The Two Princesses of Bamarre
By Gail Carson Levine
Princess Addie is timid where her sister Meryl is strong, and shy when she is brave. As children, they’d act out scenes from the epic poem Drualt, with Meryl starring as the heroic knight. There was also the Gray Death Adventure, where Addie would catch the kingdom’s worst plague and Meryl would quest to save her. No one expected Meryl to be the one to get sick. Addie realizes that the only way to rescue her sister is to search for a cure-on her own. But she does have help. The sorcerer Rhys, her caretaker Bella, and the elf healer Milton all give her gifts to help her on her quest. After nearly being killed by a specter (Rhys saved her), slaughtered (they feasted on her magic tablecloth until they couldn’t move), captured by the dragon Vollys (who told her the secret of the Gray Death, and then Addie escaped. I’ll say this: her escape plan involved a sword called Blood-biter and a pair of seven-league boots), Princess Addie returns to find Meryl just hours from death. Rhys accompanies them to a village near a special valley where the fairies’ secret palace is hidden on a mountain. Years earlier, the villagers there would not help Drualt’s sweetheart, Freya, when she was mauled by a dozen gryphons, causing Drualt to leave Bamarre. He would not return “...until the timid go forth with the strong.” Not all the villagers were cowards, however. Some join Rhys, Addie, and Meryl to the valley where the waterfall is the cure, but Vollys returns! Along with her are several gryphons and specters who slow them down. Meryl doesn’t make it in time. But that would be a really terrible place to end the story, so the fairies apparently rescue everyone, curing everyone in Bamarre of the Gray Death except for the ones closest to death-like Meryl. Meryl lives, but only as a fairy. They meet Drualt, who is also a fairy, and Rhys and Addie get married. This was a pretty good book, but I liked it because of the epic poems. Check out Drualt.
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