epaulets attracted him to the shack.
Vid vassen av den krökta ström
som tycktes kärlek, kärlek susa
låt ömma känslor dig berusa,
var lycklig, älska, njut och dröm!
An enchanting tenor voice resumed the melody, and the whole forest began to whisper at unison. The lordling, Draco, was left breathless once more.
ii. what's wrong with draco?
Vid vassen av den krökta ström
som tycktes kärlek, kärlek susa
låt ömma känslor dig berusa,
var lycklig, älska, njut och dröm!
Men vet att under kärlekstvång,
ack vilket tvång den hunnit giva!
För första känslan trogen bliva
ty hjärtat älskar blott en gång!
The lordling stopped his steed and got off. He approached the shack and tiptoed to take a peek inside, but a veil concealed the wall, and through the shack's only window came a dazzling light. The dark young lad, accompanied by the musical box, sang an old song which, as a little boy, he'd been lulled to sleep with in whispers by his mother, Dame Lillian. Draco could not restrain the tears. He climbed up the eaves to the rooftop and found a skylight. Shading his eyes with his hands, he finally caught a glimpse of the singer. He was sitting before a large musical box, radiant, and surpassed in loveliness the best-looking people, male or female, the lordling had ever seen. And that dazzle that reflected off his epaulets and the sash on his waist! From his vantage point on the rooftop, the lordling was about to fall backwards to the ground. Harry, who had caught a glimpse of him through the mirror in front of him, smiled and resumed his song. It appeared to him that the fair stranger was the most charming, with his great big eyes and that shocked expression. Suddenly he had a craving for getting to know him better.
But then the lordling's entourage arrived, all at once. The dark lad stopped singing, flicked the wand and once more he became Dirty Harry the ragamuffin, while Draco returned to the firm ground, still consternated by what he had just beheld.
Young Lord Draco returned home. He lived in an enormous edifice hewn out of stone in a cold and hard marble rock with streaks in faded colours. Since forever, it is still unknown of whether out of a whim or out of necessity, the local fashion obliged the inhabitants, including the ruling family, to wear pointed hats. Draco's family ruled the surrounding lands since so long ago that no one knew when the Malfoys had arrived thither.
As soon as he returned from the woods, Draco slumped into bed and plunged into terrible melancholy. Now nothing piqued his interest, except remembering the face of the young man in the shack. Lord Lucius and Lady Narcissa interrogated each other by looking into one another's eyes; they did not understand why their son, who was always merry and bright and wide awake, no longer left his quarters. Day followed day and the lordling kept himself shut, with an absent look in his eyes and lost in his dreams. He did not reply to the questions of his parents, he had stopped eating and languished beyond repair. Lord Lucius and Lady Narcissa were more and more worried for each time.
The only company that Draco tolerated was that of his three best friends: Blaise, Gregory, and Vincent. He had opened his heart to them and asked them to investigate: who was this beau who lived in the hut in the woods? The three friends returned at once, carrying bitter news with them: everywhere they had gotten the reply that this lad was a ragamuffin, one Dirty Harry, and that neither in that shack nor elsewhere in the woods there lived any beau or beauty.
"Well, I don't care!" Draco exclaimed, leaping at once out of his melancholy. "You want me to eat? Right, then I'll eat, but it has to be a brioche made by Dirty Harry expressly for me."
His parents were elated. The three friends left immediately, to give Dirty Harry the commission of the brioche for the lordling.
Petunia was most surprised when she heard of His Lordlingship's commission, but she tried to conceal her feelings. The Malfoy scion had shown interest in her estate, and that was the only thing that mattered to her. The older woman went to find Harry in the tool shed, gave him the commission and handed him eggs, milk, flour and everything necessary for making brioche. From a distance, the three friends saw Dirty Harry leave the shed. Upon seeing how filthy he was, all three winced, but Petunia insisted.
"Do not forget to tell His Lordlingship that the eggs are from our farm and that the flour has come from our mill."
Harry raced into the shed. It seemed fun to cook for the lordling. He waved his wand to put on his cream summer suit, style his hair, and adorn his cuffs with twin cufflinks. He also wished for a recipe to make the best of brioches.
A blank notebook began to fill with a list of recipes: gâteau d'amour, cherry heart pudding, forbidden fruitcake, kouign-amann or lovers' brioche...
Harry repeated "lovers' brioche," and the notebook began to fill with the recipe, as the necessary ingredients appeared one by one:
iii. kouign-amann or lovers' brioche
Flour (a little) and then
three eggs,
sugar (a lot),
and butter (even more),
a pinch of salt, yeast for fluff, diluted in some warm milk,
vanilla for smiles, and rhum to dream of south sea islands.
Knead with lots of care, mix everything with love,
once, and twice, and thrice.
Leave the dough to rest, open the oven and put it in, smother with melted butter (well).
Take out after exactly half an hour,
dust with sugar while the brioche is still hot,
serve as soon as possible and, if cooled, re-warm the lovers' brioche.
Harry poured, kneaded, mixed, folded the dough into three... and only doubted a tenth of a second before taking off his left cufflink with the crystal glass bead and letting it drop into the dough that he immediately afterwards tucked into the oven.
By the shack's side, the three friends were growing impatient. They did not understand what was happening: the shack had begun to glow so intensely that they could not peer through the window to see what was going on inside; yet it seemed to them, indeed, that the so-called Dirty Harry had an angelic voice. What a shame that he should be so filthy!
When the brioche was ready, the dark-haired lad, disguised under his burlap sack, handed it over to the three friends, who hastened to bring it to the lordling.
iv. cufflinks and suitors
Everyone at Court in the fortress awaited the famous brioche and wondered if at last Lord Draco would return to be his usual self and recover his lost mirth. The three friends stormed into his bedchamber with hats held in hand.
"The brioche!" Vincent announced.
"It's coming!" Gregory explained.
"Here it is!" Blaise murmured.
"And Dirty Harry?" asked Draco, crazy with elation. "Have you seen him?"
Two of the friends replied, visibly uncomfortable:
"Dirty Harry? That ragamuffin..."
"He's a scarecrow..."
And Blaise added:
"But he has the loveliest voice..."
The lordling sniffed the aroma of the brioche, tore off a good chunk and put it into his mouth while exhaling a sigh of joy.
The three friends watched him with their hearts in their fists, as well as Lord Lucius and Lady Narcissa, who had joined them in the room. All of them, leaning over Draco, expected the brioche to cure him. But then the lordling turned fuchsia, then scarlet, then purple. He tried to scream in vain, clutched his throat, put a finger into his mouth and began to retch and gag, trying to dislodge the foreign object from his trachea.
Lord Lucius, Lady Narcissa, and all three friends looked at him, petrified and without a clue of what to do, when suddenly Draco drew deep breaths and his face returned to its usual fair colour. He held between his fingers the crystal cufflink and looked at it with a smile. In the act, instantly, the lordling himself knew exactly what to do as well. The cufflink was so shiny, so small... seeing it, no one could connect it to a ragamuffin. Suddenly, Draco came up with a stratagem to impose Harry as his fiancé in front of his parents and the entire Court.
"I will marry the person, male or female, who owns a cufflink that perfectly matches this one, no matter their gender, where they come from, or who they are."
Therefore, the proclamation was spread throughout the land and far beyond its reaches: the lordling was to marry the person with only one cufflink that matched his own perfectly.
Horses and other mounts of all species galloped forth, from hippogriffs to horntail dragons, as well as vehicles on wheels, on sails, propelled by air... They combed the country down to each and every shire, because no one had to be forgotten.
And the suitors --all suitors without exception, male or female or non-binary, young or old, meek or bold--, began to apply massage on their fingers, to butter them up with essential oils that would allegedly make their hands more delicate, or to sleep with their hands wrapped to moisturise their dry skin; some even went as far as to resort to hire master forgers to produce the matching cufflink.
On the day that had been appointed came the invasion of an immense crowd. Suitors streamed into the royal halls one right after the other. They were so numerous that one could not see the end of the queue. And they were of all ages, short and tall, chubby and lanky, fair and dark and ginger and nutbrown. Even some villagers from a distant shire, who wore stuffed songbirds for hats, had arrived.
They seemed to compete in caquetage, and they all speaking at once made so much noise that it was difficult to keep track of conversation, or even to hold a conversation in the first place.
In between a push and a shove, they accused one another of cutting in line. But suddenly the horns of His Lordship resounded, and everyone present kept silence.
In the great hall, Lord Draco sat on his alabaster throne, surrounded by his three bosom friends. His Lordship and Her Ladyship, sitting comfortably on twin thrones a little further, were impatient to see the result of all these events.
First a maiden presented herself, a cute-looking redhead, slender and smiling. Yet, when the cufflink was produced, only the crystal on her ring was shown to come from the same quarry as the cufflink's. Then came an enormous person of uncertain gender, their skin milky white, who barely could hold the cufflink in between their fingers. A toddler also tried her luck, but she was too young and the jewel felt to the ground with a clink immediately.
An old peasant wench guffawed at the top of her lungs while the cufflink trembled between age-twisted fingertips. She wanted to have fun and dream herself as well. The lordling addressed her with a smile.
The fifteenth suitor, a tall golden-haired young man, would have pleased him, if the image of Dirty Harry had not left his mind's eye. Furthermore, this fellow could not produce the matching cufflink either. After three hours, Lord Draco had begun to grow horribly bored. By his side, his three friends were yawning. Yet still there were many suitors to see... Lord Lucius fell asleep. The test kept on in its course, to the pace of His Lordships's yawns and His Lordlingship's sighs.
At nightfall, there were still over a hundred suitors waiting. Still Draco did not give up that easily and he wanted to see them all. Farm folk with weather-beaten hands, artisans with callused hands, metalworkers with muscular hands softened by the leather gloves they wore at work, travellers with dreamy eyes, circus performers who tried to produce the matching cufflink and did not succeed but who delighted everyone assisting with their crazy somersaults, musicians, dressmakers, teachers and students, everyone... All of the suitors tried to produce the matching cufflink, yet no one succeeded.
When, at the end of the night, the last suitors were left, when the fingertips of the last maiden were outstretched in vain towards the cufflink, the lordling asked if they had warned Dirty Harry. Amidst the crowd of spectators, lanky Petunia let out a guffaw:
"Dirty Harry? That tatter on two legs!?"
Lord Draco stood up and commanded his men to bring him to the throne room.
And so it was done.
Harry came in the end, at last, escorted by the three friends of His Lordlingship. He walked alone across the immense throne room, barefoot, head sunken beneath his burlap hood and supporting the heavy sack he wore for a cloak. The whole crowd held its breath.
His Lordlingship could not marry such a freak!
Dirty Harry approached the fair young man, produced a petite hand from out of the sack and presented it to him. In the hollow of that silky palm, a cufflink twinkled like a little star. Lord Draco did not even dare to breathe a word. He tried to lock eyes with Harry, icy blue with emerald green, and, with a slight tremble, he produced the other cufflink.
When both cufflinks were thus shown to match perfectly, Dirty Harry lifted his head and let the burlap cloak fall to the marble floor. He was wearing his mess uniform, crimson and embroidered with golden thread, and his luminous beauty dazzled everyone who was present. A sparkle of light awoke Lord Lucius, who looked towards his wife and stifled a childish scream of high-pitched glee in seeing the young stranger's splendour.
"My boy, you have found the most... radiant of partners!"
He seized Harry by the wrist, raised it, joined it with Draco's hand, and exclaimed:
"I now pronounce you husband and husband!"
The lordling gently kissed Harry's fingertips.
"Harry, do you want to marry me?"
The dark young lad looked at the marble hall.
"May I plant and grow flowers, ivy, and ferns here?"
"All that you wish."
"And... can we free all magical creatures, all animals, and feed only upon seeds and plants?"
"Eat seeds? Well... of course, why not?"
"Thus only then, fair Draco, will I marry you."
They kissed.
The suitors who wore chickens, ducks, geese, or songbirds for hats clucked in delight; how pretty was this Harry boy at the end of the day! Petunia discretely dried up a tear of joy that welled up in her left eye. The most bitter among the suitors had to choke on their pain, and the most jealous ones had to realise it: Harry and Draco made for a wonderful couple.
They kissed once more as the crowd yelled a "HOORRAY!" that resounded even in the neighbouring countries.
v. ever after drarry
Still today the marriage of Draco and Harry is remembered. There was dance and song, an endless stream of dishes come from distant worlds, a labyrinth of silken cloths in intense colours for decorating the streets, games, perfumes... When the wedding was celebrated, all cages in the country were opened, and all flying avians launched off towards their freedom, drawing a cloud of clarity in the turquoise blue skies.
Crossing the entourage of guests, Harry's guardian appeared. He touched the bespectacled young man's hand and planted a tender kiss upon his brow.
"My lad, how happy I feel! What kind of insanity took over us during the war?"
Harry nestled in Sirius' arms, recovering the childish impulse that he had missed for so long.
vi. a tale as old as time
Type 520B is one of the oldest fairytales that exist. The Female Bear (L'Orsa), a primitive version thereof, appears in the Pentamerone, the first compilation of magic and fairy tales ever, by Giambattista Basile, released in Southern Italian dialect in 1635. The Grimms retook the tale in 1819 with Allerleirauh, the Russians tell the story of Pigskin, the British Isles inspired Shakespeare's King Lear with the folkloric Coat O'Rushes... Everywhere in the world, similar stories of this kind are told.
In all versions, in a manner similar to Cinderella, who is also forced to conceal her beauty, don a magic gown and reclaim her true identity thanks to an object, Donkeyskin or Catskin or Allerleirauh is, however, a more active young person than her sister heroine of the cinders. She winds up concealing her beauty under a cloak of animal or plant remains and flees her home. Finally, she deliberately places a surprise (a ring, a spool of gold thread...) in a cooked dish (chicken gratin, brioche, soup...) destined to the prince or lordling, in order to be discovered by her love interest/husband in the moment that she has decided herself.
I have enthusiastically followed the steps of this intelligent young person who does not resign themselves. Allerleirauh/Donkeyskin/Sapsorrow is one of those princesses who know what they want.
Illustrations that especially stress the plant kingdom, for I have rooted the tale in the power of nature, in the midst of oceans and woodlands. The hero/ine, fallen from grace, regenerates in the forest, that world so close to women that once were called witches, women who told children tales in order for them to cross their inner boundaries and grow up without fears. And thus the circle is closed.
I have loved to rewrite this tale. I have experienced once more that childhood sense of wonder from when I first watched fairytale and Shakespeare films on TV for the first time. I have fed upon these universes made by filmmakers and poets.
The value of a tale that is key for me... I thought that weaving these threads would be complicated. But the words welled up as if they had always been there, waiting since my childhood. Following the steps of old Victorian narrators, the melodies of fairytale films, and turning the pages, I have enjoyed a lot to give my voice to this Sapsorrow tale. I hope that, for each read of this queered version, each and every person may recover the echoes of the wonderful world that enchanted my childhood.
