She looked at me and then hugged me tightly, and I clung to her, waiting for the continuation of the story about the princess.

“… But suddenly the sky turned black, it seemed that all the suns of the world had disappeared. A voice, inhuman, terrible, like thunder, cut through the air, and a chill gripped the princess’s body. The terrifying voice said: ‘How dare you invade my domain, stupid girl?! How dare you pick my favorite lily?! Now you will never leave this place, you will forever remain my captive!’”

The princess lost consciousness in horror, and the lily fell from her hands.

She woke up in a room that resembled her own castle, and at first she thought it was just a dream – but soon the princess realized what she had done. She was very ashamed of her impudence, but she could do nothing … The room in which the mysterious host had placed her turned out to be a golden cage in the tower of a strange, unfamiliar castle, the door was locked, and there were bars on the windows.

Day and night the princess cried from fear of the unknown, day and night she languished in ignorance, she spent all her time alone. When she woke up, there was delicious food on the table, and when she fell asleep, the empty plates disappeared, only to be filled again the next day. She never saw the owner of the terrifying and terrible voice – he avoided her.

But someone brought her food, someone made sure that she didn’t die of hunger …

The princess was not grieving over her own fate as a captive, she felt guilty before the one who, just like her, loved the lily that she wanted to appropriate for herself.

One morning, a little bird flew into her window. The princess immediately began to question it about the mysterious inhabitant of the castle, but the little bird only said that it was not allowed to fly even close to the princess’s window. Then the princess, claiming that she regretted what she had done, begged to know at least something … And then the little bird told the terrible secret of the castle’s host.

“Maybe that’s enough for today?” Mom suddenly said, looking at me questioningly.

Her last sentence didn’t fit with the narrative. I even had to make an effort to emerge from the fairytale world with the princess and the scary voice that imprisoned her in a golden cage.

I shook my head, showing with my whole appearance that I was not going to sleep at all, and the story really interested me.

“Please … I’ll never sleep without knowing what happened to the princess.”

I made a pleading face, and she kissed my forehead.

“My dear, it’s a long story.”

“That’s good,” I muttered, settling on my other side, burying my nose in her shoulder.

“… The master of the castle turned out to be a musician who had spent his entire long life alone. He had built his castle himself, and he had taught the five-petal white lily to sing with the power of his mastery. Worldly destinies did not concern him – he was far from the ordinary vanity of human lives. People did not understand him, and he did not try to understand them either. He despised them for their insensitivity and bad taste, he despised them for what they—”

The princess could not understand why there was no kindred spirit who could understand the genius hermit: he was talented, smart, and probably handsome … The princess immediately asked about the stranger’s appearance, and the little bird looked around in fear. Seeing the sparkle in the young princess’s eyes, it answered: ‘He can never be like other people. Everyone who has ever seen him died of horror. You are the only one who survived meeting him … Because you have not seen him.’

The little bird had barely finished speaking when a roar was heard behind the door of the princess’s room – and the walls shook from the terrible sound. The little bird quickly flew away … But there was more than just rage in that cry – there was pain and despair in it.

The princess was frightened, but immediately understood that the stranger would not harm her. Whoever this mysterious inhabitant of the castle was, he would not hurt her. If he wanted to, he would have done it long ago … If she herself would not provoke him.

She had a plan: to pretend to be asleep and see who was bringing her food – what to do, such is the curious nature of a woman. That same night, when the door to the room opened, the princess could not distinguish anyone’s footsteps, could not see anything except complete darkness. She sat up in amazement – and at that very moment something stirred the air, as if by the wind, a black shadow slipped through the doorway, and the doors closed again with a lock.

The night visitor did not utter a word, but the princess knew that it was the master of the castle.

The next night, the princess again intended to lie in wait for the stranger, pretending to be asleep, but in the morning she suddenly discovered that the door to the room was not locked. She went wandering along the corridors, she liked everything in his house, she did not count the minutes and hours of the walk – and did not even remember that there was a world beyond the castle walls, and did not think about escaping. Then she found herself in the library.

The princess loved to read, she decided to collect books for her room. On the large oak table lay ancient manuscripts and treatises, and the princess knew their language.

They spoke of a curse that befell the master of the castle. He was an ugly monster, made by the creator for the shining star, the center of the universe, as a creator without a human form, but with a human soul. Until the end of his days, he was forced to drag out his existence in solitude … So that’s what the little bird was talking about!

Someone’s strong hands grabbed her and dragged her out of the library, a terrible voice screamed at her, scolded her for daring to leave the tower, shook her like a rag doll, but she looked with wide-open eyes at—

“The monster? Was it scary?” I whispered, instinctively pressing closer to Mom.

It seemed to me that all the shadows of the universe now surrounded us in the room, and the dim light of the nightlight did not dispel the thickening obscurity.

“No, dear, she did not see the monster …”

“How so?”

But she only sighed, hugging me tighter, continuing, “… The princess saw nothing – they were standing in the dark, and the shadow hid the one who was in front of her. She could only see his amber eyes. And that saved her then.”

He locked her in the tower room again, carefully checking all the locks, and she fell on her bed and burst into tears. She could not believe his cruel fate, the curse that could not be broken.

But the monster didn’t know that the princess had read the book.

“Mom …”

It seemed to me that she was crying, and I raised myself up on my elbows in fear to meet her gaze, but when she looked at me, there were no tears in her eyes.

But she was sad – like that unhappy princess from the tale.

“Mom, did she stay to live in the castle with the monster? Why didn’t she run away?” I asked after a pause.

“Why would she run away?”

“Well, but …” I was puzzled why she didn’t understand – it was so obvious. “But he’s a monster. How can you know that there’s a monster roaming around somewhere, and even keeping you locked up, and still go to the library as if nothing had happened?”

She laughed quietly, patting my shoulder.

“He didn’t hurt her … It’s all her fault, she wanted to steal the lily from him. Isn’t that right?”

I nodded gloomily, still not understanding anything.

“But why did he keep her? He could have eaten her, cooked her, I don’t know … Why would he need her?”

Mom now didn’t hide her condescending but kind laughter. Leaning her forehead against mine, she said, “My sweet, he simply fell in love with her.”

“Fell in love?” I gasped in surprise. “Can monsters really love?”

“Of course they can … They love much more than people, they put everything they have into this feeling, because they know that this love is all they have, one and for life.”

I hemmed disbelievingly, but was in no hurry to free myself from her embrace.

“But wait, does he really think that she can love him too? He is—”

She looked at me strangely – straight in the eye – but I just squirmed in the blanket in bewilderment.

“He is what?”

“A monster.”

Her gaze fell somewhere on my knees bent under the blanket. When she looked at me again, I was overcome by the feeling that I had said something wrong.

“What do you think, one can’t love a monster?”

But I said the truth! One can’t love a monster – and everyone knows it! A monster is a monster, and nothing can be done about it …

I felt uneasy under Mom’s watchful gaze, but I still hadn’t got this strange thing about love.

When she spoke again, her voice had softened, “Victor, when you grow up, you’ll understand … There are things that can’t be judged by their appearance alone – by the shell they’re enclosed in. You can’t look at the wrapper and not see the contents.”

I wanted to say something in my own defense, but she didn’t let me object.

“Do you want to know what happened next?”

I nodded slowly – I really did, but I wasn’t sure that I comprehend everything completely. What a strange tale …

I allowed myself to be wrapped in a blanket and peacefully closed my eyes, feeling the arms hugging my shoulders.

“… The monster made sure that the princess did not leave the room anymore. She had to think he was not nearby, and sometimes it seemed to her that he really was not there – and it was just an endless dream.”

The white lily no longer sang to her in her dreams. Life seemed to have left the princess, because she felt lonely … without him.

If the princess had managed to read those ancient scripts to the end before the monster found her in the library, she would have learned that the curse could be broken … But she couldn’t know that – she already knew more than she was supposed to.

The days dragged on endlessly, and the nights even longer. The princess tried as best she could not to fall asleep, to at least catch a glimpse of a shadow creeping towards her in the night, to at least once feel the pleasant breath of wind from a black cloak … But she did not remember how she fell asleep, and when she woke up, she saw a fresh breakfast on the nightstand.

One night, the cunning princess decided to sleep next to the door, expecting that as soon as the master of the castle appeared in her room, she would immediately wake up and talk to him. She just wanted to apologize for her behavior – and nothing more.

Everything turned out as she had designed: he had not expected that, having entered the room as a silent shadow, he would stumble over the snoring princess. Before he could figure out anything, she woke up and spoke to him. She tried very hard not to frighten or anger him. She asked him to let her out of the room at least occasionally and promised that she would not try to escape.

Luck was definitely on her side: after a week, the monster sometimes opened the door to the room, then he began to come to her and bring books, a little later they began to talk about these books. The princess liked to talk to him, he no longer avoided her – she even sometimes thought that he smiled at her witty jokes. As before, the princess could not see him – he was always hidden by a shadow.

And she never once remembered that he was the monster.

Days and months flew by … The garden of paradise had already faded, and the bright leaves had turned yellow, then fallen, the earth was covered with a white blanket, and it came off with time. Spring was opening the first buds on the renewed trees in the garden, the princess was looking out the window. She did not dream of seeing the spring sun again – she was ready to marry the darkness, if only— If only to stay with him.

She thought that she had long ago become boring to him – sometimes it seemed to her he would gladly throw her out of his castle, but the word given once on that summer day in the garden held him. She felt how tense he was sometimes when talking to her, and how he wanted to run away as soon as possible, just not to see her … She was offended that she did not interest him at all.

One night at dinner – for they dined together every night, with a long, gloomy dining table between them – the princess asked him to sing to her. She knew the voice she had come to love, the voice of the five-petal white lily that sang to her in her dreams, was his voice.

He refused. He explained that he was simply not in the mood, and that he would definitely sing to her some other time, but the princess realized that he was lying.

The princess thought he simply didn’t love her.

She, choking from her tears, told him everything she had thought about on dark nights, languishing alone in her tower … She screamed that one cannot always live the way he lived, fearing the light only because the light sometimes burns.

She confessed her love to him, and he stood there, not saying a word.

‘No, you can’t love me,’ he finally muttered.

It was as if he didn’t hear her. He looked at her, she begged him to let her stay with him. Suddenly he came up to her, grabbed her by the shoulders, and his amber eyes were glowing, but she wasn’t afraid. He wanted to scare her, but the princess wasn’t afraid of the monster.

‘Now I’ll prove to you that you’re lying to yourself,’ he whispered and stepped into the light.

“Oh,” I blurted out, and I realized that I had been clutching the blanket tightly, waiting for the end of the story.

My legs twitched involuntarily in an attempt to escape, but in Mom’s arms I was not afraid of any monsters.

In response to my silent question, she only smiled softly.

“… The princess, as before, did not see a monster in him. Everything we have imagined for ourselves – true and untrue – is stored in our heads. Vision is selective, and we see what we want to see. The princess did not want to see a monster in him – and she didn’t … You just have to want it.”

“But the curse is now broken? The princess fell in love with the monster – he became a man?”

Mom sighed, pressing her nose somewhere on the top of my head.

“Does it matter? She loves him even as he is … No, the curse never went away, and he remained … the monster. But for her, he was the most beautiful man in the world, because when you love, you don’t sight anything except what you want to sight,” she paused for a moment, weighing her words. “Yes, Victor, fairy tales don’t always have an obvious ending – and not necessarily with wonders. Isn’t it enough that they met and were happy?”