Honeycomb by Joanne Harris (book series for 12 year olds .txt) 📕

what had happened, but clearly blamed the Lacewing King for his neglect of the royal visitor.

The Lacewing King was surprised and ashamed—but also secretly relieved. He immediately sent word to the Butterfly Princess, explaining that her mother had died unexpectedly in her sleep and expressing his humble condolences. Then, as he awaited the arrival of the Princess, he worked to make his underground court as magnificent as it could be.

He had the walls hung with black crepe, and veiled every mirror in spider’s web. He placed a thousand black candles in every crystal chandelier. He ordered a lavish funeral, with mourners and weeping and incense, and a carriage topped with fine black silk and drawn by an army of carrion beetles.

Then, assuming an air of grief, he went to keep watch by the bedside of the Caterpillar Queen. He sat by her body for three days, awaiting the Princess’s arrival, during which time he amused himself by telling the dead Queen exactly what he thought of her.

He told her how much he had always loathed her miserable appearance; her lack of conversation, her greed, her rudeness, and her laziness. He told her how she disgusted him, with her stink of rotten fish. He told her that the only reason he had tolerated her for so long was that he was in love with her daughter.

By then, the Caterpillar Queen’s body had turned hard and brown, and still the Princess had not arrived. And then, on the fourth day of his watch, the Lacewing King was horrified to see the hard brown shell split open with a sudden crack, revealing a silken envelope that opened in its turn to reveal the elegant form of the Butterfly Princess; as beautiful as ever; veiled in nothing but her wings.

For a moment, she stood, blinking in the torchlight. Then she stretched her golden limbs and turned her luminous eyes to the King.

“I would have been yours,” she told him. “But you broke our agreement.”

Then she spread her butterfly wings and flew away into World Above. The Lacewing King ran after her, pleading for a chance to explain, but the Princess had already gone back to her court in the treetops.

He never did marry, in the end. Perhaps he always secretly feared having to care for a mother-in-law. As for the Butterfly Princess, he never mentioned her again, although some said they had seen him, in summertime, at the edge of the woods, watching the butterflies at play. And from that day forth, his head chef’s signature dish of honeyed, roasted caterpillars—once a favourite in his court—was no longer served there.

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NAIL

Once there was a farmer who kept a wild, ferocious bull. The bull was so savage that he had to be kept locked up in the barn, but even so, the other farm animals were terribly afraid of him. The hens and geese trembled in fear every time they crossed the barnyard, and the sheep and ducks and donkeys lived in terror of his horns.

“What can we do?” said the animals. “That bull could get free any time.”

They became increasingly nervous. Just thinking about that bull and his horns made life in the farmyard unbearable. Hens and ducks stopped laying eggs. Horses threw their riders. Sheep became tangled in hedges. Pigs and rabbits ate their young. Soon, the very mention of horns, or even the sight of a cow in a field, was enough to provoke a near-stampede as the climate of panic grew.

The animals all agreed that this was a sorry state of affairs, and that something drastic would have to be done. Finally, they came up with an idea. They appointed a pack of dogs to protect them. The dogs patrolled the farmyard, identifying potential threats. Horned creatures—goats and cows—were cautioned to make sure they didn’t intimidate the other animals.

One rainy day, a Snail appeared on the farmyard gate. As a flock of geese went by, it put out its horns and waved at them. None of the geese seemed to mind very much, but the dogs gave the Snail a caution.

“Put those horns away,” they said. “That’s threatening behaviour, that is.”

The Snail ignored them and wiggled its horns again.

The dogs went to the farmer and complained about the aggressive snail. They presented such a convincing case that the farmer agreed to investigate. He spent the rest of the week killing snails in and around the farmyard. By the end of that time there wasn’t a snail to be seen within miles, and the animals all agreed that the threat had been well and truly addressed.

Meanwhile, the bull broke out of the barn and ran amok, trampling and goring everything in his path. A flock of sheep was scattered, and some ducks were badly frightened. The dogs (and indeed, the farmer) saw this as further proof that you can never be too vigilant, and extended their war on invertebrates to include slugs and caterpillars, as well.

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ING

There once was a cat who longed to be King. He lived near the palace kitchens, and he had often seen the King, regal in his tall white hat, distributing food to the populace. (In fact, that stately personage was only a third apprentice pot-boy, but the cat had no idea of this, and longed to be just like him.)

And so he went to the Council of Cats and declared, “O Cats, behold your King!” But the other cats just laughed at him.

Then he went into the stables, where the King’s horses were kept, and where an army of stable-boys worked to keep them ready and fed.

“Behold your King!” he mewed at them. But the stables were far too noisy for anyone to hear him.

And so the cat who longed to be King went out into the forest alone, searching for his subjects. And in due course, he came across a flock of chattering green parakeets.

“Behold,