Story of the Foreign Fairy Chapter 34

When our winter comes, the swallows fly to a distant place. In this far away place lived a king. He has 11 sons and one daughter, Alisa. These 11 brothers are all princes. When they go to school, they wear heart-shaped badges on their chests and swords at their sides. They wrote on gold tablets with diamond pens. They can memorize the book from beginning to end and from end to end. People knew they were princes as soon as they heard it. Their sister Alisa sat on a small stool made of mirrors. She had a picture album, which cost half a kingdom to buy.

Ah, these children are very happy; but they will not always be so. Their father is the king of this entire country. He married a wicked queen. She treats these poor children very badly. They could see it the first day. There was a grand celebration throughout the palace, and the children were playing games to entertain the guests. But they did not get the extra snacks and baked apples to eat. She only gave them a teacup of sand; and told them that this was considered delicious food.

A week later, she sent her little sister Alisa to stay with a farmer in the country. After a while she spoke so ill of the poor princes in the king's presence that he no longer cared to talk to them.

"Fly away into the wilds, and make your own living," said the wicked queen. "Fly away like those giant silent birds." But the bad thing she wanted to do did not fully come true. They turned into 11 beautiful wild cranes. They made a strange cry and flew out of the palace window, flying far across the park and into the forest.

Their sister hadn't gotten up yet and was sleeping in the farmer's house. It had not been daylight long when they passed here. They circled on the roof, dropping their long necks this way and that, flapping their wings at the same time. But no one heard or saw them. They have to keep flying forward, flying high into the clouds and far away into the vast world. They flew straight into a large dark forest extending toward the coast.