“Somebody help me! –“ shouted the little man again.
He was a pixie . Pixies were of the fairy family, but unlike their beautiful siblings, they were ugly and rather clumsy. Pixies also liked to play tricks and were masters at telling lies. The boy raised his ax and cut the spider in two, then with his hunting knife, freed the little man.
“How can I thank you, dear boy?” the pixie fluttered around the boy.
The boy shook his head, for he wanted nothing in return for his help.
“Fly along and be more careful,” the boy said, turning his back on the pixy.
“I insist.” The pixy said, fluttering around and standing on the boy’s nose.
Again and again, the boy turned away from the pixy. He remembered his grandmother’s tales about trickster pixies and how you couldn’t make deals with them or hold them to any promise.
But the tiny pixy did not give up. He became more and more insistent and annoying. By the end of the day, the boy had enough.
“Fine, but whatever deal I make with you will be on my turns,” the boy said sternly.
The pixy smirked and let out a peal of laughter. Before it could find a way to twist things to its preferred ways, the boy lifted a finger and told it, “you go back on our deal, lie, or trick me in any way and I will bring you back to the spider!”
The pixy shuttered and wrapped it’s wings around it.
When the boy saw the pixy wasn’t about to do anymore mischief, he told the pixy about the kingdom and the beautiful princess. The pixie laughed in response. Few people knew that it was the pixies who made up the ability to lie to get out of a deal with the cave trolls . Many thought these were only tales to keep unruly children from lying. But somehow this boy, this innocent boy who knew not the difference between truth or lie knew enough to see through the pixy’s ways of deception.
“Will you help me, or do I take you back to the spider?” the boy asked.
The pixy sighed, “fine. I’ll help you seek an audience with the king, but I will not help you to break the spell.”
The boy nodded, “good enough.”
Before the pixy could complain, the boy tossed it into his knapsack and set off.
When the boy arrived in the kingdom, the people laughed at the sight of his poor and tattered clothes.
“I seek an audience with the king,” the boy said to the guards at the gate.
“What business does someone like you have with the king?” One guard asked. “Audience days are on Wednesday, come back then and make the line like everyone else.”
“I’m here to ask for the princess’s hand in marriage,” the boy said without hesitation.
The guards doubled over with laughter.
“Do as he says, for he is a prince who’s traveled from very far,” the pixy said, now sitting on the boy’s shoulder.
A guard laughed even harder and struck the ground with his spier tip. “If he’s a prince, I’m a flying pig!”
The laughter turned into gasps as the guard turned into a flying pig and flew up, over the tall castle towers and away!
“I can try and brake the curse,” the boy told the guards. “At least let me try.”
The remaining two guards looked at the boy, then nodded at each other. The king's word was law, and whether they wanted it or not, the guards let him into the castle.
One of the guards escorted the boy to the throne room where the king met with his advisors. Years of ling and those lies becoming true had sent the kingdom into parole and the bad times where only getting worse.
“We could increase taxes,” the king said.
“We can’t your majesty, not after the devastating harvest,” an advisor said.
“Then disguise the taxes, call them something like,” the king stroked his fingers through his long beard. “A tribute to the crown!”
The doors opened and the guard walked in, to which the king roared, “what is the meaning of this interruption!”
“This boy claims he can break the curse, in return he wants the princess hand in marriage,” the guard stated.
“This…. Fellow?” the king asked, reddening.
“Dear King, the curse can only be broken by one who knows the truth from the lie. Perhaps he is the one,” The queen quietly said from her throne.
The king grumbled and looked at his advisors, who all nodded in agreement with the queen.
“Very well, if you guess what's true and what's a lie, you'll get my daughter's hand in marriage, if you lose, I'll cut off your head.”
“I will do my best your majesty,” the boy agreed.
The king told the boy a story about a beautiful princess who had been stolen by a witch and imprisoned in a tower. The tower was guarded day and night by the ugliest birds. This way no one would ever dare come close to the tower and see the princess.
But as the princess grew, so did her kindness and beauty. The birds loved her and were her only friends. One day, the princess broke free and ran off into the forest with the help of the birds.
The witch was so angry that she turned the princess into the ugliest bird. The princess kept her freedom, but she was cursed to roam the land as the ugliest bird, not even the other birds came close, for she looked terrifying!
Only he who saw the true beauty within could brake the spell and so it happened. The princess bird was terribly injured during a storm and could no longer fly. A huntsman found her and despite her size and ugliness, he nursed her back to health. His kindness began to unscramble the threads of magic that held the spell together. Soon the princes could turn human, but only at night. She decided to pay her savior’s kindness by cooking for him, keeping the house clean laundering and ironing his clothes and polishing his axes.
Puzzled by who could be doing that, the huntsman pretended to be asleep one night and saw the beautiful princess. He fell madly in love with her. His love was so great that he became ill. Thinking it was something she’d done, the princess flew away one night to never return.
But she too was in love with him, so she couldn’t stay away, no matter how hard she tried. One night, she returned, seeing how sick he was, the princess told him all about her curse.
In that moment, the witch showed up and whisked the princess away!
Desperate to be reunited with her, the huntsman recovered and did not stop searching till he came across the tall tower that looked abandoned. There he saw the princess. She was an ugly thing to be sure, but his heart could only see her radiant beauty, no matter that she was molting and looked sickly. He climbed the tower, thought he window and took the bird-princess in his arms. The moment he kissed her and held her close, the spell broke and she was once again a beautiful princess.
“So, my dear boy, is this tale true, or false?” the king asked, eagerly rubbing his hands. He’d outdone himself and he could tell from the looks of the queen and advisors.
The boy frowned and looked thoughtful. The king’s story seemed familiar, but it felt more like a fairytale, than a true story. He’d also listened to the talk of the people as he came into town.
The pixie, who had hidden itself in the boy’s hair, immediately whispered in the boy's ear, “it's a lie.”
The boy nodded in thanks, he had no doubt the pixie wasn’t tricking him.
“That is a lie,” the boy said. “Here’s what really happened, you didn’t want to give your daughter away, so you told a lie to end all lies. You forgot about the curse and in telling a lie you turned your daughter into an ugly bird. Ashamed of your actions and afraid of what others would think if they saw the princess, you hid her away in the tallest towers where only her servants can see her.”
As soon as the boy said the words something amazing began to happen up in the princess tower. The princess changed, her beak disappeared in a flash of light. In a shower of sparks the feathers turned into a beautiful dress, and the princess became human again.
“The curse is broken!” The princess exclaimed. While her maids cheered, she spun in a circle and couldn’t stop laughing.
“I can talk, I have hands, I have feet, I’m me again!” The princess couldn’t stop talking. She’d been a bird for so long, she’d forgotten what being human felt like.
The maids lead her out of the tower and into the throne room. All the years spent as a bird only made her beauty that much more magnificent.
There was a loud gasp when she entered the room, all were frozen in place, staring at the princess with wonder.
The boy smiled and held out a hand to her.
In spite of the boy’s poor appearance, the princess liked him very much,.
“Thank you for braking the curse,” the princess said humbly.
From that day on, she never again told another lie. Soon, her parents and the royal court began to follow her example.
As time went on, the princess and woodchop’s son fell deeply and truly in love. Before long they had a sumptuous wedding, and for three days they ate and drank and were merry. No one dared to tell a lie again, lest the old witch's curse befall them again. Not long after, the kingdom was renamed the Honest Kingdom and everyone lived happily ever after!
suffer from the past, to long for the future, but to forget the present.
Any unsourced images and writing are my own. Life is worth it!
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