"Do not fail, sister!" said all the others. "For if you fail you can
speak to us no more."
The first peahen answered, "Do not fear that I shall fail!" And she
began stepping down the long boughs of the elm.
The Prince lying below heard all that was said. "Ah! poor sisters," he
thought, "have I found you at last; and are all these sorrows brought
upon you for me?" And he unloosed his doublet, and opened his vest,
making his breast bare for the peahen to come and peck out his heart.
He lay quite still with his eyes shut, and when she reached the ground
the peahen found him lying there, as it seemed to her fast asleep, with
his white breast bare for the stroke of her beak.
Then so fair he looked to her, and so gentle in his youth, that she had
pity on him, and stood weeping by his side, and laying her head against
his, whispered, "O, brother, once we lay as babes together and were
nursed at the same breast! How can I peck out your heart?"
Then she stole softly back into the tree, and crouched down again by her
companions. They said to her, "Our minute of midnight is nearly gone. Is
there blood on your beak! Have you our brother's heart for us?" But the
other answered never a word.
In the morning the peahens came rustling down out of the elm, and went
searching for fat carnation buds and anemone seeds among the flower-beds
in the garden. To the Prince they showed no sign either of hatred or
fear, but went to and fro carelessly, pecking at the ground about his
feet. Only one came with drooping head and wings, and sleeked itself to
his caress, and the Prince, stooping down, whispered in her ear, "O,
sister, why did you not peck out my heart?"
At night, as before, the peahens all cried in chorus as they went up
into the elm; and the Prince came and wrapped himself in his cloak, and
lay down at the foot of it to watch.
At midnight the eight peahens lifted their heads, and said, "Sister, why
did you fail last night?" But their sister gave them not a word.
"Alas!" they said, "now she has failed, unless one of us succeed, we
shall never hear her speak with her human voice again. Why is it that
you weep so," they said again, "now when deliverance is so near?" For
the poor peahen was shaken with weeping, and her tears fell down in loud
drops upon the ground.
Then the next sister said, "I will go down! He is asleep. Be certain, I
will not fail!" So she climbed softly down the tree, and the Prince
opened his shirt and laid his breast bare for her to come and take out
his heart.
Presently she stood by his side, and when she saw him, she too had pity
on him for the youth and kindness of his face. And once she shut her
eyes, and lifted her head for the stroke; but then weakness seized her,
and she laid her head softly upon his heart and said, "Once the breast
that gave me milk gave milk also to you. You were my sister's brother,
and she spared you. How can I peck out your heart?" And having said this
she went softly back into the tree, and crouched down again among her
sisters.
They said to her, "Have you blood upon your beak? Is his heart ours?"
But she answered them no word.
The next day the two sisters, who because their hearts betrayed them had
become mute, followed the Prince wherever he went, and stretched up
their heads to his caress. But the others went and came indifferently,
careless except for food; for until midnight their human hearts were
asleep; only now the two sisters who had given their voices away had
regained their human hearts perpetually.
That night the same thing happened as before. "Sisters," said the
youngest, "to-night I will go down, since the two eldest of us have
failed. My wrong is fresher in my heart than theirs! Be sure I shall not
fail!" So the youngest peahen came down from the tree, and the Prince
laid his heart bare for her beak; but the bird could not find the will
to peck it out. And so it was the next night, and the next, until eight
nights were gone.
So at last only one peahen was left. At midnight she raised her head,
saying, "Sisters, are you awake?"
They all turned, and gazed at her weeping, but could say no word.
Then she said, "You have all failed, having all tried but me. Now if I
fail we shall remain mute and captive for ever, more undone by the loss
of our last remaining gift of speech than we were at first. But I tell
you, dear sisters, I will not fail; for the happiness of you all lies
with me now!"
Then she went softly down the tree; and one by one they all went
following her, and weeping, to see what the end would be.
They stood some way apart, watching with upturned heads, and their poor
throats began catching back a wish to cry as the little peahen, the last
of the sisters, came and stood by the Prince.
Then she, too, looked in his face, and saw the white breast made bare
for her beak; and the love of him went deep down into her heart. And she
tried and tried to shut her eyes and deal the stroke, but could not.
She trembled and sighed, and turned to look at her sisters, where they
all stood weeping silently together. "They have spared him," she said
to herself: "why should not I?"
But the Prince, seeing that she, too, was about to fail like the rest of
them, turned and said, as if in his sleep, "Come, come, little peahen,
and peck out my heart!"
At that she turned back again to him, and laid her head down upon his
heart and cried more sadly than them all.
Then he said, "You have eight sisters, and a mother who cries for her
children to return!" Yet still she thought he was dreaming, and speaking
only in his sleep. The other peahens came no nearer, but stood weeping
silently. She looked from him to them. "O," she cried, "I have a wicked
heart, to let one stand in the way of nine!" Then she threw up her neck
and cried lamentably with her peafowl's voice, wishing that the Prince
would wake up and see her, and so escape. And at that all the other
peahens lifted up their heads and wailed with her: but the Prince never
turned, nor lifted a finger, nor uttered a sound.
Then she drew in a deep breath, and closed her eyes fast. "Let my
sisters go, but let me be as I am!" she cried; and with that she stooped
down, and pecked out his heart.
All her sisters shrieked as their human shapes returned to them. "O,
sister! O, wicked little sister!" they cried, "What have you done?"
The little white peahen crouched close down to the side of the dead
Prince. "I loved him more than you all!" she tried to say: but she only
lifted her head, and wailed again and again the peafowl's cry.
The Prince's heart lay beating at her feet, so glad to be rid of its
nine sorrows that mere joy made it live on, though all the rest of the
body lay cold.
The peahen leaned down upon the Prince's breast, and there wailed
without ceasing: then suddenly, piercing with her beak her own breast,
she drew out her own living heart and laid it in the place where his had
been.
And, as she did so, the wound where she had pierced him closed and
became healed; and her heart was, as it were, buried in the Prince's
breast. In her death agony she could feel it there, her own heart
leaping within his breast for joy.
The Prince, who had seemed to be dead, flushed from head to foot as the
warmth of life came back to him; with one deep breath he woke, and found
the little white peahen lying as if dead between his arms.
Then he laughed softly and rose (his goodness making him wise), and
taking up his own still beating heart he laid it into the place of hers.
At the first beat of it within her breast, the peahen became transformed
as all her sisters had been, and her own human form came back to her.
And the pain and the wound in her breast grew healed together, so that
she stood up alive and well in the Prince's arms.
"Dear heart!" said he: and "Dear, dear heart!" said she; but whether
they were speaking of their own hearts or of each other's, who can tell?
for which was which they themselves did not know.
Then all round was so much embracing and happiness that it is out of
reach for tongue or pen to describe. For truly the Prince and his
foster-sisters loved each other well, and could put no bounds upon
their present contentment. As for the Prince and the one who had plucked
out his heart, of no two was the saying ever more truly told that they
had lost their hearts to each other; nor was ever love in the world
known before that carried with it such harmony as theirs.
And so it all came about according to the Queen's dream, that the
forester's daughter wore the royal crown upon her head, and held the
Prince's heart in her hand.
Long before he died the old King was made happy because the dream he had
so much feared had become true. And the forester's wife was happy before
she died. And as for the Prince and his wife and his foster-sisters,
they were all rather happy; and none of them is dead yet.