The King's Son
deuteragonist · human
Hears singing across forty miles of nothing, finds a tower with no door, and sits down among the trees to work out what to do.
What they are like
- Kind
- 10/10
- Brave
- 7/10
- Clever
- 6/10
- Honest
- 9/10
- Curious
- 8/10
- Patient
- 10/10
How we meet them
Lost, which is how he is any use at all. Nobody who knew where they were going would have been out there.
Personality
Careful and slow, which is the right speed. He realises four seconds too late that he has frightened her, and then sits on the floor by the window and does not move for two hours.
What they want
He cannot leave her up there, and he cannot get her down, so he brings her the one thing he can: the information that there is an outside.
How they change
Cannot rescue her. Falls into a thorn bush, walks in one direction for two years, and is found.
How they speak
Patiently and in enormous detail. He describes towns, the sea, markets, horses, and the fact that most buildings have doors.
How the story treats them
The story quietly declines to make him a rescuer. He never gets her out. She gets herself out, and then she finds him.
One surprising thing
In the Grimms' version he is blinded by thorns for two years. That has been removed here, but the two years of walking has not.
If they were real today
He would be the friend who cannot fix your situation and keeps turning up anyway.
Things they say
- “So people can go in and out.”
Key moments
He sat down on the floor
Realising four seconds too late that he has terrified a person who has never seen another human being, he sits down by the window and does not move for two hours.
Most buildings have doors
He tells her about towns and the sea and markets, and mentions doors almost in passing, and she asks why, and everything changes.
“So people can go in and out.”
Two years in roughly one direction
He comes off the braid into thorns, gets up half-blind, and walks and asks for two years without knowing which way anything is.
Who they know
Rapunzelfriend
Two hours from opposite sides of the room, on the first evening, and neither of them moves.
Characters like The King's Son
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