The Crystal Princess and the Day Star

Once there was a world of snow whose interior was filled with crystal palaces of ice where beautiful people danced under shining lights. There was a widowed king there, and he had one beautiful daughter. This princess had everything her way and was at the top of the social pyramid. She did not abuse her position though she made sure to maintain it. When rivals tried to be catty or to whisper against her, she deftly put them back down. She was not cruel, but she was firm.

Then there was a revolt, her father was thrown down, and she experienced humiliation after humiliation. She was brave, she endured insults and replied with spirit when she could, but her real mastery of social technique helped her only a little now that she was no longer the Princess and her father the King.

But a princess born was still a princess so she carried herself with dignity and even at times merrily. But if anything her quality made the persecution worse. It escalated to violence, against which she was helpless. Came the day when she was struck and clawed and knocked down by a coterie of her former rivals and weeping, clothing torn, she fled into tunnels and long forgotten ways until she came to the desolate surface.

The surface was deep in snow and ice. It was night perpetually, and dark birds flitted from dark pine to dark pine under the stars, and strange crags loomed.

She was desperate but even now she was not without resource. She tried to start a fire. She sang, coaxing, to the birds. She wandered, looking for some refuge or place. When all these failed and her last warmth was about to leave her she fell to her knees and surrendered herself to whatever might come.

In that moment, all creation beheld her. Life flowed out from her and flowed back. It reached even to the stars. One star took pity on her and moved. It came down until he touched the surface. His light drove out the darkness and it was day there, something that had never before happened. His heat melted the snow. It rose in steam. His heat burned her and she cried out. But she did not flee. He came to her, and took her unto himself, and in due time, they had a son to rule over this land that for the first time knew warmth and day and light.

She had been pursued by her enemies but when the say the warmth and great light, they cast themselves back down.

In due time, the son of the Star and the son of the Princess took his own place in the sky and became the Sun, with all the brightness of a star but magnified ten fold and a hundred fold and more by love.