Page 8 - Three of Happiness

“Just a minute,” said the Elf, “I did not say that I was finished.”
“What... you mean there are more tasks? You are being just too unreasonable. I just can’t believe there are more tasks,” the Queen screamed.
“Just one more task,” said the Elf. The Queen sighed in relief. “Just one more?” “Is that it?” she demanded. “If I can do these others, I can do one more.” “Good, good,” the Elf replied.
“Queen, you must go throughout the kingdom and without threats or bribes, you must raise an army of peasants. You must then take your army to the Black Forest and...” The Elf paused and the Queen finished
the sentence.
“And run off the dragon,” she said in a hushed tone.
“Yes,” replied the Elf, “and run o the dragon.”
As you might imagine, the Queen was very upset and said so in very vivid terms. To which the Elf smiled and replied, “You don’t have to do it. But if you don’t, I can’t give you the Key.” “Well then,” snarled the Queen, “I guess I will just have to do it!”
The Queen then went back to the castle and assembled all of her advisors. She was determined to get into the Tree of Happiness no ma er what it took. She therefore began to tell her assembled advisors of her plans. “I want to build a road, a wide road covered with stone from one end of the kingdom to the other.
Her advisors looked at each other in disbelief. The Queen wanted to do something that had never been done before. This was very different and they were
quite uncomfortable.
“But your majesty,” said one of the elder advisors, “This is a very di cult task you wish. It will take a long me and cost much money. Besides, we have no knowledge of how to build such a road.” Everyone shook their heads in agreement. She could hear the mumbling in the group, “Too much money,
too much me and much too di cult.” “Dear Queen,” said another advisor, “You really don’t need such a road. You almost never leave the castle and all your friends are here.”
“None of you understand,” she said. ‘’I must have the road.” ‘’Oh no!” they said, almost all at the same time. The chairman of the advisors stood and said, “It is our opinion that this road idea is a bad idea and should not be considered any longer.” And with that, he sat down with a very sa s ed look on his face.
It sounds like the Queen is going to have trouble doing her ‘Tasks.’
Page 7