There once was a little princess whose mother and father loved her quite dearly. But the princess had a secret that no one in the kingdom could know. Her heart was made of stone. She knew with all her being from a young age that something was not right. She could run, jump and play just the same as the other kids but it always seemed like something was weighing her down. All the King’s doctors could not fix the princess’s heart. First, they tried the finest chocolate in all the kingdom, hoping the sweetness would coax the princess’s heart back to normal. But alas it only gave her a stomach ache. They then tried hiring the funniest court jester in hopes that laughter would, in fact, be the best medicine. But alas the jester could not make the princess laugh. The doctors began to worry that perhaps nothing could be done to help the princess. The king and queen mourned dearly for their hopeless daughter. Until one day the oldest man in all the kingdom was brought to the princess. He said he had met a man many years earlier whose heart, like the princess’s, was also made of stone. The old man said that the princess had a special heart. It was not bad to have a heart of stone but rather a gift. You see a stone is what builds the world. It was the first tool of man he said, building empires and kingdoms just like the one she was meant to rule. A wet stone can sharpen even the dullest sword he told the young princess who had a great deal of confusion on why this was so important. The old man told the princess not to be ashamed of her heart for it would build cities and defend those cities when necessary. Never again was the princess concerned with her stone heart.
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