But once the man succumbed to the king’s temptations, the monarch ordered the arrest of the sprite and seized the traps for his own gain.

The sprite was imprisoned in an iron cage placed in a tower on the grounds near the palace. The king them entrusted the key to this prison to his wife, with the threat that her life was forfeit if she gave up the key.? The king then busied himself in his restless search for new wealth.

One day the young prince came into the gardens where the sprite sat in jail. “Royal child,?the sprite begged. “Set me free. Set me free and I will be of service to you.?o:p> Now the prince did not know how to release the prisoner. But the sprite told him a secret plan. The boy should go to his mother and ask her to search his hair for lice.?While his head rested in her lap, the boy could pick the queen’s pocket and steal the key.? This the boy did, and soon the wood sprite was free.

Having traded their clothes, the exiled prince and his servant approach a foreign kingdom.

Cast into exile

The sprite immediately went out to spoil all the king’s traps.?Thus it was that no animals could be caught and skinned. The king was furious and realized that the sprite had escaped.? So he turned on his wife. He demanded of all his advisers, what should be done with a faithless woman who had betrayed her husband’s trust?? Should she be executed, whipped, banished? No punishment seemed sufficient to appease the angry monarch.

But the young prince stepped forward and admitted that it was he, not the queen, who had freed the sprite. Now the king was grief stricken.? His fine son was his greatest treasure, but the king knew that he must be punished.?The king could not execute the boy, but the chose no less terrible a fate for one raised in comfort and surrounded by servants.?The boy was banished from the kingdom, cast into the wild world to fend for himself. Only one servant could accompany him. Now the servant was not pleased to have to follow the prince.?The winds of autumn were beginning to howl, and winter’s icy blasts were not far away.?They walked beyond the sprite’s enchanted woods, across desolate plains, until they came to an ancient well. “Draw me water to drink,?the prince commanded his servant.?“No,?came the reply.