Once upon a time, a boy was born with a birthmark that looked like a duck. To his parents, the significance of the mark was very clear: the boy was meant to grow up and marry the princess, and become king.
For a long time, no one but the boy (whom they called Fortune) and his parents took the prophecy very seriously. The king and queen especially, repeatedly assured their daughter that there was no good reason she should have to marry Fortune, who was growing up to be very arrogant and obnoxious. However, the Princess Fanny, who wasn’t the most pleasant girl around either, worried more and more as she got older. Maybe her parents didn’t actually expect her to marry Fortune, but the other kids could talk about nothing else, and Fortune himself treated her as though they’d been married for years.
So as her sixteenth birthday drew near, the Princess summoned Fortune, and told him that if he was really to marry her, he would have to go to the giant treacherous mountain that bordered the kingdom, and steal three biscuits from the Terrible Monster that lived atop it.
Fortune vowed he would bring them to her, smacked her on her rear end, and took off.
Truly, the journey was long. And hard. And tiring. After walking about half the day, Fortune collapsed next to a lake. He quickly ate all the food he had brought for the journey, and drank all his water. Then, he fell asleep and did not wake until it was dark out.
On the lake, a light glowed faintly.
Finally, boat drew near him, steered by the largest meercat he’d ever seen. On the way across the lake, Fortune tried to make friendly conversation, but no matter what he said, the meercat only complained in a high pitched voice about his lot. He’d been rowing for years, he said, back and forth and back forth. Whenever he tried to leave, his feet would refuse to move.
Finally, Fortune just said “Sucks for you,” and was pushed off the boat near the shore.
The journey up the mountain was longer and harder than anything Fortune had ever done, and by the time he reached the top, he hated Princess Fanny. Quite a lot.
There was a cave atop the mountain, and from the cave came the most fearsome noise Fortune had ever heard: the crunching of bones, the slurping of blood, a deep satisfactory sigh. Hoping that the noise meant the beast had only just eaten, Fortune entered the cave.
The End…For Now
Source: The Devil and the Three Golden Hairs, Brothers Grimm
