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Prince Charming
80 x 30cm
Acrylic, gesso, oil pastel, pastel, pencil & ink on canvas
October 2026
The Gnomish women had taken him in seven springs ago. It was just after the King had died in battle and his young Queen had gone mad with grief. She had come to hate her son who looked so like his father.
He had been brought deep into the forest by a weeping, elderly woodcutter and told to run. The man had orders to kill him, but he showed her the blood of a lamb instead and the Queen was satisfied.
In the meantime the confused and terrified child had wandered the forest, living on berries and drinking from streams until Joan had found him one morning asleep in their fern garden and taken pity on him, half starved and ragged as he was.
Gnomes are small, shy creatures and stay away from man as a rule but the women agreed that they couldn’t leave the boy to fend for himself. So he became Roy (short for royal, they weren’t blind to his true lineage) and for the next ten years he lived contentedly with the seven sisters as their adoptive son.
Roy was sweet-natured and curious, kind to all the creatures of the forest and loved by all who came across him. He grew tall, and strong and just.
And that should have been that. But destiny wasn’t finished with him yet.
On the eve of his eighteenth birthday he was fishing quietly on the banks of a stream when a shadow fell across his heart. Turning, he saw an old lady with a moss green cloak and a basket of red apples. When their eyes met a strange look passed across her face and he could not explain the sudden bolt of loss and pain that struck him.
He stood up and bowed.
‘May I be of service to you good mother?’
‘Nay, boy, I have found all I require this day. Do you like apples?’
When they found him he was stretched out on the bank, lying as if asleep. The poisoned apple lay a little way off. Only a single bite had been taken.
The Gnomish women were distraught. It seemed the mad Queen had learnt her son still lived and vowed to remedy that. So, disguised as a peasant, Queen Snow White had been searching her kingdom for him for months.
The sisters tried everything but the young man could not be woken. Not alive yet not dead they laid his body on a mossy bank and covered him with all the flowers of his woodland home. All who passed by wept for his loss. The sisters never left his side.
A year and a day passed and an entourage from Faerie were passing on their way to the Royal City. Princess Willow looked down from her reindeer at the still form of Roy, and fell in love. She dropped from her steed, bent down to his side and taking one hand in hers gently kissed his cheek. A single tear shed by a fairy for love’s sake is a powerful thing and as Willow wept for him, a tear splashed onto Roy’s lips. In an instant the black magic of the poison was dissolved and with a cough he sat up.
The first thing he saw when he opened his eyes was the love in Willow’s and his heart met hers before they even spoke.
Great was the joy over all the land when the long-dead Prince rode back to the Royal City with his Fairy bride and seven Gnomish mothers. The mad Queen was captured but treated kindly because Roy was a good son and had felt something of her pain.
There was much feasting and celebrations which lasted for a month, after which they all lived happily ever after.
80 x 30cm
Acrylic, gesso, oil pastel, pastel, pencil & ink on canvas
October 2026
The Gnomish women had taken him in seven springs ago. It was just after the King had died in battle and his young Queen had gone mad with grief. She had come to hate her son who looked so like his father.
He had been brought deep into the forest by a weeping, elderly woodcutter and told to run. The man had orders to kill him, but he showed her the blood of a lamb instead and the Queen was satisfied.
In the meantime the confused and terrified child had wandered the forest, living on berries and drinking from streams until Joan had found him one morning asleep in their fern garden and taken pity on him, half starved and ragged as he was.
Gnomes are small, shy creatures and stay away from man as a rule but the women agreed that they couldn’t leave the boy to fend for himself. So he became Roy (short for royal, they weren’t blind to his true lineage) and for the next ten years he lived contentedly with the seven sisters as their adoptive son.
Roy was sweet-natured and curious, kind to all the creatures of the forest and loved by all who came across him. He grew tall, and strong and just.
And that should have been that. But destiny wasn’t finished with him yet.
On the eve of his eighteenth birthday he was fishing quietly on the banks of a stream when a shadow fell across his heart. Turning, he saw an old lady with a moss green cloak and a basket of red apples. When their eyes met a strange look passed across her face and he could not explain the sudden bolt of loss and pain that struck him.
He stood up and bowed.
‘May I be of service to you good mother?’
‘Nay, boy, I have found all I require this day. Do you like apples?’
When they found him he was stretched out on the bank, lying as if asleep. The poisoned apple lay a little way off. Only a single bite had been taken.
The Gnomish women were distraught. It seemed the mad Queen had learnt her son still lived and vowed to remedy that. So, disguised as a peasant, Queen Snow White had been searching her kingdom for him for months.
The sisters tried everything but the young man could not be woken. Not alive yet not dead they laid his body on a mossy bank and covered him with all the flowers of his woodland home. All who passed by wept for his loss. The sisters never left his side.
A year and a day passed and an entourage from Faerie were passing on their way to the Royal City. Princess Willow looked down from her reindeer at the still form of Roy, and fell in love. She dropped from her steed, bent down to his side and taking one hand in hers gently kissed his cheek. A single tear shed by a fairy for love’s sake is a powerful thing and as Willow wept for him, a tear splashed onto Roy’s lips. In an instant the black magic of the poison was dissolved and with a cough he sat up.
The first thing he saw when he opened his eyes was the love in Willow’s and his heart met hers before they even spoke.
Great was the joy over all the land when the long-dead Prince rode back to the Royal City with his Fairy bride and seven Gnomish mothers. The mad Queen was captured but treated kindly because Roy was a good son and had felt something of her pain.
There was much feasting and celebrations which lasted for a month, after which they all lived happily ever after.