Emily

Emily in the original 1997 version

Emily is the youngest of the Jewel Princess and is the main protagonist of the Emerald Princess books. She is the ruler of the Greenwood and daughter of King Regal and Queen Jemma. In the 2020 reprint, the other princesses are her cousins and the king and queen are her uncle and aunt.

## Biography

### The Ruby Princess Runs Away

On the day of her coronation, Emily wakes up at dawn and excitedly chatters to her sisters about being crowned the Emerald Princess. She is crowned by the great wizard Gallivant along with Demetra and Sabrina, but just as he is about to place the Ruby Crown on Roxanne's head the doors burst open to reveal *another* Roxanne. This other Roxanne with a torn dress and tangled hair declares that she is the rightful princess and that the other girl is Rudgrin, the daughter of the evil Lord Bleak who has been sent to impersonate the ruby princess. She claims that Rudgrin is wearing a magical shape-changing mask that allows her to look like Roxanne, but the girl accused of being Rudgrin orders the guards to arrest the other girl for being the real imposter. Emily can only stare along with everyone else in the room, unable to be sure who is telling the truth. After some confusion, Gallivant announces that there is a way to determine the true Roxanne: each princess is born with a mark in the shape of her jewel. Whichever girl bears the mark must be the true princess. The messy Roxanne with thorns in her hair and dirt on her face smiles confidently and raises her right arm so everyone can see the teardrop mark on her wrist. Emily and her sisters raise their wrists too, showing their own marks. Twitter, the palace secretary, pulls off Rudgrin's mask and reveals her twisted, ugly face to the whole court. The guards instantly take her out of the throne room as Emily welcomes her sister back home. The jewel princesses happily watch as Roxanne is crowned the rightful Ruby Princess at last.

### The Sapphire Princess Meets a Monster

One morning, Princess Sabrina is anonymously given a beautiful golden picnic basket filled with good food. Sabrina chooses to share her gift with her three sisters and invites them to a picnic. As they paddle around the lake waiting for Roxanne, who is late as usual, Sabrina challenges Emily and Demetra to a race. Emily is eager and ready to go, but Zazz advises Sabrina to use a different boat since the one she's using is weighed down by her friend and pilot Gurt, the heavy golden basket, and all the picnic things. Zazz offers to get another boat, but Emily tells Sabrina to simply hop onto hers so they can race Demetra together. When Sabrina tries to leave her boat, however, the picnic basket magically jumps into her hands. Although surprised, Sabrina takes the opportunity to share a piece of chocolate with the hungry Zazz. Before they can take a bite, something knocks hard against the boat. Thinking that some water sprites may be playing a trick on her, Sabrina peers into the water and suddenly screams, falling into a faint. Emily thinks fast and splashes some cold lake water on her sister, waking her up.

Sabrina shakily describes a terrifyingly huge, gray, sharp-toothed face she saw under the boat and Gurt dives in the water in the hopes of finding out what the creature may be, reporting when he returns that he followed a great shadow until it went into the part of the lake known as the Deep Dark. Zazz speculates that the creature may be the legendary Blue Lake Monster, a being that is thought to be a demon left over from the Dark Times when Lord Bleak ruled the land. Emily and Demetra are convinced that anything connected with Lord Bleak must be malevolent, but Sabrina is not so sure. Sabrina calms everyone down and encourages them all to eat their lunch, but no sooner does her hand touch the picnic basket than the monster's enormous gray head suddenly erupt above the water.

Sabrina quickly reaches into the small pouch at her waist and tosses her magical flying dust over her companions, who instantly rise into the air. She sends her sisters and Gurt to the safety of the palace while she and Zazz fly to Misty Marsh to consult the wise Storkz. At the Sapphire Palace, a worried Emily and Demetra watch as Gurt rallies together a crowd of Blue Lake dwellers in front of the palace and arms them with willow wands, urging them to hunt down and kill the monster. When Sabrina returns, she tells her sisters that she thinks it is very sweet that her people want to protect her, but she doesn't want anyone to get hurt, not even the monster. Emily speculates that perhaps the creature has shown itself to Sabrina after so many years of isolation in order to tell her something. Suddenly, Emily looks out the window and sees the monster's huge shadow underwater, heading straight for the oblivious crowd below. Sabrina can't let it attack her people, so she decides to use her magic dust to fly over the creature and distract it. She tells her sisters that she'll lead it across the lake to the Spinning Pool, thinking it may get caught in the current and disappear forever. Emily isn't thrilled by Sabrina's risky plan, but she and Demetra promise to protect the people of the Blue Lake by keeping them on land as much as possible before Sabrina flies out the window. The next time Emily sees her, the monster's enormous head is in her lap.

Terrified that the monster has caught her sister, Emily (with Zazz clinging to her hair) races alongside Demetra and Gurt in leading the people of the Blue Lake to rescue Sabrina from the monster. However, they are thrown into complete confusion when the Sapphire Princess throws her arms protectively over its head and commands them to stay back. Although they had all thought the monster was trying to hurt her, Sabrina now suspects that the creature was only trying to help her. Emily and the others see the golden picnic basket near the princess and notice that there are dead flies and ants surrounding the perfect food, indicating that it has been poisoned. Sabrina announces to her people that everything the creature did was to protect her from the poisoned food; it even ate a pear that she was about to bite to save her. She is devastated that the creature is dying of the poison and desperately wishes to help it somehow when Sage, leader of the Storkz, appears and informs the princess of a tiny purple flower that could cure the monster.

Sabrina fetches the flower herself and gently persuades the creature to eat it as Emily and everyone else cautiously watch from a safe distance. When at last the creature opens its eyes, it begins to cry and begs the princess not to look at its ugliness. Emily is shocked to hear it explain that it used to be a beautiful mermaid called Oona, the spirit of the Blue Lake, before Lord Bleak cursed her into her monstrous form. Everyone including Emily is extremely ashamed from how they treated Oona just because she *looks* ugly and evil, and sincerely apologize to her. Oona accepts their apology, overjoyed to finally be able to talk to someone without them running away in terror. Sabrina would like to hold a celebration complete with a feast, but with her picnic basket full of poisoned food she has nothing for them all to eat. Fortunately, Roxanne finally arrives on Hapgood to the joy and exasperation of her sisters. The girls try to explain the adventure they just had as they waited for her, mentioning that their picnic basket was poisoned and that Sabrina's only alive because their new friend Oona saved her. A shocked Roxanne tells them about the very upset Darklings she and Hapgood saw earlier and the girls speculate that the evil creatures were probably angry that their plan to poison Sabrina failed. Luckily, Hapgood had thought ahead and reveals their own picnic baskets with enough food for everyone.

### The Emerald Princess Plays a Trick

Princess Emily excitedly rigs up a mulberry bush to lurch backwards when she pulls a string in order to play a prank on the palace gardener, Staghorn. Ducking behind a different tree along with her best friend and royal adviser, Arden, she lies in wait for the unsuspecting gardener while trying to stifle her giggles. Soon, Staghorn tries to trim the bush with his shears and Emily joyfully tugs on the string, causing the bush to leap away from him. Seeing the utterly dumbfounded look on Staghorn's face makes Emily laugh out loud, startling the gardener even more. She pops out from behind the tree, gives the embarrassed Staghorn a hug, and demonstrates how she tricked him. He agrees that he must have looked quite silly before he leaves, insisting that he has more work to do. Arden notices that Staghorn does not appear to be amused and tries to get Emily to realize that maybe her tricks are not as fun for the people she plays them on, but the princess good-naturedly brushes off her concerns.

Arden reminds the princess that she's supposed to meet her sister Roxanne at the edge of the Greenwood, and Emily glows in anticipation of another trick. She urges Arden to carry her to the border before her sister gets there. Throwing on a black hooded cloak, she asks Arden to hide so she can surprise Roxanne. Waving away the unicorn's protests, Emily waits until Roxanne has crossed the Rushing River before leaping out at her, scaring her sister so badly she screams. When she realizes the creature is just Emily playing another trick, Roxanne is furious because she thought Emily was a Darkling and was genuinely scared. Emily finds that so funny, tears of laughter trickle out of her eyes. She doesn't understand why Roxanne is so mad at her and claims that the people of the Greenwood love her tricks.A skeptical Roxanne asks Arden to settle their discussion, but Emily waves away the unicorn's opinion when she carefully admits that she thinks pranks are only fun to those who pull them. The young princess then describes all the fun things that she *was* going to do with her sister. Roxanne is confused by the past tense until Emily dramatically sticks her nose in the air and declares that Roxanne is being too grumpy to have fun with. Shocked and angry at her sister's behavior, Roxanne turns right around and marches out of the woods, announcing that she's going to visit Sabrina instead. Emily is startled out of her dramatic teasing and begs Roxanne to come back, but she doesn't even turn around. In fact, she uses her magical shield to make her invisible. Emily barely has time to be stunned before a man named Crosscut stumbles out of the woods, begging her to go to Staghorn. He was trimming the Twisted Vines when something went wrong, causing him to get hurt. Recognizing that this is very serious, Emily casts aside her her silliness and goes immediately to the Twisted Vines.

She finds him near the Babbling Brook with an injured leg, but Staghorn refuses to tell her where exactly it hurts, so the fairy Hazelnut informs her that his ankle may be broken. Emily wants to get him to the Emerald Palace where he can get treatment, but he insists that go to Nana Woodbine, a woman famed for her healing skills. The princess agrees and offers to send for Nana Woodbine, but Staghorn flat-out refuses to go to the palace. He shakes her off when she tries to help him get to his feet, accepting help from Crosscut instead. She asks how he got hurt, but Hazelnut rudely denies her an answer until Arden patiently reminds the fairy that Emily is her princess. Hazelnut snaps that Staghorn got caught by a rope that yanked him upside-down into the treetops. When Arden wonders where the rope could have come from, Hazelnut tells her to ask the princess before she flies away, leaving a very confused Emily behind. At Arden's gentle suggestion, she decides to go to Nana Woodbine's cottage and see if there is anything she can do to help Staghorn.

Nana pleasantly informs Emily that Staghorn's ankle is only badly bruised, but his pride suffered a deeper injury when he foolishly swung upside down in the trees. When the princess asks to see him, Nana gently but firmly refuses to allow it and closes the door in Emily's face. Unable to stand the cold-shoulder treatment she's been getting, Emily uses her magical pan flute for the very first time and shrinks herself down to the size of a mouse so she can smuggle herself into the cottage and hear what everyone is saying. As Arden patiently waits outside, Emily squeezes under the door and overhears Staghorn and his friends talking about her. They discuss that the numerous pranks she plays on her people are very annoying, but they're forced to pretend they're funny because she's the princess. They believe that she set the trap that injured Staghorn as another trick and the little gardener's best friend Fluke decides to tell King Regal, judging that when a princess starts hurting her own people, that's when she should stop being a princess. Unable to bear another word, a tearful Emily wriggles her way outside and runs straight into Arden. Ashamed, she confesses that the unicorn and Roxanne were right in believing that the people of the Greenwood weren't amused by her tricks and that they even think she is responsible for Staghorn's injury. Arden encourages Emily set things right with the gardener by finding out who really set the trap, so the tiny Emily sends Arden to the Blue Lake to ask Roxanne for help as she herself hacks her way through the tall grass to investigate the Twisted Vines.

After two hours of fighting her way through the tangle of undergrowth, the starving princess reaches up to tug a blackberry off its bush and notices an odd vine which, upon closer inspection, proves to actually be part of a rope net. As she examines it, she discovers a hidden cage. Before she can puzzle out its origin and purpose, she notices Darklings working on the trap and hurriedly tries to blend in among the blackberry leaves. Emily is horrified to overhear their plan to kidnap residents of the Greenwood so they can force them to work for Lord Bleak and knows she must warn her people to stay away, so she uses taps on a tree to summon a Shinnybin, long-armed creatures that can quickly swing through the trees and use a system of knocks and clicks to spread messages throughout the forest. The Shinnybin Sorrel answers her call and stares at the tiny-as-a-mouse princess, but makes no comment, simply agreeing to spread the warning. Almost immediately after Sorrel shimmies away up a tree, Emily hears the fisherman Fluke singing as he strolls down a path leading straight for the Darkling trap. She shouts at him as loudly as she can and manages to startle him with her small size. She begs him not to go into the Twisted Vines, but he suspects that she's trying to play another trick and doesn't listen to her. Without missing a beat, Emily throws herself onto the net to prevent Fluke from being captured and is promptly thrown into the cage, which is then yanked into the air by a system of ropes.

A flabbergasted Fluke apologizes to the princess for not believing her and tries to cut her down with his knife, but the rope is too thick. Emily spots the Darklings making their way to the cage and orders him to hide, noticing that the sun is about to set. Remembering that the pan flute's magic lasts until "a half turn around the sun", she knows that the sunset will break the spell. As she stares at the sun, willing it to set faster, she hears Arden and Roxanne heading straight for the Twisted Vines. She tries to scream at them to stop, but they can't hear her small voice. Meanwhile, the Darklings are overjoyed that they appear to have caught a fairy, but when they look closer they realize they caught the Emerald Princess herself. Confused as to why she's a mere six-inches tall, they lower the cage for better look. Just as the cage touches the ground Roxanne's voice pierces the air, demanding to know what they've done to her sister. Paying no attention to the delighted Darklings, Emily blows the lowest note on her flute as soon as the sun slips beneath the horizon, magically growing to the size of a giant.

Emily effortlessly plucks the Darklings from the ground and dangles them in the air over a thicket of thorns, demanding that they leave her land and promising that if they come back she'll turn them into bugs. The terrified Darklings swear to never return and are dropped outside the Greenwood's border where they waste no time in running away as fast as possible. A stunned Roxanne praises her sister as Fluke asks if she can really turn people into bugs. Laughing, she says that she can't, but the Darklings don't know that. Emily loves being able to see the whole Greenwood and even spots another trap, easily springing it with a prod of her finger. She asks Arden to spread the word about the hidden cages so her people won't accidentally get captured by one. Luckily, Sorrel, who has been hiding in a treetop, volunteers to spread the word along with Fluke, who promises to make sure that Staghorn and Nana Woodbine know who truly set the traps as well as who saved his life.

The Emerald Princess admits to Roxanne that her tricks have only upset people and apologizes for scaring Roxanne earlier, promising that she won't do so ever again. Roxanne happily accepts and asks her sister to shrink back down so they can celebrate the end of Emily's practical jokes, but Arden reminds both of the royal sisters that once the pan flute's magic is used, she has to remain that way until either sunset or sunrise. Roxanne laughs so hard she almost falls over, relishing the fact that for once, the joke is on Emily.

## Abilities

**Size Manipulation-** Emily can grow to the size of a giant or shrink to the size of a mouse when she plays the magical pan flute given to her by the great wizard Gallivant. The low notes make her grow while the high notes make her shrink. However, once she has changed her size, she must remain that size until "a half turn around the sun", i.e. sunrise or sunset. She wears the pan flute on a golden cord slung around her shoulder.

## Gallery

The Emerald Princess Finds a FairyThe Emerald Princess Plays a TrickThe Emerald Princess Follows a UnicornEmily's Emerald PalaceLarissa McCoy as Princess Emily in *The Ruby Princess Runs Away* movieEmily's 2020 design
## Quotes

* "You should have seen the look on your face when the bush leaped into the air...you looked positively silly!"
* "Staghorn always looks a little grumpy. That's why he's so much fun to play tricks on."
* "Don't be a stick-in-the-mud. I play tricks on my friends in the Greenwood all the time. They love it."
* "It's a little scary to be so small. Even the tiniest mouse could hurt me."

## Trivia

* Emily's dress is made of green velvet.
* In the short film adaptation of *The Ruby Princess Runs Away*, Emily is played by Larissa McCoy.
* Emily's character design is largely unchanged in the 2020 reprint, and she is the only princess who is not racebent.