Amata

Amata is one of three witches who set out for the Fountain of Fair Fortune in search of relief from heartbreak. Her decisive act is to give up the happy memories of her former lover: the stream opens a way forward, and Amata discovers that she no longer regrets losing a man who was cruel and faithless. She then yields her chance to bathe to Sir Luckless, and the two leave the garden together to lead long and happy lives. The ending makes her generosity, rather than the Fountain’s supposed magic, the turning force of the tale.

Identity and Motive

Amata waits with Asha and Altheda among the crowd gathered before the garden walls. Each witch carries a different burden: Asha is afflicted by an illness no Healer can cure, Altheda has been robbed of her home, gold, and wand, and Amata has been deserted by a man she loved dearly. Believing her heart may never mend, she hopes the Fountain will relieve her grief and longing.

The women meet on the outskirts of the crowd and tell one another their sorrows. Their shared vulnerability becomes the basis for a compact: if any of them gets the chance, they will join forces and try to reach the Fountain together. Amata’s story therefore begins not as a solitary contest for a cure, but as a promise of mutual aid among strangers.

Entering the Garden

At sunrise, a gap opens in the wall and the crowd surges towards it. Creepers from the garden seize Asha; she grasps Altheda’s wrist, and Altheda clutches Amata’s robes. Amata, in turn, catches on the armour of a gloomy-looking knight seated on a thin horse. The creepers drag all four through the opening, while the disappointed crowd is shut out as the walls seal again.

Asha and Altheda resent Amata for bringing the knight, since only one person can bathe and they expect the choice to be difficult enough among the three of them. The knight, known outside the walls as Sir Luckless, has no magic and considers himself unskilled at jousting or sword duels. Certain he cannot outdo the witches, he proposes withdrawing from the garden. Amata rebukes his faint-heartedness and urges him to draw his sword and help them reach their goal. Her insistence keeps him with the group, though she does not yet know what that choice will mean for either of them.

The Stream and the Lost Memories

The four travel through a garden abundant with rare herbs, fruit, and flowers, meeting no obstacle until they reach the hill where the Fountain stands. A stream encircles the summit, and a stone in its clear depths bears the command, “Pay me the treasure of your past.” Sir Luckless tries to cross on his shield, but it sinks. The witches pull him from the water; their own attempts to leap the stream fail, while the sun continues to descend.

Amata understands the stone’s demand. With her wand, she draws from her mind the memories of happy times spent with her vanished lover and drops them into the rushing water. The stream carries the memories away, and stepping stones appear, allowing all four travellers to cross and reach the summit. The passage is opened by a loss that is at once literal within the enchantment and emotional in its consequence: Amata pays with treasured memories rather than with gold or strength.

At the Fountain, as the sky burns ruby and the day nears its end, Amata’s sacrifice changes what she wants. The water has washed away her regret; she now sees that her former lover was cruel and faithless, and that being rid of him is itself a happiness. The journey has not restored the relationship or erased the fact of desertion. Instead, losing the memories that made her cling to it lets her reassess what she has lost.

The Choice at the Fountain

Before the travellers can decide who will bathe, Asha collapses, exhausted and close to death. Altheda gathers herbs, hoping she can cure Asha and earn money by selling remedies; she tells the others to let Amata bathe. Sir Luckless then bows and gestures for Amata to take the opportunity. Amata refuses the turn offered to her and directs it to him instead, asking that he bathe as a reward for his chivalry.

Sir Luckless enters the Fountain in the last rays of the setting sun, astonished that he has become the chosen one among hundreds. When he emerges as the sun falls below the horizon, his triumph gives way to a proposal: still in his rusted armour, he throws himself at Amata’s feet and asks for her hand and heart. He has come to regard her as the kindest and most beautiful woman he has ever seen. Amata is delighted and recognizes in him a man worthy of the affection she had once placed in someone else.

Ending and Significance

The three witches and Sir Luckless leave the hill together, arm in arm. All four live long and happy lives, and none of them knows or suspects that the Fountain’s waters have no enchantment. Amata’s happy ending therefore does not depend on a magical cure delivered by the water. Her change begins when she parts with the memories that bind her to grief, and continues when she gives up her own turn for another person.

Her arc links the tale’s quest structure to a reversal in the meaning of its promised reward. Amata arrives hoping to have sorrow removed by the Fountain; on the way, she relinquishes her past, recognizes the truth about her former lover, and freely yields the prize. What appears to be the Fountain’s gift is accompanied by ordinary acts of insight, mutual assistance, and generosity. The story’s final irony is that the travellers attribute their good fortune to enchanted water, although the water itself did nothing: their choices have already changed what fortune can mean for them.