King Melon

Once upon a time there was a king who loved melons very much and that’s why he was called King Melon. His gardeners tried for years to grow melons. The king himself, who loved to watch the plants sprout and raise their creeping stems out of the ground, would sow the seeds brought over from far away places and would patiently care for them, but the melons that sprouted would rot in the field before ripening. The queen, although she shared the king’s concern with the melons, wanted to have a baby, especially because she was not that young anymore and she thought she would have no one to comfort her in her old age.

 One day, the king’s page, Butterbur, could not wake up early in the morning to draw the melon-painted curtains from the king’s bedchamber so that the powerful sunlight would not disturb his master, even though the big cricket sleeping under his pillow chirped and chirped. The king woke up with the hot rays on his face and saw the bare windows and the sun ruthlessly pouring its light through the crystal windows.

-“Butterbuuuuuur!” The page was sleeping in his closet, dead tired from watering the melons all day long. He jumped up and made haste to the king’s chamber. He understood at once why he had been called.
 -“Forgiveness, Your Highness, I couldn’t wake up because…”

 -“Shut up, you fool! If something like this ever happens again, I will send you to the woods to raise the pigs and I’ll bring Cutterbur, the keeper of the pigs, to take your place!”
 Butterbur drew the curtains, painted with rows of watermelons, and walked out wistfully.

He left and got into the barrel used for watering the garden, in which he took his daily bath, and started to ponder. The keeper of the pigs was the only person he hadn’t asked why the king’s melons would not grow. What if he went and asked him… you never know where the answer might come from. He got out of the barrel, got dressed and set out in his used-up car towards the woods looming in the distance. There the king’s pigs were guzzling beechmust.

 Butterbur found Cutterbur, the keeper of the pigs, but not without some trouble, and told him:

 -“Our king likes melons and we’ve been toiling for years to grow melons; but after their fruits appear they start rotting and we get nothing out of our work. Do you happen to know if there’s anything we can do about this?”

 -“Maybe it rains too much for them”, said the keeper of the pigs. “Come back tomorrow and I will have some seeds brought all the way from the Green Country, which is famous for melons, but I just have to look for them.”

Butterbur thanked him and returned to the castle. Weary from worrying about the melons and from the long trip in his rumbling car, he couldn’t wake up the next day either to fulfil his duties to the king.

   The king woke up with the sun on his face again as in the previous morning and roared “Butterbuuuuuur”, the crystal windows broke to pieces and the entire chamber was filled with shivers tiny as the sand. The page opened the door and the king and the queen were sitting up in their golden bed, stupefied, covered in a shiny dust in the bright light of the sun. Butterbur could not handle this awesome sight and fell down unconscious.

But this did not tame the king. Immediately Butterbur had to throw all of his clothes and belongings into the car and start off towards the woods where Cutterbur, the keeper of the pigs, lived.

-“You came!” rejoiced the keeper of the pigs when he saw the page. He ran into his cottage and brought a small bag, unopened, and said:

-“Take this to the king and tell the gardeners to sow the seeds tomorrow!”

-“The king ordered that you go to the castle and be his page instead of me, and for me to take care of the pigs, said poor Butterbur.”

 -“Hmm, let’s go together and my brothers can take care of the pigs.”

Butterbur thought the king would forgive him if he gave him the seeds so he didn’t say much else. The two of them entered the car that was very heated by the sun and set off on the dusty road to the castle.

 When they arrived, King Melon was in the throne room, holding a council meeting with the great adviser Stinging-Nettle. Upon seeing them, the king became red with anger and the adviser lifted his long and spiky beard from his chest and gave them a squinting look, full of disdain.
 Butterbur kneeled on the carpet holding the bag up towards the king:

 -“Melon seeds from the Green Country, Your Highness!”
 The king stretched out his hand to take the bag; wanting to harshly reprove them for not obeying his command, he kept it stretched, but something inside of him would not let him do that. He grabbed the bag, opened it and toppled the black seeds over a tray.

-“Well start sowing, and if this time the melons fail to grow, your heads will take their place on this tray.”

 Cutterbur and Butterbur prepared the field and sowed the seeds and the small plants sprouted quickly and started to grow in creeping stems. The melons appeared, green they were, but then the gardeners noticed the same weird thing happening, the barely ripened fruits began to rot.

 The two pages were walking on the field turning and twisting the melons on all sides when to their joy, they saw that there was a healthy melon perfectly ripened. When the time came for it to be eaten, the two pages picked it, put it on a golden tray and presented it to the king and the entire court.

 On one hand, the king was happy because for years there have been no melons on his field, and on the other hand he was upset: only one single melon in the entire field? He took the big silver knife and wanted to prick the melon’s rind but the melon slid and rolled under the chairs and through the hallways into the gun room.

It kept hiding and then reappearing, and when someone thought they had it, the melon continued to roll head over heels. It finally rolled until it reached the king’s chamber and landed on a curtain covering the floor, so that no matter how much they looked for it, nobody noticed it.

 The king bent down and set the curtains aside looking carefully under the bed and yet, nothing! At nightfall he stopped looking and went to bed. He locked the doors and his servants kept on looking for the melon throughout the entire castle. They looked for it till morning, when they collapsed frustrated and dead tired.

The next morning nobody was able to draw the curtains at the windows, but the king was not upset anymore. The sunlight fell right on the melon that was on the curtain and it was the first thing the king saw when he woke up.

 -“Goodness gracious, there it is!” said the astonished king.

 -“Knock, knock!” Butterbur and Cutterbur came in pale as a ghost and shaking:

 -“Your Highness, the melon vanished into thin air!”

 -“You will vanish, you fools, soon enough. Take it away!” and he pointed to the melon.

 The two pages lifted the melon and took it away and then the king joined them to split the melon and eat it. But when he stretched his knife towards it, the melon slid again and started rolling, and the advisers began to follow it again. As the day before, when they thought they had it, the melon would find a way out and roll either under an armchair or a table or behind some statues. At one time, the great advisor cut in front of it, saying:

-“There’s no way you can escape now!” but the melon slipped between his legs and the great advisor fell backwards and landed on the biggest staircase in the throne room.

 After this trick, the melon reached a summer house where the queen was sitting and knitting. It hid at her feet, under her wide silk skirts. After she finished sewing she lifted her arms and stretched them to loosen them, got up and fell on the melon. The melon turned a little bit and the queen giggled. Then the melon started spinning her about the summer house and the queen loved this and was laughing out loud. The ladies of honour rushed to see why the queen was laughing and were taken aback to see her spinning around on the melon.

-“Enough, for I am getting dizzy!” she shouted and the melon stopped. Then she went into her chamber with the ladies of honour and the melon went rolling with them in between their skirts.  

 The queen went to the mirror. She took the melon and laid it on her belly, turned around and took a look at herself from the side, sighing. Then the melon entered her womb and she became a pregnant woman, ready to give birth. The queen and the ladies got scared but in the same time they were happy. 

 The queen sat down on the throne with the ladies of honour next to her, while the king and the courtiers were under the table searching for the melon. She smiled and said:

 -“Stop searching, the melon is with me!”

 Great was the king’s astonishment. He wondered what the queen would give birth to if inside of her was a melon. But when he touched her belly, he felt a living creature moving exactly like a baby in its mother’s womb.

Shortly after that, the queen gave birth to a big beautiful son. The king was beside himself with joy and they feasted and partied for three days. They named him Prince Charming Meloan and he grew in one year as others would in seven years.

 After the birth of the boy, the melons started to grow and to ripen on the king’s field with no trouble at all. King Melon’s melons were so sweet and tasty that they were heard of beyond the borders of their country. The neighbouring king, Deadly Nightshade, asked for seeds.

Cutterbur and Butterbur, by now great advisers, sent him some, but on his land nothing sprouted from the seeds. Enraged, King Deadly Nightshade set out with his army to lay waste the fields of king Melon.

 King Melon got very upset. Being the peaceful king that he was, he was not very skilful in regard to war, but Prince Charming Meloan said to him:

-“Don’t worry, father!” and whistled once, and all the melons in the field came out and formed an army rolling towards King Deadly Nightshade’s army, their enemy. The melons rolled at such speed that they knocked the soldiers backwards. Meanwhile, Prince Charming Meloan fired shots from his musket from behind the melons. The battle was over in one day and the enemy’s army was knocked down.

A year passed by and King Deadly Nightshade set out against King Melon again. This time his army was twice as big but the neighbour’s melons were also a few hundred times more numerous.

The king’s soldiers made catapults for melons and struck the enemies until they destroyed them.

King Deadly Nightshade would not give up. He summoned the state council and decided to first of all destroy the melons, and then King Melon. But how would they do this?
 They sent an army of hungry hamsters to invade the king’s fields and nibble on the melons. But great was King Deadly Nightshade’s surprise when he saw Prince Charming Meloan coming towards him with an army of huge hamsters, their bellies full of melons, fat, satiated and holding guns in their paws. A terrible battle began.

 All of a sudden, during the fight, a rider on a white horse showed up, with long locks of hair emerging from beneath his helmet. He took off his helmet and lo and behold: King Deadly Nightshade’s daughter, so much more beautiful than even the most beautiful sunrise! The girl started shouting:

 -“Hey, Prince Charming, stop the fight for I want to be your wife!”
 Prince Charming tried to look at her but had to shade his eyes because of her great beauty. Immediately he stopped the fight and they made peace. He went back with the princess and her father, King Deadly Nightshade, to King Melon’s palace.

There they had a wedding that lasted three days and three nights. King Deadly Nightshade offered them a quarter of his kingdom, but after a while, being the miser that he was, asked to have it back. This only made Prince Charming and his wife laugh. They gave him back the lands, this time full of melons and lived happily. Who knows, maybe they still do today, in case they haven’t died yet.