BACK SCARAB 8' The prince and the sacred scarab Once upon a time a long time ago in a land far, far away, the Prime Minister outside of the throne room pounded his walking stick loudly on the floor and shouted, "Announcing the young Prince Phillip!" Prince Phillip peaked his head around the door, then nervously made his way to the foot of the throne and knelt before the king. "Your Majesty," he said softly. "Speak up, boy!" shouted the king. "Your Majesty, I have a request." said the prince. "I suppose you want to marry my daughter!" shouted the king. "Why, yes! How did you know?!" asked the prince. "Everybody in the kingdom knows you are in love with my daughter!" shouted the king. "Well, then," replied the prince, "May I marry her?" "Sure!" exclaimed the king. "I can?!" exclaimed the prince. "Yes, you can." replied the king, "But first, you must prove that your love for my daughter is true and strong." "How will I do that?" asked the prince. "Go to Egypt and bring me the Sacred Scarab!" exclaimed the king. "As you wish." replied the prince as he backed out of the room, "I shall leave for Egypt at once. And when I return, I shall bring you the Sacred Scarab." After the prince left the throne room, the king and all of his court broke out in uproarious laughter. "He has no idea what the Sacred Scarab is!" laughed the king. "He doesn't even know where Egypt is!" laughed the Prime Minister. "He has no idea what he's getting into!" said the queen. The next day, the prince came to the palace to say goodbye to the princess. "Please don't go!" exclaimed the Princess. "I must!" exclaimed the prince, "Without the Sacred Scarab, the king won't let me marry you!" "But you don't understand!" exclaimed the princess, "Noone expects you to find the Sacred Scarab! Explorers have been searching for it for thousands of years and noone has even come close to finding it! Many people think that the Sacred Scarab is just a myth, that it doesn't even exist!" "Then, why would the king send me to Egypt to bring it back?" asked the prince. "He doesn't expect you to bring it back!" exclaimed the princess, "He doesn't want you to marry me." "I... I don't understand. Why not?" asked the prince. "My father is a jealous man." replied the princess, "Some even say he's paranoid." "Paranoid?" asked the prince. "Yes." replied the princess, "He thinks that everyone is plotting against him to take away his crown and his throne. He thinks that the first thing you'll do after you marry me is kill him and become king yourself." "But I would never do that!" exclaimed the prince. "I know that." replied the princess, "But my father thinks you will. And he will do everything in his power to prevent you from marrying me. He's quite sure that you'll never return alive from Egypt. That's why he dared you to go!" "I MUST go!" replied the prince, "I can't imagine life without you. Farewell, my darling princess!" And with that, the prince went across the sea toward Egypt. Now, the prince was not experienced in battle, nor was he experienced in exploration or treasure hunting. But he was very smart. Knowing what the princess told him about the king's paranoia, he assumed that the king would not wait for pirates to attack him on the high seas, or for Egyptian bandits to ambush him in the sand doons. He assumed that the king would send soldiers and even the palace guards pretending to be pirates and bandits in order to keep the prince from succeeding. He was right. Within three days after leaving his home port, the prince saw the sails of another sailing ship approaching from the rear. But when the ship tried to come along side of the prince's ship, his sailors popped up from behind the gunwales and threw bottles of lamp oil at the attacking ship. Within seconds, the bottles crashed on the deck of the enemy ship and caught fire. Minutes later, the entire ship was on fire and the king's soldiers were swimming for their lives. When the prince arrived in Egypt, he had the captain sail the ship up the Nile River to the city of Geeza, where the tombs of the Pharaohs were covered by the sand doons. The prince had asked the advice of the wise men of his day. They all thought that, if the Sacred Scarab even existed, it would surely be in one of the many pyramids at Geeza. But the prince decided that, since that's where everybody had been looking for the Sacred Scarab for thousands of years without success, he would look elsewhere. When he arrived at Geeza, he noticed several men following him into the sand doons. These men did not look like Egyptians. Egyptians are dark skinned. These men were light skinned, like the king's palace guards. So, he ran. And they ran. He ducked behind a sand doon. Suddenly, the sand under his feet began to sink. A moment later, he fell through a hole in the ground and landed in a dark cave down below. Then a large stone fell into the opening above and the hole was plugged. In the darkness below, the prince could hear the palace guards talking to each other above. "Did you see that?!" asked one of them, "The ground just swallowed up the prince. He's dead for sure. Our job here is done. Let's go home and tell the king that the prince is dead." It was pitch black in the hole, but the prince did not light his torch until he knew the guards were gone for good. When the fire grew bright, the prince could see that he had fallen into a room that was built by men. It had cut stone walls, floors and ceilings. There were paintings on all the walls that seemed to tell stories about the Egyptians of old. The paintings showed boats on the Nile River carrying what looked like a casket into the sand doons. They showed kings from other lands also coming to the sand doons bringing gifts to the dead Egyptian King. The procession of kings covered the entire wall and continued around the corner. In the next room, the prince discovered the same casket as the one pictured on the boat on the Nile River. This underground room was a tomb, the tomb of an Egyptian king! When the prince brought his torch to the casket, he saw hundreds of the gold gifts that were in the pictures. But he was not interested in the gold. He wanted the Sacred Scarab. But what was the Sacred Scarab?! Noone back home seemed to know what it looked like, just that it was very unusual and very valuable. So, the prince looked around at the gifts from visiting kings until he found the one that looked the most unusual: it was a huge beetle -- the size of a large grapefruit -- with gold wings covered in emeralds, gold legs covered with diamonds, antennae of strings of pearls, mouth parts of sapphires and eyes of rubies. This was the Sacred Scarab! It was sitting on a pedestal all by itself. When the prince picked it up, the ground shook, the sand under the pedestal began to sink, and when the pedestal had disappeared, a section of the wall near the pedestal fell into the hole. All this movement uncovered a secret staircase that led to the sand doons above. After the sand stopped moving, the prince climbed the staircase with the Sacred Scarab in his backpack. After he began walking back to the ship, he felt the ground shake again and heard the sand shifting again. When he looked back, the sand doons had covered the secret staircase again. Noone would ever find the kings tomb again! Back home, the Prime Minister outside of the throne room pounded his walking stick loudly on the floor and shouted, "Announcing the young Prince Phillip!" "That's impossible!" shouted the king as he sprang to his feet, "He's dead! My guards told me that the Egyptian sand doons swallowed him up!" Then, Prince Phillip walked into the throne room holding the Sacred Scarab at arm's length toward the king. "Your Majesty," he smiled, "I..." Upon seeing the prince alive, the king died of shock. Prince Phillip married the princess and became King Phillip and they all lived happily ever after. ©2008 Bob Snook. Conditions for use: This story is free. Pay no fees or royalties. Do not sell this story or rewrite it. You may reproduce and distribute this story freely, but all copies must contain this copyright statement. http://www.bobsnook.org/kid email: bob@bobsnook.org BACK |