Chapter 1

1

Many years ago, in a kingdom far away, there lived a young prince. This prince was very handsome, and everybody in the kingdom loved him. His father, the king, doted on the young man, and did everything he could to make the boy happy. His mother, the queen, adored her prince, and devised new and special gifts for him every day. The subjects of the kingdom brought offerings to the prince, and served at his pleasure, without a single complaint. The prince, being a good man, responded in kind and treated everybody fairly and with respect. But, much to his father’s confusion and his mother’s disappointment, there was one thing the prince never did.

He never smiled.

Finally, unable to tolerate his son’s dour expression any longer, the king sent out a decree. He dispatched messengers to every corner of his country, and runners to all the neighboring kingdoms. The first person to make his hard-faced child smile would earn the right to marry him.

Unfortunately for the king, things did not go as planned…

* * * *

“This is stupid.”

“Hush. She’s not stupid.”

Prince Leopold leaned closer to his mother. “I never said shewas stupid. I said thisis stupid. Bribing women to come to court to make fools of themselves is pointless.”

The queen brought the fan up to her mouth, shielding it from view. “You know that your father is not going to change his mind about this. He just wants to see you happy.”

Leo believed his mother, but that didn’t make the situation any less ridiculous. The kind thing to do—the merciful thing—would be to send the girl back to her home with a couple of pieces of gold. Some sort of token payment for her effort and the time she spent traveling to the castle. He had to give her credit for originality—he had never seen such a risqué puppet show before, but he certainly did not want to watch something so explicit in front of his mother and everybody else in the long hall. It was all he could do to keep the grimace from his face.

As far as he knew, this was not the last young woman waiting for her turn to perform. Leo liked to make a game of predicting the new extremes the girls would go to. If the morning brought naughty puppets, what could the afternoon bring? He hoped it wasn’t anything that would embarrass his mother or cause the girl injury.

“I’m not feeling well, Mother.”

“Leo…”

“I think something from this morning disagreed with me.”

“You can’t leave in the middle of her…performance.”

“Is this only the middle?”

Celeste sighed. “You’ll wait until she’s finished. It’s only polite.”

“I’m not interested in being rude, Mother. But she’s not going to make me smile. We’re wasting everybody’s time.”

“How do you know that?” Celeste shook her head. “Okay, well sheprobably won’t, but that doesn’t mean the entire day is a waste.”

“I’m to go hunting tomorrow. If I can’t prepare, then the whole day iswasted.”

“Fine. You may leave when she’s done.”

Winning the small victory didn’t actually make Leo feel better. His mother tried to hide it, but it was clear that she did consider the day wasted, and she was disappointed. As a child, sensing there was something amiss, he had tried to smile for her. Repeatedly. The result had never been what he would call a stunning success. Once, he had reduced her to tears over it.

He heard the servants whisper of a deformity. Something wrong with him. Something that twisted his face in a permanent frown. The more superstitious servants used a different word. Curse. Somebody had put a curse on King William’s only son. A witch wanted to destroy the throne. The rumors didn’t bother him now, but as a child, they had been devastating. More than once he had been sure his mother would send him away and never let him return home.

The girl refused to make eye contact with him. This was not uncommon. Most people were too shy, too respectful, too intimidated, to meet the eye of royalty. But the puppeteer’s tendency went beyond that. She would acknowledge the Queen with a shy smile and a bob of her head. Her eyes would roam the wide hall, searching for response and laughter. But as soon as those eyes fell on him, she would glance away quickly. As though she could not even stand the sight of him.

Nerves? Or something else?

His father going to the extremes to find somebody who could make Leopold smile only made the rumors worse. That’s how they break the curse. Mark my words, if he doesn’t smile before he turns twenty-five, this kingdom is doomed. It was difficult to know which came first, the rumor or the King’s stubborn demands for a smile, for a laugh, for anything besides a dour expression.