The Princess of the Lake Listen to the story of the Princess of the Lake, as I heard it from those who heard it. My name is Svetlana, and this is the story of the Princess of the Lake. A long time ago, a young girl lived in an old, dilapidated house. She was an orphan, and no one knew who her parents were. Most people in the village avoided her, but my grandmother's parents cared for the disheveled, unkempt child. She went to the village school, but the other children didn't like her and constantly teased her. The teacher noticed her quick wit but was too cowardly to stand up for her. He was afraid that the other villagers would ostracize him. The Catholic priest in the village raised the cross every time he saw her and called her a witch. This went on until she grew into a young woman. The Catholic priest saw that she was blossoming from a scruffy child into a beautiful young woman. One day after religious instruction, he grabbed her bottom. Then she stuck a fine needle into the back of his hand and said, "My name is Alexandra." The next day, she disappeared. My grandmother was one of her classmates, and one day she set out to find her. She suspected she was in the mountains because Alexandra had told her mother that her parents lived there. My grandmother, then 17 years old, wandered through the mountains for many weeks, making fires and sleeping outdoors. One day, exhausted, she came to a beautiful lake and rested in an old ruin. It was already dusk, and she had gathered some wood to make a fire. In her bag, she still had some dried meat and flour. As she went to the shore to get a jug of water, Alexandra suddenly stood before her. Terrified, she froze like a statue and dropped her jug. The next thing she remembered was someone leaning over her and rubbing a herb against her forehead. She saw a woman with eyes that shone in the firelight. Her long hair was black. Her face had delicate features but a stern expression. She told me: "She was the most beautiful person I had ever seen. I recognized her. Alexandra, who went to school with me." The herb she had rubbed on her forehead was a healing herb. It was already night, and my mother described how everything around her began to glow. She saw many animals and amphibians. Even the water had a strange glow. The princess of the lake told her that many of these animals were evil people who had come here with the intention of abducting her. She had transformed them all into frogs, fish, toads, and salamanders. "I suddenly had a vision of our Catholic priest and told the princess that one day the priest had an abscess on his hand. It became infected and didn't get better. Eventually, his hand had to be amputated, and later his entire arm. In the end, he died of blood poisoning. The Princess of the Lake instructed me to teach the children in the village about natural history, and she told me all night long about plants, different kinds of infusions, the stars, and our solar system... I didn't understand many of the things she told me, but years later I remembered, and they suddenly took on meaning. At dawn, she showed me a path I should follow. I later became a teacher, and I have been one my whole life. I tried to find the Princess of the Lake three more times, but I never found her again." This is the painting of the princess that my grandmother painted. I carefully restored it.