They returned to the palace together. The princess was nervous about going inside, but the King kept his arm around her and held her tightly as they walked through the big front doors. Soon the news traveled throughout the palace and everyone hurried to welcome the princess home. She was overwhelmed with their love and genuine concern for her, and she began to realize that they had all worried about her while she was gone. She had not been forgotten.
The princess walked through the halls and rooms that she remembered from her childhood. Little had changed, and it felt good to be home. At last, the King brought her to the throne room and sat her down on a throne next to his.
"Daughter," he said, "I am so happy to have you home. I have missed you so much!"
Even though the princess had seen with her own eyes how happy everyone was to have her home, she still had a hard time believing him.
"You’ve had all the other princes and princesses to make you happy," she said. "I thought you didn’t really love me."
"Oh, no, my dear," the King assured her. "No one could ever take your place."
"But you didn’t come to get me," the princess stated one last time. "If you really loved me, you could have found a way to save me. I could have grown up here, with you, in the castle. I could have gone to school, and learned how to be like you. I could have had a happy childhood if you had only come and rescued me. Instead, I had to live with the dragon!"
"You are right," the King said gently. "You have had a long, hard time. I have worried about you every day since you were taken from me, and wondered what would be the best thing to do for you. But look at you now. You are still alive, you are here, and you have grown into a wonderful young woman all by yourself. Even though yours was not a life either of us would have chosen for you, in the end it has worked out alright. Perhaps the hardest lesson to learn is that today is not the end. There will always be a tomorrow, and things will always get better."
The princess looked at her father for a long time. She knew that what he said was true. She was alive, and finally back home. But she couldn’t be happy about all the years she had missed living in the palace. That did not seem fair to her.
"You look tired, now," the King said. "Would you like to go to your room so you can bathe and rest?"
The princess was taken by a maid to her old bedroom. She was suprised to find that it had been kept exactly the same, as if it was waiting for her to come home. She bathed and put on a new silk gown she found lying on the bed. Then she picked up a brush and stood in front of the mirror to fix her hair. She was amazed to see herself in the glass. She looked so different from the little girl she had been when last she was in this room. Not only was she taller and older; her face had matured, and in her eyes she saw a warmth and gentleness that reminded her of her father. Her dark hair, that had then reached her shoulders, now fell in soft waves far down her back. As she brushed it she studied the crown on her head with wonder. She had not seen it since she looked in the piece of mirror at the woodcutter’s hut. Now she saw that there were gems adorning several golden twists and curlicues. In the center of the crown, a diamond blazed brilliantly. On one side of it, a ruby sparkled, on the other an emerald flashed.
"How did I get this?" she wondered in amazement.
There was a knock at her door, and she found her father standing in the hall, waiting to escort her down to dinner. She took his hand, then stopped and asked, "Daddy, I don’t understand this at all. How did I get this beautiful crown? I haven’t been to school since the dragon kidnapped me. In fact, I’ve forgotten most of the things I knew when I used to live here. Why do I have a crown like this?"
"My dear, you can relearn all the things you used to know when you lived here in the palace, but you have earned that crown by enduring the hard things that have happened to you since you were taken away. You have learned through experience, and you have grown up into a lovely young woman. If you had lived here in the palace all of your life, you would have grown up just as lovely, but you wouldn’t have earned that crown."
The King reached out his hands to his daughter, and she let him take her hands in his. She felt, rather than saw, the roughness of his right hand, and curiously turned it over. The palm of his hand was red and scared. The princess looked up into her father’s eyes, and then down at his hand again. With her finger she traced the outline of her name that had been burned into his hand when he held her necklace, so many years before.
Then, at last, the princess knew that her daddy never had, and never would forget her. He loved her, and he always would.
And they lived happily ever after.
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