THRICE Upon a Time...

2. Stuff Prince Charmings

Sleeping Beauty's Tale:

The hollow echo of Prince Valore's footsteps on the hard concrete of the palace floor rebounded off the walls. The Prince glanced cautiously around. He could hear no noise. The rooms were silent.

Prince Valore was an exotically handsome young man, his French looks inherited from his French parents. He had only recently transferred from France, and although he hardly spoke a word of English, many girls fell at his feet, captivated by his tall, muscular figure, big round hazel eyes and thick tangle of curly toffee hair.

He had heard of an enchanted palace, where huge shoots of thorns grew to protect the princess and her servants who lay slumbering within. Many princes had attempted to slash their way through before, but none of them had managed to defeat the sharp spikes.

Even so, when his father's friend, Lord Fondement, took a bet as to whether Valore could or could not enter the enchanted palace, Valore immediately nodded his head yes. He was umemployed, poor, and he refused to disappoint Lord Fondement. Plus, the money bet was plenty, which was simply a bonus.

When Valore arrived at the foot of the twisting green thorns on Lord Fondement's fabulous white horse, he glanced nervously up at the huge hedge of  over-grown vegetation. These thorns have defeated many before him, and they would not go easy on him.

Valore was extremely strong, and, as his tanned muscles rippled under his tight white shirt, he began to hack through the thorns with his father's glittering silver sword. Howver, to his dismay, as soon as the first thorn snapped in half, another even taller, even spikier one grew up beneath it.

"This is no good." Valore decided several hours later. The sun was high up in the sky, and sweat pooled onto his collar. He wiped his mouth with the edge of his shirt and he gulped down some water from a plastic bottle which he had carried in a large backpack.

Now, Valore may not have quite so wide a range of vocabulary, but he was not a stupid boy. He suddenly remembered that his mother had once told him that plants loved classical music. Valore himself was a great musician (or so he hoped to become), and he always carried his little ukulele around with him.

Valore pulled his ukulele out of the backpack, sat on a rock, and played a few chords. Then he began to sing:

"O-o-o-o-o-h thorns

O-o-o-o-o-h thorns

Let me in, in, in in in in in~~~

Please let me in~~~

Mo-oney, do it for mone-e-e-ey~~~~"

Okay, so it wasn't that genius a song, but it did the trick.

Valore's eyes grew as big as dinner plates, for suddenly the thorns had started swaying. Row after row of giant long thorns. They bowed their great thick heads, and shook their spikes in time to the music. And then slowly they parted, revealing a perfect passage to the palace door.

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So here he was, inside the famous sleeping palace.

The ground was coated with dust, and spiders skuttled around the corners. Valore knew that the only thing for him to do now would be to find the sleeping princess and wake her from her sleep...somehow.

Valore was thoroughly creeped out by the castle.

It wasn't that there weren't any people---there were. Heaps of them.