The Princess and the Most Faithful Knight

Once upon a time there was a beautiful princess. Her beauty was spoken of throughout the lands. Poets wrote tomes filled to the brim with sonnets and limericks devoted to her beauty. Artists filled entire galleries with paintings and sculptures trying desperately to capture her near perfect form. Her beauty was surpassed only by her wisdom. Her father, the king, had raised her to be a fair just, ruler and over time her only concern became the happiness and safety of her subjects.

One fateful day, a charming prince came to town. He had come to woo the princess and woo he did. They spent hours together. Hours became days. Days became weeks and the beautiful princess began to fall in love with the charming prince. Their love was spoken of throughout the kingdom.One day, the charming prince took the beautiful princess to a shady meadow at the edge of the deep wood. He began to tell her how much he loved her. He said if she loved him, she would go into the deep wood and pick him the rarest flower in the world: the scarlet rose. The princess agreed out of pure devotion to the charming prince and went into the deep wood in search of the scarlet rose. The sun began to set and just when all seemed lost she happened upon the rose. She reached for the beautiful bloom but, at the very touch of the thorns, the beautiful princess fell into a deep sleep. The charming prince then appeared. He stood over her body and smiled. It had been his plan all along. He then stole all the princess’ riches and stole away. He had a maiden waiting for him in another kingdom and he left the beautiful princess alone in the deep wood.

The king sent out search parties but to no avail. Months passed until, one day while hunting, the king happened upon a beautiful woman covered in vines. It was his daughter. He tried to wake her but try as he might she would not stir from her deep sleep. The king lamented over his beautiful daughter, taken from him in the prime of life. He called his advisors to him who took the beautiful princess back to the castle. They laid her down in her bed chamber and pondered what to do. His advisors studied her sleep and found that the cause was the poison of the scarlet rose. When they informed the king he begged them to give her an antidote but no such antidote existed. They tried every potion in the kingdom to rouse her but none would wake the beautiful princess. The king’s advisors came to him and told him that all they could do was wait for the poison to run its course. The king, enraged, searched the kingdom for the cause of his daughter’s sleep. He found nothing until he heard word from another kingdom of a young prince whose fortune arose seemingly from nowhere. This was the charming prince that had betrayed her.

The king, then, issued a decree that, from that day forward, should a man wish for his daughter’s hand that man must wait at the kingdom for her to awaken. Men from across the world came to wait for the hand of the maiden of incomparable beauty. The suitors lined the streets of the kingdom. Each trying to prove his worth and so it was.But as the years went by the stories of the princess’ beauty faded from record and the art made in her image was lost. And slowly men began to grow weary of waiting believing that the beautiful princess would never awaken. One by one they left the kingdom. Days turned to months turned to years until the streets, once lined with suitors lie barren. All the suitors had left the beautiful princessSave for one.

A lone knight remained. Knelt at her bedside, he had not budged from the moment he arrived. His armor, heavy with rust, he waited on. Time passed until one fateful day the princess finally awoke. When she opened her eyes, only one knelt before her: the most faithful knight. As he looked in her newly opened eyes, he spoke of what had transpired: The poison, the king’s decree, and how he’d waited for her.But then the most faithful knight said something that surprised her. He spoke of how he had always loved her from afar. He said he had become a knight in hopes of one day serving her in her court. The beautiful princess was moved to tears. She called in her father who was elated to see his daughter in full spirits yet again. Out of his joy, he promised her anything she desired. She said she wished for only one thing: the faithful knight to join her in her court. But not as a knight, but as her husband.They were married the next day and the kingdom rejoiced. And for years to come the kingdom would tell the tale of the beautiful princess and the most faithful knight.