The Beautiful Young Queen

A beautiful young woman walked gracefully through the summer fields.  Though her entourage attended her closely, she walked with long, joyous strides, as freely and independently as a child going off on her own into a world that was ready and waiting to embrace her imagination.  The members of her entourage, however, did not see her as a child.  For she was a queen.  As the young queen crested a hill in the fields she saw at a distance a man sitting alone in tall grass.  It was clear, even from a distance, that he was insane, for he waved his arms and moved his head as though he spoke to a large audience, though there was no one there.

She turned to the company that was with her and said, “You must wait here.  I have found the king who was lost, and I must speak with him alone.”

The queen’s attendants prepared to obey without protest.  They were not afraid for the queen to be alone with the lost king, for he was her own brother-in-law.  Rather, being amazed that the lost king had been found, they all began to talk excitedly among themselves.  Although both the queen’s husband and his brother were kings over their own realms, the brother of the queen’s husband had lost his kingdom and had himself become lost in the days of their youth through rivalries that had occurred at that time.

As the queen approached the lost king, she saw that he was sitting upon a boulder surrounded by the tall grass.  His hair had grown long; his nails had also grown long, so that it would have been impossible for him to fold his hands.  His skin was pale, as one who is ill, yet it was painted with mud and dirt, as though to protect it in its vulnerability, for the king wore but few clothes.