We moved along the mountain path. The moonlight was very bright, and there were rocks everywhere, and to me it all looked dead and yellow, like the moon. I had just spent several hours with three men who were openly planning to kill her. So why, I wondered, was I more frightened now than then? Who was the horrid hooded figure to strike fear in me so? What could be worse than dying? I offered him money as ransom, the man in black just laughed. Many times, he would spin off the path, heading into wild terrain, running and pulling me behind him. I fell, when I told him I could not move that quickly, he yelled back, “You can! And you will! Or you will suffer greatly. Do you think I could make you suffer greatly?”(Goldman). I nodded. I did my best to keep up, I was frightened as to what he would do to her, so I dared not fall again. “Where… do you take me?” (Goldman). I gasped, when he gave me a chance to rest. He did not answer. I warned him that Prince Humperdinck would find us. He mocked me, saying I wasn’t capable of love, he mocked my pain. We ran again, not talking for hours. As we were running along the edge of a towering ravine, we stopped, I sank down to rest. The man in black stood silently over me, he pointed back the way we had come. I stared, as I did, I saw the waters of Florin Channel filled with ships. “‘He must have ordered every ship in Florin after you,’ the man in black said. ‘Such a sight I have never seen.’ He stared at all the lanterns on all the ships as they moved”(Goldman). I once again warned him that he can never escape Humperdinck, I tried to promise him that no harm would come to him if he released me. He, once again, did not take this offer seriously. This man in black, though he seemed very cruel and frightening, also mocked me, my love, my grief. I told him I had died the day my love was killed. When he was distracted by the ships once again, I shoved him and he fell down the steep ravine. I told him that he could die too for all I care. From the bottom of the ravine I heard words whispered from far, weak and warm and familiar. “As… you… wish…” (Goldman).
I was shocked. I was thrilled. I felt sick, what had I done to my poor, sweet Westley. I did not hesitate a moment, I went down after him, keeping my feet as best I could, my balance quickly was gone, and the ravine had me. I fell fast and I fell hard, but that did not matter, I “would have gladly dropped a thousand feet onto a bed of nails if Westley had been waiting at the bottom. Seeing him again, my one true love, who I thought was dead. Seeing him again could not be described in words, it was pure bliss, pure love. Westley held my face in his quick hands. “‘When I left you,’ he whispered, ‘you were already more beautiful than anything I dared to dream. In our years apart, my imaginings did their best to improve on your perfection. At night, your face was forever behind my eyes. And now I see that the vision who kept me company in my loneliness was a hag compared to the beauty now before me’” ( Goldman). Such words, such beautiful words, but all he spoke of was my beauty, I wondered if he loved me for anything more than that. “‘Enough about my beauty,’ I said. ‘Everybody always talks about how beautiful I am. I’ve got a mind, Westley. Talk about that.’ ‘Throughout eternity I shall do that very thing,’ he told me. ‘But now we haven’t time’”(Goldman). We started hurrying down the ravine floor. Being reunited with my love was honestly more than I could ever hope for. We ran faster and faster, neither of us spending breath in conversation. We were finally able to slow down, Humperdinck was far behind us, I was full of relief. At least I was, but then Westley gave me his best attempt at a smile and said, “With any luck at all, we should soon be safely in the Fire Swamp” (Goldman). I heard his speech, of course. But I did not, I did not, take it well… I had spent long, nightmared years dreaming that I would die in the Fire Swamp. I searched somewhere for a sufficiency of courage. Evidently, I found it in his eyes. At any rate, hand in hand, we moved into the shadows of the Fire Swamp. The Fire Swamp was terrifying, we encountered all of its known threats: the fire spurts, the Snow Sand, and the ROUS’s. My Westley saved me, he saved me from all of that. I will not go into too much, believe it or not, the Fire Swamp doesn’t hold very fond memories. Though while we were in the Fire Swamp, Westley told me of the Dread Pirate Roberts, more specifically, he told me how he came to be the Dread Pirate Roberts himself. It was a wonderfully fascinating story, though one he is far better equipped to tell, I’ll make sure to ask him to tell it in his own writings. It was nearly dusk when we at last saw the great ship Revenge far out in the bay. When we left the Fire Swamp, we were surrounded by the great Armada, “a hundred mounted horsemen, armored and armed. In from of them the Count. And out alone in front of all, the four whites with the Prince astride the leader” (Goldman). “‘I accept your surrender,’ the Prince said. Westley held my hand. ‘No one is surrendering,’ he said. ‘You’re acting silly now,’ the Prince replied. ‘I credit you with bravery. Don’t make yourself a fool.’ ‘What is so foolish about winning?’ my darling Westley asked. ‘It’s my opinion that in order to capture us, you will have to come into the Fire Swamp. We have spent many hours here now; we know where the Snow Sand waits. I doubt that you or your men will be any too anxious to follow us in here. And by morning we will have slipped away.’ ‘I doubt that somehow’, said the Prince, and he gestured out to sea. Half the Armada had begun to give chase to the great ship Revenge. And the Revenge, alone, was sailing, as it had to do, away. ‘Surrender,’ the Prince said. ‘It will not happen.’ ‘SURRENDER!’ the Prince shouted. ‘DEATH FIRST!’ Westley roared”(Goldman). My heart burned within me, my Westley had died once and it killed me, if he died again, I could not have lived knowing I could have saved him. ‘…will you promise not to hurt him…?’ I whispered. Both Westley and Humperdinck were confused and shocked. I took a step forward and said, “‘If we surrender, freely and without struggle, if life returns to what it was one dusk ago, will you swear not to hurt this man?’ Prince Humperdinck raised his right hand: “I swear on the grave of my soon-to-be-dead father and the soul of my already-dead mother that I shall not hurt this man, and if I do, may I never hunt again though I live a thousand years’”(Goldman). My heart was slowly breaking inside of me. I could not bear to stay. I went away with the Prince. It was the worst mistake of my life.
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Prince Humperdinck took my hand and held it high and the crowd cheered. “That’s enough, mustn’t risk overexposure,” (Goldman 98), he said,as he started back in toward the castle. But I told him that some of them have been waiting so long, and that I would like to walk among them. He replied by telling me that, “we do not walk among commoners unless it is unavoidable,” (Goldman 98). Believe it or not, I was a bit upset by this, “I have known more than a few commoners in my time. They will not, I think, harm me” (Goldman 98). And with that I left the balcony, I then emerged “a moment later on the great steps of the castle and, quite alone, walked open-armed down into the crowd” (Goldman 99). Wherever I went, the people parted, I crossed and recrossed the Great Square, slowly and smiling. I was smiling, when the people wanted to touch my skin or gown I let them. I had studied very hard to do things royally, and I wanted very much to succeed, so I kept my posture erect and my smile gentle. I was rather tired after this victory, so I rested a bit. But very shortly after, I changed into my riding clothes and went to fetch Horse.
Really, that was one thing in my life that hadn’t changed. I still loved to ride, and I would for several hours every afternoon, regardless of weather or whatever happened to be going on. I did my best thinking then. Not that my best thinking ever expanded horizons. Still, I told myself, I was not a dummy either, so as long as I kept my thoughts to myself, well, where was the harm? As I rode through the woods and streams, my brain was awhirl. The walk through the crowd had moved me in a strange way. I’d really done nothing for three years but train to be a princess, and then a queen, today was the first day it actually felt like my reality. I don’t hate Humperdinck or anything, I just don’t like him, he’s always off someplace or playing in the Zoo of Death. Really there are two main problems: was it wrong to marry without like, and if it was, was it too late to do anything about it. The answers: no and yes. In my way of thought, “it wasn’t wrong to marry someone you didn’t like, it just wasn’t right either,” (Goldman 101). The other answer was even easier: I had given my word I would marry; that would have to be enough. True, he had told me quite honestly that if I said no he would have me disposed of, in order to keep respect for the crown at its proper level; still, I could have, had I so chosen to said no. Everyone had been telling me that I was very likely the most beautiful woman in the world. Now I was going to be the richest and most powerful as well. “Don’t expect too much from life,” I told myself, “learn to be satisfied with what you have” (Goldman 101). Dust was closing in, I was about half an hour from the castle, my daily ride was three-quarters done. I reined Horse, standing in the dimness was the strangest trio I had ever seen. “The man in front was dark, Sicilian perhaps, with the gentlest face, almost angelic. He had one leg too short, and the makings of a humpback, but he moved forward toward me with surprising speed and nimbleness. The other two remained rooted. The second, also dark, probably Spanish, was as erect and slender as the blade of steel that was attached to his side. The third man, mustachioed, perhaps a Turk, was easily the biggest human being I had ever ever seen”(Goldman 101-102). He told me that they poor, lost circus performers, looking for a nearby village. When I informed him that there was no one nearby. He jumped at me saying, “Then there will be no one to hear you scream,” (Goldman 102). That was all that I remembered, perhaps I did scream. If I did it was from sheer terror, for there was certainly no pain. But unconsciousness came. This next little bit was honestly a total blur, I awoke to the lapping of water. I was going to speak, but thought it better to listen to their conversation, but after a moment, it got harder and harder to hear. Because of the terrible pounding of my heart. Their conversation was dizzying and frightening. I learned that they were hired to kill me in order to start a war with Guilder. The Sicilian somehow knew that I was awake and listening to it all. He must have been a mind reader. They talked some more, then unconsciousness came. Again. I don’t know how long I was out, but we were still in the boat when I blinked. This time, without daring to think -- the Sicilian would have known it somehow -- I threw the blanket aside and dove deep into the Florin Channel. I stayed under for as long as I dared and then surfaced, starting to swim across the moonless water with every ounce of strength remaining to me. Behind me in the darkness there were cries, apparently none of them can swim. I continued to leave them behind me. My arms ached from effort but I gave them no rest. My legs kicked and her heart pounded. Over the water I heard, “The sharks will get her, don’t worry,” (Goldman 105). I wish he hadn’t mentioned that. “Princess,” the Sicilian called, “do you know what happens to sharks when they smell blood in the water? They go mad. There is no controlling their wildness. They rip and shred and chew and devour, and I’m in a boat, Princess, and there isn’t any blood in the water now, so we’re both quite safe, but there is a knife in my hand, my lady, and if you don’t come back I’ll cut my arms and I’ll cut my legs and I’ll catch the blood in a cup and I’ll fling it as far as I can and sharks can smell blood in the water for miles and you won’t be beautiful for long” (Goldman 105). I hesitated, silently treading water. Around me now, although it was surely my imagination, I seemed to be hearing the swish of giant tails. I thought, “If I come back, they’ll kill me anyway, so what’s the difference? “The difference is—” There he goes doing that again, I thought. He really is a mind reader. “—if you come back now,” the Sicilian went on, “I give you my word as a gentleman and assassin that you will die totally without pain. I assure you, you will get no such promise from the sharks" (Goldman 106). The fish sounds in the night were closer now,” (Goldman 106). I began to tremble with fear. I was terribly ashamed of myself but there it was. I only wished I could see if there were really sharks and blood being caught in the cup. “I don’t believe them,” I thought. “There are no no sharks in the water and there is no blood in his cup” (Goldman 106). “There was the splashing sound of liquid landing on liquid. Then there came a pause. Then the sharks went mad” (Goldman 107). I did not get eaten by the sharks at this time. “Fortunately for all concerned save the sharks, it was around this time that the moon came out” (Goldman 107). The Turk reached out and I was back in the safety of the murderers while the sharks swam around in wild frustration. We soon approached the Cliffs of Insanity. I did not understand. Going up the Cliffs could hardly be done, and no one had ever mentioned secret passages through them. Yet here we were, sailing closer and closer to the rocks. The Spaniard then discovered that, less than a mile behind them “another sailing boat, small, painted what looked like black, with a giant sail that billowed black in the night, and a single man at the tiller. A man in black” (Goldman 110). I could not take my eyes from the great black sail. The men I was with frightened me, but for some reason I could not explain, the man in black frightened me more. The Cliffs of Insanity were very close now. When we reached them, we climbed up and up. The man in black followed closely behind. He almost seemed to be flying. Tied hand and foot, sick with fear, I wasn’t sure what I wanted to happen. Except this much I knew: she didn’t want to go through anything like it again. It was over, we had reached the top of the Cliffs. The man in black was no more than three hundred feet away. The Sicilian untied the rope, the man in black didn’t fall, instead he kept climbing, not quickly of course, and not without great effort, but he was climbing. The Sicilian ordered the Spaniard to kill him, the Turk picked me up and began to follow the humpback The man in black beat the Spaniard, he then beat the Turk. I don’t know how he did it. The Sicilian laid out a picnic. Then held a knife up to my neck. We sat there, the man in black approached. There was a battle of wits, something about the goblets, some poison, and Australia, I admit, I got lost rather quickly. Somehow, the man in black out thought the Sicilian. When I asked who he was. He simply replied that he was no one to be trifled with. There once was a time where what I liked to do, preferred above all else really, was ride my horse, Horse, and to taunt the farm boy. I was never really one for boys, or for bathing.
An interesting fact about Princess Buttercup, is that for a time, "She hated to wash her face, she loathed the area behind her ears, she was sick of combing her hair and did so as little as possible" (Goldman 42). In my personal opinion this shows us a lot about the princess, on one hand, we could view her as rude, stubborn, and unhygienic, (which she very well was), but it also shows us that there was a time when she cared very little about things such as appearance. And yet, despite what I said, others in the village would act rather rudely towards me, the other girls stopped talking to me. One day, when I asked a girl named Cornelia about the silence she replied, “I should think, after what you’ve done, you’d have the courtesy not to pretend to ask” (Goldman 43). As you could probably imagine, I was rather upset. And rather confused. “And what have I done?” “What? What?...You’ve stolen them” (Goldman 43). And with that she turned and fled, but I understood, I knew who “them” was. Those “beef-witted featherbrained rattleskulled clodpated dim-domed noodle-noggined sapheaded lunkknobbed boys” (Goldman 44). Ugh, I hold to my claim that I was never really one for boys, especially those boys. Around when I turned seventeen, men would come to town in carriages, just for the ‘privilege’ to catch a glimpse of me, they would gather outside of my window and laugh about me. At first I found it revolting, but I soon just learned to ignore them. If they grew too damaging, the farm boy handled things, he would thrash a few of them and send the others on there way. I never failed to thank him for this, and as always he would simply reply with ‘As you wish.’ For some odd reason, one day the Count and Countess came to our farm asking about our cows. Yes, our cows. This apparently made no sense to my parents, our cows were not necessarily known for their milk. But what did make our cows so amazing was that the farm boy cared for them. I told them that. After they left, all I could see, all I could think about for that entire rest of the day, was how the Countess looked at the farm boy. I closed my eyes and the Countess was looking at Westley. Every time I closed my eyes the Countess would not stop staring at Westley! I don’t know why but it burned inside of me, he’s my farm boy, he’s my Westley! I sat in bed and thought about him, “the farm boy had eyes like the sea before a storm, but who cared about eyes? And he had pale blond hair, if you liked that sort of thing. And he was broad enough in the shoulders, but not all that much broader than the Count. And certainly he was muscular, but anybody would be muscular who slaved all day. And his skin was perfect and tan, but that came again from the slaving; in the sun all day, who wouldn’t be tan? And he wasn’t that much taller than the Count either, although his stomach was flatter, but that was because the farm boy was younger” (Goldman 56). I sat up in bed, “ it must be his teeth. The farm boy did have good teeth, give credit where credit was due. White and perfect, particularly set against the sun-tanned face” (Goldman 56). But it really does make no sense why someone such as the Countess would get so hung up about his teeth. There must have been something I was missing. Oh, oh dear, the farm boy was staring back at the Countess. But she’s so old, and she really looked very ridiculous in the dress, and that dress looked very ridiculous in the cowshed. She looked ridiculous even before she got to the cowshed. “With her too big painted mouth and her little piggy painted eyes and her powdered skin and … and … and….” (Goldman 57). Flailing, and thrashing I wept and tossed and paced and wept some more. I wanted him he is my farm boy. Oh, this is what love must feel like. |
AuthorPrincess Buttercup of Hammersmith was once a poor peasant. She fell in love with the farm boy, Westley, and they decided to get married. Tragedy strikes and Westley is reported to have died at sea. Buttercup vows to never love again, even though she gets engaged to Prince Humperdinck roughly five years later. Buttercup is almost assassinated by Vizzini, Inigo, and Fezzik, but saved by a mysterious man, who is in fact her long lost love, Westley... Quotes"Enough about my beauty. Everybody always talks about how beautiful I am. I’ve got a mind, Westley. Talk about that.”
“Westley and I are joined by the bond of love and you cannot track that, not with a thousand bloodhounds, and you cannot break it, not with a thousand swords.” “I love you, I know this must come as something of a surprise, since all I’ve ever done is scorn you and degrade you and taunt you, but I have loved you for several hours now, and every second, more. I thought an hour ago that I loved you more than any woman has ever loved a man, but a half hour after that I knew that what I felt before was nothing compared to what I felt then. But ten minutes after that, I understood that my previous love was a puddle compared to the high seas before a storm.” "Let me get this straight. Are you saying my love is a grain of sand and yours is this other thing? Images confuse me so - is this universal business of yours bigger than my sand? Help me, Westley. I have the feeling we're on the verge of something just terribly important.” “Westley, my passion, my sweet, my only, my own. Come back, come back. I shall kill myself otherwise. Yours in torment, Buttercup." She looked at Humperdinck. "Well? Do you think I'm throwing myself at him?" |