Bold Tales of Brave-Hearted Boys

by Susannah McFarlane

  Just as he was tiring, his sword ripped through the last cluster and Leo saw what it had been hiding—two gatehouses to the sides of a long and narrow stone bridge, which spanned a deep, tree-filled ravine and led to an imposing castle.

  Leo climbed off his horse and led it as he approached the bridge, his whole body tingling with excitement. He slashed at the thorny creepers covering the door of a gatehouse and pushed with all his strength to open it. Inside he found two armor-clad guards, crossbows still in hand, slumped on the floor. He checked their chests. They were still breathing: they were asleep. Leo looked up at the castle. The tallest tower, entwined in brambles, flew a tattered royal flag.

  It hadn’t been just a story! Leo had found the castle of the sleeping princess.

  Leo looked up the castle’s wall, calculating the height of the tower. Shouldn’t take too long, he thought as he approached it and grabbed hold of the thorny branches, his hands protected by his thick riding gloves, then began to climb. But as he reached the top, a black raven swooped at him, pecking viciously at his hands. It swooped again and Leo swung at it, using his tennis backhand stroke to send it tumbling away. Leo pulled himself up onto the stone window ledge and looked in. There on a bed, surrounded by dry, dead flowers, was a girl in a blue dress. Leo couldn’t help but also notice a cello and a royal tennis racquet leaning against the wall. “It really is the princess!” he exclaimed. “How terrible! All the things she could have been doing. I must break the curse.”

  Just then the raven returned, pecking at his eyes. Leo swiped at it again, but this time he lost his grip on the brambles and fell from the ledge as the raven swooped back up into the sky. Luckily he managed to grab hold of some brambles and break his fall just before he hit the bottom.

  “That was close!” he said. “Now I need to find that evil fairy. Perhaps if I can get inside the castle…”

  But then there was a ferocious crack of thunder from the sky, and although it was the middle of the day, everything went dark.

  Leo’s horse whinnied nervously and he jumped onto its back, a tremor of nerves shooting through his body. What would happen next? Leo didn’t have to wait long to find out.

  “Who dares disturb my accursed castle?” shrieked a voice.

  Leo looked up to see a figure, taller than three women and dressed in a swirling purple-and-black winged cape, with a horned crown on her head, standing on top of the castle’s highest turret. She held a long scepter, which she now pointed at Leo.

  “The evil fairy. Yes!” said Leo.

  The fairy grew taller still, and now there was a flash of lightning.

  The thorny briars clutching the castle walls sprang out, as if alive, and curled toward Leo on the bridge. Leo again took up his sword, and he struck at them powerfully, sending them flying to either side of him.

  The fairy, enraged, raised her scepter again and sent showers of fire down onto the bridge, igniting the brambles.

  Flames began to lick around Leo’s boots, but the prince stood his ground, using his shield to deflect the fiery darts the evil one rained down upon him and his horse.

  Now the trees in the ravine caught fire, and the enchantress raised her scepter again, unleashing a lightning bolt that struck the bridge in front of Leo right between him and the castle, the stone crumbling into the flames below.

  “You will not proceed!” the enchantress bellowed. “My curse will stand. You will concede!”

  Prince Leo knew he wouldn’t concede. Everything he’d trained for had prepared him for this moment.

  “That’s not the way we do things in my family,” he said as he prodded his horse firmly, backtracked a little, and then charged toward the breach in the bridge. With a flying leap, he landed on the other side.

  The enchantress, incensed, transformed into a huge black-and-purple dragon, spraying a hideous green slime from its mouth and hurling fireballs from its claws. The dragon swept down and landed beside Leo. It belched a torrent of green slime at him, but he used his shield and held strong, deflecting it. The slime hit the castle wall, blasting through the stone.

  That was close, thought Leo.

  The dragon struck again and again, but each time Leo matched it perfectly, until, repelling a giant fireball and sending it scorching into the dragon, Leo lost his footing. He scrambled up but struggled to get back into position in time to deflect the next slime attack—Leo knew the moment it hit his shield that he’d made a mistake. The shield flew out of his hand.

  The dragon moved in. Leo held his sword tight and advanced.

  He remembered what his father had told him of the legend: “Only the piercing of the evil fairy’s heart by a king’s son, one young and true, bold and of blood royally blue can break the spell.”

  I’m a king’s son, he told himself. This is what I need to do, what I have trained for. Pierce the heart, break the curse, and let that princess get on with what she needs to do.

  Leo took a deep breath. He knew he had to get close. He advanced on the dragon, ducking the slime and fireballs, until he was so close he could see its hideous scaly skin. The dragon rose up on its hind legs, exposing its chest.

  Now! thought Leo.

  He hurled his sword, and it pierced the dragon’s heart.

  The dragon’s scream was earsplitting. It lurched and then fell from the bridge, into the fiery pit below. There was an explosion and then, eerily, nothing. At that moment, the sky became a brilliant blue and the sun shone its rays all over the castle. Leo’s sword lay glistening on the bridge by the castle gates, which now opened before him.

  Wait until I tell Father about this! Leo thought.

  4.

  LEO WALKED THROUGH the castle gates just as guards in the courtyard got up from the ground, stretching. A doorman held the castle door open for Leo, stifling a yawn, and inside the great entrance hall, servants, footmen, and ladies-in-waiting rose to their feet too, looking bewildered.

  “Um, I need to see the princess,” Leo told a young woman who was rubbing her eyes.

  “The princess!” she exclaimed, as if suddenly remembering. “Have you not heard, sir, that my lady is asleep, victim of the cruelest of curses? She’ll be asleep for years, until a king’s son, someone young—”

  She stopped mid-sentence, looking intently at Leo.

  “You! Are you the one who is young and true, bold and of blood royally blue?”

  “Well, madam, I am royal,” replied Leo. “And, if I may say so, I think I have just been pretty bold with a particularly evil fairy.”

  “And she is dead?” asked the lady-in-waiting.

  “Very much so,” confirmed Leo.

  “Then the spell is broken, and Princess Aurora will be awake! Oh my goodness, I must go to her! And the king and queen!”

  The lady-in-waiting turned to a footman. “Call for the bells to be rung and trumpets sounded. The spell over this castle is broken! And look, on the stairs!”

  The lady-in-waiting dropped to the floor in a low curtsy. Leo looked up to the top of the grand staircase to see the princess awake and smiling, standing in between a king and queen (Leo could tell them by their crowns).

  As the bells rang out and the royal trumpeters began to play, all the servants bowed low.

  “Your Majesties!” Prince Leo bowed down in front of the king, queen, and Princess Aurora.

  “Arise, noble prince,” said the queen. “With your courage, you have destroyed the evil fairy and broken the curse. What is your name?”

  “Prince Leopold Charming at your service,” replied Leo, grinning.

  “We owe you an enormous debt of gratitude,” said the queen. “I could kiss you, I’m so happy! May I?”

  “Of course,” replied Leo happily, “but you don’t owe me anything, Your Majesty. It’s my job.”

  “Well, we can still say thank you!” said Princess Aurora, descending the stairs. “I can’t tell you how happy I am to be awake. I have a lot to do! I can get on with my archery and—”

  “Archer
y?” asked Leo. He wasn’t expecting that.

  “Oh yes,” said the king, looking proudly at his daughter. “Aurora has a great eye. She’s quite the expert markswoman.”

  “And then there’s her tennis,” said the queen. “That volley! Ah, and now you’ll play again, my dear girl.”

  “I adore tennis,” said Leo. “We have a really good court at our castle. I play with my two best friends, Edvard and Gilbert, and we’d love another player for doubles. You could come over and play with us one day, if you’d like?”

  “I’d be thrilled to,” said Aurora. “I’m a little out of practice, though.”

  Leo grinned. “That will make you easier to beat.”

  “Not that out of practice,” replied Aurora quickly.

  “You’re on!” said Leo.

  Over the next weeks and months, Leo and Aurora spent a lot of time together, playing in their newly formed string quartet with Gilbert and Edvard or on the royal tennis court, where Gilbert and Edvard always wanted to pair up with Aurora, for she was by far the strongest player.

  But Leo always had Aurora as his partner.

  “After all, guys,” said Aurora, “it was Leo who did the dragon-slaying and curse-breaking.”

  “Quite true,” said Edvard.

  “Fair point,” conceded Gilbert.

  And so, more often than not, Leo and Aurora thrashed the viscounts, and they all lived happily ever after.

  About the Author

  SUSANNAH McFARLANE is the author, creator, and publisher of some of Australia’s most successful children’s book series. She is best known as the author of the bestselling EJ12 Girl Hero and EJ Spy School series, which have sold over one million copies. Susannah also created and cowrote (with Louise Park, as Mac Park) the hugely popular D-Bot Squad and Boy vs Beast series; wrote the Little Mates series of alphabet books; was series editor for Stuff Happens, about the everyday challenges boys face; and wrote Fairy Tales of Fearless Girls.

  This beautiful treasury features artwork from four leading illustrators: Brenton McKenna, Simon Howe, Matt Huynh, and Louie Joyce.

  Aladdin

  Simon & Schuster New York

  Visit us at simonandschuster.com/kids

  www.SimonandSchuster.com/Authors/Susannah-McFarlane

  This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real places are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and events are products of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or places or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  ALADDIN

  An imprint of Simon & Schuster Children’s Publishing Division

  1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, New York 10020

  www.SimonandSchuster.com

  First Aladdin hardcover edition October 2020

  Text copyright © 2019 by Susannah McFarlane

  Jacket illustrations copyright 2020: giant © Brenton McKenna; Hansel, Gretel, and witch © Simon Howe; thinking boy © Matt Huynh; dragons © Louie Joyce; birds © In Art & Bildagentur Zoonar GmbH/Shutterstock; additional images © Sandra Nobes/Allen & Unwin

  Illustrations on pages 1-28 copyright © 2019 by Brenton McKenna

  Illustrations on pages 29-58, pv & pvii copyright © 2019 by Simon Howe

  Illustrations on pages 59-88 & pi copyright © 2019 by Matt Huynh

  Illustrations on pages 89-118 & piii (dragon), pvi & p120 copyright © 2019 by Louie Joyce

  Originally published in Australia in 2019 by Allen & Unwin as Bold Tales for Brave-hearted Boys

  All rights reserved, including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form.

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  Jacket designed by Sandra Nobes and Karin Paprocki

  Interior designed by Sandra Nobes and Michael Rosamilia

  Art Direction by Sandra Nobes

  Jacket illustrations copyright 2020: giant © Brenton McKenna; Hansel, Gretel, and witch © Simon Howe; thinking boy © Matt Huynh; dragons © Louie Joyce; birds © In Art & Bildagentur Zoonar GmbH/Shutterstock; additional images © Sandra Nobes/Allen & Unwin

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Names: McFarlane, Susannah, author. | McKenna, Brenton, illustrator. |

  Howe, Simon, illustrator. | Huynh, Matt, illustrator. | Joyce, Louie, illustrator.

  Title: Bold tales of brave-hearted boys / Susannah McFarlane ;

  Brenton McKenna, Simon Howe, Matt Huynh, Louie Joyce.

  Description: First Aladdin hardcover edition. | New York : Aladdin, 2020. |

  Originally published: Crows Nest, Australia : Allen & Unwin, 2018. | Audience: Ages 5-9. |

  Summary: Reimagines four classic fairy tales with a twist to value kindness and honesty as much as strength and valor.

  Identifiers: LCCN 2020019068 (print) | LCCN 2020019069 (ebook) |

  ISBN 9781534473591 (hardcover) | ISBN 9781534473607 (ebook)

  Subjects: CYAC: Fairy tales. | Conduct of life—Fiction.

  Classification: LCC PZ8 .M45787 Bol 2020 (print) | LCC PZ8 .M45787 (ebook) | DDC [Fic]—dc23

  LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020019068