Sleeping Beauty
A christening curse, a hidden spindle, and a castle asleep for a hundred years
Page 1
In a kingdom of green hills and a shining river, a king and queen who had longed for years for a child were at last blessed with a baby daughter. Their joy was so great that they threw open the castle gates and invited the whole land to a magnificent christening feast. Bells rang, banners flew, and from every town and village the people streamed up to the castle to celebrate the little princess who had been so long awaited. The king, beaming with happiness, resolved to invite the kingdom's good fairies too, to bless his daughter with every gift a child could wish for.
Page 2
The christening was the grandest the kingdom had ever seen. In the great hall, before all the court, the good fairies came one by one to the cradle to give their gifts: beauty, grace, kindness, a singing voice, wit and wisdom. Each touched her wand to the sleeping baby and spoke a gentle blessing, and the whole hall sighed with delight. The king and queen watched with brimming hearts, certain that no child had ever been so richly blessed or so dearly loved as their little daughter on this happy, golden day.
Page 3
But one old and powerful fairy had been forgotten, and she swept into the hall in a fury at the slight. Drawing herself up before the whole silent court, she declared a cruel fate: when the princess grew to be a young woman, she would prick her finger on the spindle of a spinning wheel and fall down dead. The court gasped in horror. But one good fairy had not yet given her gift — and though she could not undo so strong a curse, she could soften it. The princess would not die, she promised gently; instead she would fall into a deep sleep of a hundred years, until a prince should come to wake her.
Page 4
To save his beloved daughter, the king gave a desperate command: every spinning wheel and spindle in the whole kingdom was to be gathered up and destroyed, so that the princess might never come near one. In the great town square the people brought out their spinning wheels by the cartload, and a huge bonfire was lit. For years afterward not a single spindle could be found anywhere in the land, and the princess grew up happy and safe, cherished by everyone, while the memory of the old curse slowly faded into a story people only half believed.
Page 5
The years passed, and the princess grew into a kind and curious young woman. One day, exploring the oldest part of the castle, she climbed a narrow winding stair she had never noticed before and came to a little door at the very top of a forgotten tower. Behind it, in a small dusty room, sat an old woman quietly spinning thread on a spinning wheel — for this one old soul, far from the world, had never heard the king's command. The princess, who had never in her life seen such a thing, watched in fascination, and asked if she might try the strange and pretty whirling wheel herself.
Page 6
The moment the princess touched the spindle, she pricked her finger — and at once, just as the good fairy had foretold, she sank down into a deep and peaceful sleep. And in that same instant the gentle magic spread out across the whole castle, so that the king and all his court, the guards on the walls, the cook in the kitchen, the horses in the stable, even the fire on the hearth and the birds in the air, all drifted softly to sleep exactly where they were. A great silence settled over everything, and a hedge of roses and thorns began to grow up all around, until the sleeping castle was hidden from the world to wait for its hundred years to pass.
Page 7
A hundred years went by. The great hedge of roses and thorns grew tall and thick and wild, climbing higher than the castle towers themselves, until the sleeping castle vanished altogether behind it and became no more than a legend. Now and then, over the long years, a bold young man would hear the old story of the sleeping princess hidden within and come to try his luck — but the hedge was too high and too dense for anyone to pass, and so the castle slept on, silent and secret, while the seasons turned and turned and the world outside quite forgot it was ever there at all.
Page 8
At the end of the hundred years, a young prince came riding through that country and heard the old tale of the castle and the sleeping princess beyond the thorns. Something in the story drew him, and he resolved to try where so many had failed. But as he approached the great hedge, a wonderful thing happened: the thorns, as if they had only been waiting for him, drew back of their own accord, and the roses opened to make a clear green archway before him. Marvelling, the prince walked through the parting hedge and into the silent, sleeping castle beyond.
Page 9
Through the still and silent castle the prince walked, past sleeping guards and dozing courtiers, until at last he came to the finest chamber of all, where the princess lay peacefully asleep just as she had for a hundred years, as lovely and as fresh as the day the enchantment fell. The prince, moved by the sight, knelt and gently took her hand — and at that very moment the hundred years came to their end, and the spell was broken. The princess opened her eyes, and woke, and smiled up at him as if she had known him all her life. And all through the castle, in the very same instant, everyone else awoke too, and the long sleep was over at last.
Page 10
The whole castle came joyfully back to life, and the news spread across the land that the sleeping princess was awake at last and had found her prince. A great wedding was held, grander even than the christening a hundred years before, and the king — who had slept all those years and woke no older — gave his daughter's hand with tears of happiness. The townsfolk, whose own great-great-grandparents had once wept at the curse, now crowded up to the castle to cheer the waking kingdom and its beloved princess. And so, after the longest sleep in all the world, the princess and her prince began their life together, and the whole land rejoiced.
About this story
- Audience: kids (ages 6–12)
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