All Nonfiction
- Bullying
- Books
- Academic
- Author Interviews
- Celebrity interviews
- College Articles
- College Essays
- Educator of the Year
- Heroes
- Interviews
- Memoir
- Personal Experience
- Sports
- Travel & Culture
All Opinions
- Bullying
- Current Events / Politics
- Discrimination
- Drugs / Alcohol / Smoking
- Entertainment / Celebrities
- Environment
- Love / Relationships
- Movies / Music / TV
- Pop Culture / Trends
- School / College
- Social Issues / Civics
- Spirituality / Religion
- Sports / Hobbies
All Hot Topics
- Bullying
- Community Service
- Environment
- Health
- Letters to the Editor
- Pride & Prejudice
- What Matters
- Back
Summer Guide
- Program Links
- Program Reviews
- Back
College Guide
- College Links
- College Reviews
- College Essays
- College Articles
- Back
The King's Lesson
The King’s Lesson
Once upon a time there was a king. He was handsome and rich, and he had many servants. He walked through the castle wearing splendid robes made of golden threads. He was not a bad man, but the people thought he was greedy. They hated him because he had so much more than them.
One day a beautiful girl came to the kingdom. She was the king’s cousin, Annabelle. She lived in the palace with the king and his servants, and read the king stories. The stories she read were all about the kind villagers that lived by the castle. The king loved these stories, and he wanted to meet the villagers. He asked his cousin to arrange a meeting with some of the villagers.
Annabelle brought a man who worked in the fields to see the king. The king prepared a glorious feast for the man. They ate roasted birds, steak, venison, potatoes, corn, vegetables, flaming puddings, and several kinds of wine.
After they ate dinner the king took the man on a tour of the castle. They went to the weapons room, the royal suite, the trophy room, a very large kitchen, a gigantic living room, and even a room full of toys that the king used to play with when he was little.
When the tour was over the king took the man to the throne room and asked him what he thought of the castle. The man replied, “You have brought me here to punish me.”
The king was startled and he said, “I only wanted your company.”
The man said, “You have shown me everything I don’t have. You only want me here to show me how powerful you are.” Then the man stormed out of the castle.
The king was very sad and lay in bed for a week. No one was allowed in the room except his cousin Annabelle. Annabelle comforted the king by reading him more stories about the good townspeople. The king finally asked Annabelle to arrange another meeting.
Annabelle brought a woman to the castle who worked as a seamstress in the town. This time the king prepared only a small dinner made of things the woman could make herself, and he wore his most modest robes. After they ate, instead of taking her on a tour of the castle, the king invited the woman to sit by the fire and listen to Annabelle read. When Annabelle finished her stories they went to the throne room and the king asked her what she thought of their evening. The woman said, “You only brought me here to insult me.”
The king was startled again, “I only wanted to make you feel comfortable here,” he said.
“You didn’t even bother to dress nice for me.” Then the woman left.
The king was so sad that he stayed in his room for over three weeks. The only person allowed in was Annabelle, so she could read him stories about the townspeople. After a while the king didn’t want to hear stories about the townspeople anymore. Annabelle was so distressed she ran out of the castle and cried in the field. A little boy came up to her and asked her why she was crying. She told him about the king and the trouble he had. The boy said he wanted to see the king. Annabelle took him back to the castle to meet the king.
The boy saw the king in his bed and said, “Why are you crying?”
The king looked at the boy and said, “I can’t make anybody happy.”
The little boy replied, “Well why not?”
“I don’t know what anyone likes,” said the king.
“I like toys, and candy, and cake,” said the boy. The king got an idea, and he jumped out of bed and threw on his golden robes. He grabbed the boy’s hand and ran down the hall. They took a left turn and a right turn. They went up stairs and down stairs until they finally stopped in front of a large door. The king opened the door to reveal a room full of toys.
The boy spent the whole day with the king, and he came back the next day. After a while he brought his friends, and with so many good stories about the king the townspeople thought maybe he wasn’t so bad. Soon other people gave the king a chance and he got to know what certain people liked. In the end the king learned how to make new friends, and the townspeople learned not to judge others before they know them. Everyone lived happily ever after.
The End
Similar Articles
JOIN THE DISCUSSION
This article has 4 comments.
"RAZED EXPECTATIONS"
Wisps of smoke danced into the wintry air from my lips, creating ornate designs that could never be replicated. I carefully tilted the corners of my lips into a smile that I meant to be wry. Of course, it's difficult to articulate emotions that I can't feel, but I find that irony is relatively simple to demonstrate. I inhaled the toxic vapors of the cigarette casually. Its sinister, black cancer couldn't cripple a seventeen-year-old boy with no lungs, let alone a heart.
I glanced in the direction of the horizon, and flinched. The sun was dying flamboyantly, casting its radiant colors across the sky. Its last waves of light caressed my cold, pale skin. I wanted to snarl rebelliously as I felt its warmth slide against me deviously.
“Beautiful, isn’t it?”
My muscles went rigid, and I had to focus madly on controlling my shaking hands. I would know that voice, that beautiful, disastrous voice, in the realms beyond that of Earth. I grated my teeth, reeling in the disturbing sensations that she unknowingly always aroused in me.
I cocked my body towards her arrogantly, and lifted my mouth into a crooked crescent moon. I felt my eyes flashing, but I worked vehemently to fixate an arctic, hard tone into the dark of my indigo irises.
“I find the sunset lifeless and meaningless, actually,” I countered flatly, and a beat too late.
She laughed merrily, and I struggled within myself as my mind and body became entranced by the beautiful movement of her laughter as the colors of the sun played about her.
“You amuse me, Darian. How can you have such a pessimistic view of the world? The sun will not be lifeless until it disappears beneath the horizon, and the night falls. It’ll rise tomorrow, though,” she said.
I dared not think of her name. I hated the way my soul-if I had a soul-thrilled when her voice lingered over my name. It reminded me of music. I had to close my mind defiantly as I thought of music. I wanted nothing that resembled passion.
“That’s an inane notion that foolish women entertain. You want poetry, and ridiculous vows of forever. You aren’t difficult to read. If you want that sunset to mean something, then you want unrequited love. It doesn’t work like that,” I growled unmercifully, angry at her for unleashing the flood of feelings upon me.
Her lovely green eyes shifted into hard emeralds.
“What do you know about me, Dare? And what’s so wrong with having dreams? And why are you talking to me like that? I was simply commenting on the sunset.” She tossed her red curls, clearly miffed.
I lifted my chin, and blew smoke in her face. It was easier on me when she was angry. I don’t know why she bothered with me. Why she was brave enough to confront me. Why she didn’t follow the laws of the superficial high school we both attended. Why she didn’t stay away from me, like everyone else.
“You’ll die from that smoking, Darian.” She glared at me. We’d had this argument a lot. I lifted my eyebrows, and turned away from her, signaling that the conversation was over.
She didn’t obey, and I sighed.
“You know, Dare, you could let yourself feel. You could understand it.” Her voice was soft, a whisper in the darkening air. She was air. My air.
I reviled the potency of the emotions I could feel pulsing through me. I ran a hand through my black hair nervously, my body skidding with strange, unfamiliar energy. I didn’t want to answer her. Why didn’t she leave?
I made a fatal mistake when I looked at her. Every nerve inside of me screamed, as though my body and internal organs were recharging hurriedly in the rare moment of my awakening.
I think I felt my heart beat hesitantly.
My voice seemed like that of a stranger. It had a rich, deep tone to it. It had color.
“Understand what?”
Something in my expression changed the way she was looking at me. It may have mirrored the arrangement of my own features. She became vulnerable in that instant.
“Kiss me.” She whispered brokenly.
Surprise jolted keenly through me. God, I wished I was numb again. Everything felt electric-too intense and too vivid. Emotions scattered across my being, a mutinous invasion of the raging war against myself. I was defenseless and an easy prey to her request. I breathed jaggedly, and there was a husky vibe to it. Want. I recognized it more clearly as it bloomed vibrantly through me.
And she was waiting. For me.
I destroyed the walls I had so warily built as I leaned towards her. She lifted a creamy hand and laid it tenderly against my cheek, the expectation making her bold. I moaned, and closed my eyes. My own hands loosened, and reached for her face greedily
Something hot-burning-ignited against my skin. I wrenched myself away, dazed by the unpleasant sensation. Had a spark traveled through our bodies? That’s when I noticed the cigarette kindling like a faint ember beside my marred hand. It had burnt me. The throbbing pain brought a wave of consciousness through me. Reality. And I stared at her face, inches from mine, and something clicked inside of me. Gears that began humming smoothly, like a tuned clock. I pulled back, and tossed her hand away like it stung. I grimaced as the vitals within me slowly resumed their state of nothingness, and shook my head to clear it of its nonsensical ideas.
She watched the change take possession of me, and tears began to collect in her eyes.
I found that I could care less.
I grinned at her, and mocked, “I taste of cigarettes, Clara.”
She got up shockingly to her feet, and backed away as if understanding for the first time what I was. Tears stained her nondescript face.
I smiled, that careful replication of a smile, and said acidly, “Did I humor your silly fantasies well?”
Her face crumpled entirely, and she pivoted away and ran sobbing from my scathing ridicule.
The sun died, and all was dark.
