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Ask Evil Princess Sara |
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 Well, my minions, this week's column will be rather a light one, since I'm busy working on my tan, sipping frosty and expensive drinks with little umbrellas in them, and catching up on my reading from the comfort of a deckchair planted on the sunny beaches of the Cardian Islands; your friend and dictator EPS is enjoying her downtime too much to answer any questions that require any serious thought. Brian and I had a discussion about it, and after some "convincing" on my part (involving the photos from the Wallachian Incident and a rusty cheesegrater held to his -- oh, but I digress), he agreed that since I'm technically doing twice as much work as the other characters since the advent of this column, I deserve a vacation as much as he does. If not moreso, since I'm also single-handedly running and plotting to usurp the kingdom of Corneria on top of everything else. All that cake-eating mama's boy does is copy and paste and watch the donations roll in, and he gets a week off? It's only fair that Evil Princess Sara should be allowed to take a little holiday in the sun too. After all, if your American president can do it for a month...but there I go, digressing again. It must be the sun getting to me. Or this third margarita.
At any rate, while I may have temporarily traded in my chainmail and leather for a bikini and sarong, that's no reason to let the standards for this column slide. You know the rules:
- Intellectually speaking, I am as a seagull deftly riding the sun-kissed breezes of genius while the rest of the universe is as the clambed wallowing deep in the dark muck of ignorance. This lyrical image aside, it must also be said that I'm not a trained and licensed adviceatrician (the little nurse's outfit just isn't my style). The quality of my advice is unparalleled in this world or any other, of course, but don't forget that I have no recommendation for this job other than my savagely keen mind.
- I refuse to hold any responsibility for what you do with my advice one way or the other. Just as the elven cabana boy who fetches me my drinks cannot be held to blame if I booze myself up to the point of violently projectile vomiting the next morning, so it is with the relationship between this column and your behavior. In Corneria, frivolous lawsuits are punishable by Elite Guard Hank and his collection of pokey sticks. You've been warned.
- Your dreadful little letters may be edited for length, clarity, grammar, or just because I feel like it. Evil princesses are whimsical that way.
- Just because I've shifted the setting of this column to warmer climes doesn't mean my opinion of you unwashed peasants has become equally as sunny. It takes more than a little coconut oil and bodysurfing to make Evil Princess Sara the little friend of all the world.
Now let's get on with this column...I want to get in a little more swimming before sunset.
"Dear Sara,
I am hoping you can give me some pearls of wisdom in the arena of looking one's amazing best when crushing one's enemies. As it turns out, all that fire, brimstone and mayhem are just murder on my hair. To fight the nuisance of split ends I've tried wearing it in a tres couture chignon, but somehow that isn't as awe inspiring as when one's hair is flying wild in the wind. I've also tried hot oil treatments using the fat from the charred corpses of my trampled enemies, but it just seems to weigh my hair down and make it look limp. I read somewhere that Lady Batheroi would bathe in the blood of virgins for her skin care regimen and I am wondering if it would solve my hair woes. How do you keep your ravishing mane so healthy?
Evily Von Menace
'Keeping it down right evil in Illinois since 1989'"
Well, herr doktor, it's hard to say how well darling Liza's radical anti-aging treatment really worked, since it failed to save her skin in one most important way: being locked up in a windowless tower for the rest of her days might have prevented sun damage (I prefer a strong sunblock, personally, but to each her own), but what good is a flawless complexion when you've got nobody to show it off to but a brick wall? That said, while blood might have its uses as a temporary auburn highlighting solution, there's the drying/clotting factor to consider. You could always aim for the gore-soaked battle dreadlocks look that's so popular with Klingon women, but that's a little butch for a madwoman of refinement like yourself, don't you think? Oh well...really, who can find enough virgins for that sort of thing these days anyway? There aren't enough even in Corneria to provide enough blood for a post-shower moisturizing masque.
Now, an evil princess has to keep some secrets to herself, of course, like the location of her evil day planner for instance, but what's a secret between fellow villainesses? My little trick for maintaining wickedly luxuriant and full-bodied tresses is simple, and unlike virgin blood, this formula is widely available: I shampoo once every few weeks with the tears of my victims. The saline acts as a gentle cleanser and toner, sloughing away the air pollutants and oil that can dim even the healthiest hair's glow and vibrancy. You'd think someone in our line of work would've discovered this earlier, but I only came across it by accident one evening during my most recent kidnapping. The Golden Girls was pre-empted for King Steve's annual State of the Kingdom address, and I got a little dampened by Garland's subsequent geyser of weeping. Although I was thoroughly disgusted at the time - after all, who wants to be showered by any of Garland's non-blood bodily fluids? - I couldn't help but be pleased at the effect it had on my coiffure.
Hope this helps, Frau Menace. One can never be too evil or too stylish, n'est-ce pas?
"Good day Princess Sara,
Ah, where shall I begin? Well, I am a member of a band of heroes (i.e., morons) off to save the world from god-only-knows-what. We have recently lost our first leader to a, shall we say, crisis. Because of this our
second-in-command, an emotional idiot, has taken over. For the good of... no, I shouldn't bother lying, for my personal benefit, I desire to take contol and dump that fool in the nearest pool of Mountain Dew. My one problem is that he is many times more powerful than myself and he has the support of the rest of the group. If I openly revolt, I will be killed. But I am sick of him and want control. What is a girl supposed to do in this situation?
Sincerely,
Leira"
It depends on how a girl feels about using her feminine wiles in a situation like this. I'm sure that, like me, you find outright cruelty and violence to be preferable in ordinary situations, but subtlety and manipulation can be invaluable tools in the hands of the skilled when faced with brute physical opposition. Time to make with the eyelash-batting and lowered necklines, ma chere, because now you have to ask yourself one serious question: what would the Marquise de Merteuil do?
If your new leader is the emotional idiot you say he is, all this should prove to be simple enough. For a few weeks, give the appearance of being troubled by a heart-rending secret. Be sure to sometimes gaze longingly across the campfire at the leader when he's not looking but one or two of the others are, just in case. Then later, when one of them approaches you about it, admit to having love for your new leader blossoming in your heart, now that you see how noble he is in guiding you all, a rock in the time of grief after having lost your first leader, ad nauseam. If this person suggests you tell the leader how you feel, demur for a while but eventually allow yourself to be "talked into" doing so. Use the same sort of disgustingly saccharine declarations of love on him as you did when confessing your feelings to the other party member: these are the words that every male hero feigns disinterest in but secretly longs for like a prepubescent girl with a crush on the captain of the soccer team. If he asks why you seemed unhappy with his leadership before, gulp back tears and explain that you were only afraid that you'd lose him just as your party lost your first leader. This is precisely the sentimental touch that will reel him in, the sap. Heroes are all alike.
So now you're the first lady of the party...work it! Make him your devoted slave by behaving towards him like an angel in public and like a succubus when you're alone, if you get my drift. Use this influence over him sparingly, but make it count when you do. As party leader, he may end up taking a lot of the credit for your wise choices, but the rest of the party will remember that you had a hand in the decision-making process. This will come in handy soon, because of a simple and universal narrative law of fantasy universes and the heroes found in them that'll take care of your leader on a permanent basis while leaving you as clean as a whistle.
It's simply this: the main hero's love interest is often killed at one point or another, and in this event he will always go to avenge her death alone, no matter how dangerous it is or how useful the rest of the party might be as backup. (I like to call this the Spike Spiegel Law of Heroic Grief Processes.) And, sometimes, in this hypothetical vengeance process...the hero just dies.
Arrange to be kidnapped and seemingly "killed" by a group of your enemies. Pretend to strike some kind of deal with them if you must...you won't be honoring it, of course, but they don't know that yet. You'll be able to provide them with a detailed list of your leader's weaknesses and strengths for them to base their attack strategy on, so that when he comes barging in with swords a-swinging and incoherent with grief they'll be able to take him down without a problem. Don't let them get carried away with the torturing, and don't join in yourself, unless of course you want him to know you've betrayed him before he dies. This is inadvisable, though, as heroes killed in this way tend to come back in one form or another (all gods everywhere can't resist irony).
Just make sure he's good and dead before you run off back to your party, tearfully bearing the story of how your captors feigned your death to trap your hero and kill him right in front of you, the bastards, and how it was only luck that allowed you to escape. Make his death as noble and tragic as you can, because you really want to work them into a berserker rage of grief and vengeance before they join you in getting rid of the evidence by killing the enemies. You were a smart girl and took time to study their weaknesses and strengths while "being held captive" by them, so you and your party should be able to massacre them but good.
By now your emotional idiot leader and your accomplices are dead, and you're left completely innocent, able now to play the role of grieving widow who must bravely take up her dead husband's place and lead your party onward in spite of it all. It's almost too easy, isn't it? Just be sure and send your friend Evil Princess Sara a small token of thanks when it all works out. I prefer practical gifts over jewelry, and I take a medium size in suits of enchanted invincible chainmail, s'il vous plait.
"Dear Evil Princess Sara
I really want to be an evil princess, but I really cannot find the right clothes for the job. I'm about 5 feet 4 inches tall, have red hair, you know, all the right attributes for an evil princess. However, I look
terrible in long evil gowns. My body just seems to like knee length skirts better, and women's sized concert tee shirts. Can you give me any advice on how to become an evil princess? Or maybe just the store you buy your evil gowns in?
Thanks,
Slightly Evil Olga, Duchess of Velma"
Olga, Olga, Olga. How can you possibly expect to command the unswerving respect and fealty of armies of millions in a schoolgirl kilt and a band shirt? It's just not the kind of thing that evokes worship and holy terror, unless of course your hordes consist of High Fidelity-style hipster doofuses who have the same taste in music as you do and you plan on crushing your enemies through the sheer power of cultural snobbery. Even then, I wouldn't recommend that kind of strategy. People will placidly submit to the most iron-heeled regimes, but imply that their favorite bands suck and it's mutiny on the Bounty, baby, and you're Captain Bligh in Buddy Holly glasses. A recipe for disaster if ever I saw one.
Let's modify your look a little. How do you feel about leather battle kilts, as worn by the Roman legionnaires and, of course, Xena? They're the same length as the kind of skirt you prefer, and martially stylish to boot. Maybe something leather, in a trendy shade of brown with tasteful bronze studs, over a Scottish tartan kilt in colors to match. The Roman look is a classic one, bringing with it inspiring associations of military glory and grandeur. Tres chic, tres Caesar. And as a bonus, the Roman style of leather chest armor has the same silhouette as a short-sleeved t-shirt: your outfit will be coordinated and still keep to the style you currently prefer. Just stay away from those Roman helmets. Looking like your armorer was inspired by Mr. T isn't a good look for the au courant evil princess.
"Dear E.P. Sara,
Which outfit do you think would clash least with brown hair --
Black armor with a red cape ala Zio from Phantasy Star IV? Gold jeweled armor with a spiked circlet and a red cape? Khaki Naziesque uniform with jackboots, beret, and armband?
I was thinking that the black armor would set off my cape better, but the gold would go so much nicer with the decor in my throne room. But then again, the Nazi uniform would breathe so much better on those hot days addressing the stadium crowds and give people more of that love-to-hate-him charismatic dictator vibe...
Your thoughts?
B. R."
Aside from issues of taste and decency (even an evil princess has standards), the Nazi uniform is a no-no for another reason: they were soundly defeated. If you want your potential armies to view you as just another demagogue-a-be whose ideas are as secondhand as his taste in clothes, well, that's your business, but Evil Princess Sara doesn't see a long career in aping the model of a group who couldn't even figure out that invading Russia on foot in winter isn't grade-A tactical thinking.
Black armor and red cape? Sure, if you want to look like you write poetry under the name Ravynn Darquewolfe and swoon over your rose garden when you're not busy evil overlording. Just don't be surprised when your hero enemy asks you if you bought that gorget and matching spaulders at Hot Topic before he beheads you.
And golden bejewelled armor? Are you trying to be a villain or Liberace? Evil Princess Sara despairs of your sense of taste. Maybe you'd be better suited for training to replace Siegfried and Roy. Just don't claim the tigers as your evil familiars and we'll let you get by without being thought a total disgrace to the profession of villainy, okay?
Wishing you all aloha kakou, just this once,
Evil Princess Sara
Do you have a question for Evil Princess Sara? Drop her a line at
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