Once upon a time, there was a King who had seven beautiful daughters. They were all good girls, but the youngest, named Balna, was the smartest. The King’s wife, their mommy, passed away when they were little, so the seven Princesses didn’t have a mother to take care of them.

The King’s daughters took turns making their dad’s dinner every day. He was busy talking to his helpers about important things for the kingdom.

Around this time, one of the King’s helpers, the Prudhan, died. He left behind a wife and a daughter. Every day, when the seven Princesses were making their father’s dinner, the Prudhan’s widow and daughter would come and ask for some fire from the stove. Balna would say to her sisters, “Tell that woman to go away! Tell her to get fire from her own house. Why does she need ours? If we let her come here, something bad will happen!”

But the other sisters would say, “Be quiet, Balna! Why are you always arguing with the poor woman? Let her take some fire if she wants.” So the Prudhan’s widow would go to the stove and take a few sticks. But when no one was looking, she would quickly throw some dirt into the food the Princesses were making for the King!

The King loved his daughters very much. After their mommy died, they made his dinner themselves so no one could poison him. So when he found dirt in his food, he thought they must have been clumsy. He didn’t think someone would put dirt there on purpose. He was very kind, so he didn’t want to tell them off, even though the food was ruined many days in a row.

Finally, one day, he decided to hide and watch his daughters cooking. He wanted to see how it was happening. So he went into the next room and watched them through a hole in the wall.

He saw his seven daughters carefully washing the rice and getting the food ready. When each dish was done, they put it by the fire to be cooked. Then he saw the Prudhan’s widow come to the door and ask for some sticks for the fire. Balna got angry and said, “Why don’t you keep wood at your own house? Why do you come here every day? Sisters, don’t give this woman any more wood! Let her buy her own!”

But the oldest sister said, “Balna, let the poor woman take the wood and fire. She’s not hurting us.” But Balna said, “If you let her come here so much, maybe she will hurt us and make us sad one day!”

Then the King saw the Prudhan’s widow go to where his dinner was all ready. As she took the wood, she threw a little dirt into each dish!

The King was very angry! He told his guards to catch the woman and bring her to him. But when the widow came, she told him she played the trick because she wanted to talk to him. She spoke so cleverly and made him so happy with her tricky words that he didn’t punish her. Instead, the King married her and made her his Queen! She and her daughter came to live in the palace.

The new Queen hated the seven Princesses! She wanted to get rid of them so her daughter could have all their riches and be a Princess instead. She wasn’t thankful for their kindness. She did everything she could to make them sad. She only gave them bread to eat, and not much of that. She didn’t give them much water to drink either. The seven Princesses were used to having everything nice and comfy, with good food and clothes. Now they were very sad and unhappy. They would go out every day and sit by their dead mother’s grave and cry.

They would say: “Oh mother, mother, can’t you see your poor children? We’re so unhappy! Our mean step-mother is starving us!”

One day, while they were crying, guess what! A beautiful pomelo tree grew up out of the grave! It was covered with fresh, yummy pomelos. The children ate some of the fruit and weren’t hungry anymore. Every day after that, instead of eating the bad dinner their step-mother gave them, they would go to their mother’s grave and eat the pomelos from the beautiful tree.

Then the Queen said to her daughter, “I don’t know how, but those seven girls say they don’t want dinner. They never eat any, but they never get thin or look sick! They look better than you! I don’t get it!” She told her daughter to watch the seven Princesses and see if anyone was giving them food.

So the next day, when the Princesses went to their mother’s grave and were eating the yummy pomelos, the Prudhan’s daughter followed them and saw them eating the fruit.

Balna said to her sisters, “Do you see that girl watching us? Let’s tell her to go away or hide the pomelos. If not, she will tell her mother, and that will be bad!”

But the other sisters said, “Oh no, don’t be mean, Balna. The girl wouldn’t tell her mother! Let’s ask her to come and have some fruit!” So they called her over and gave her a pomelo.

As soon as she ate it, the Prudhan’s daughter went home and said to her mother, “Now I know why the seven Princesses won’t eat your dinner! There’s a beautiful pomelo tree growing by their mother’s grave. They go there every day and eat the pomelos! I ate one, and it was the yummiest thing I’ve ever tasted!”

The mean Queen was very angry when she heard this. She stayed in her room all the next day and told the King she had a very bad headache. The King was worried and said to his wife, “What can I do for you?” She said, “Only one thing will make my headache go away. There’s a nice pomelo tree by your dead wife’s grave. You have to bring that here and boil it, roots and all. Put a little of the water you boiled it in on my forehead, and that will cure my headache!” So the King sent his helpers to pull up the beautiful pomelo tree by its roots. He did what the Queen wanted. When some of the water was put on her forehead, she said her headache was gone and she felt all better!

The next day, when the seven Princesses went to their mother’s grave like always, the pomelo tree was gone! They all started to cry very sadly.

There was a small pond by the Queen’s tomb. As they were crying, they saw that the pond was filled with a yummy, creamy stuff that quickly turned into a thick white cake. The Princesses were very happy to see this! They ate some of the cake and liked it. The same thing happened the next day and the day after that! Every morning, the Princesses went to their mother’s grave and found the little pond filled with the yummy cream cake.

Then the mean step-mother said to her daughter: “I don’t understand! I had the pomelo tree that grew by the Queen’s grave destroyed. But the Princesses aren’t getting thinner or sadder, even though they never eat the dinner I give them! I don’t get it!”

Her daughter said, “I’ll watch!”

The next day, while the Princesses were eating the cream cake, their step-mother’s daughter came by! Balna saw her first and said, “Look, sisters! That girl is coming again! Let’s sit around the edge of the pond and not let her see it. If we give her some of our cake, she’ll tell her mother, and that will be very bad for us!”

But the other sisters thought Balna was too worried. Instead of listening to her, they gave the Prudhan’s daughter some of the cake. She went home and told her mother everything.

The Queen was super angry when she heard how well the Princesses were doing. She sent her helpers to break down the dead Queen’s tomb and fill the little pond with the pieces. She didn’t stop there! The next day, she pretended to be very, very sick - almost like she was going to die! The King was very sad. He asked her if there was anything he could get her to make her feel better. She said to him: “Only one thing can save my life, but I know you won’t do it!” He said, “Yes, whatever it is, I’ll do it!” She then said, “To save my life, you have to kill the seven daughters of your first wife. Put some of their blood on my forehead and on the palms of my hands. Their death will be my life!” The King was very sad when he heard this. But because he didn’t want to break his promise, he sadly went out to find his daughters.

He found them crying by the broken pieces of their mother’s grave.

The King felt like he couldn’t kill them. So he spoke kindly to them and told them to come out into the jungle with him. There, he made a fire and cooked some rice and gave it to them. In the afternoon, it got very hot. The seven Princesses all fell asleep. When he saw they were sleeping soundly, the King, their father, quietly walked away and left them (because he was scared of his wife). He said to himself: “It’s better for my poor daughters to die here than to be killed by their step-mother.”

Then he shot a deer and went home. He put some of its blood on the Queen’s forehead and hands. She thought he had really killed the Princesses and said she felt all better!

The seven Princesses woke up. They found themselves all alone in the thick jungle. They were very scared! They started calling out as loud as they could, hoping their father would hear. But he was far away and couldn’t hear them, even if they shouted super loud!

It just so happened that the seven sons of a King from another kingdom were hunting in that same jungle. They were going home after hunting all day. The youngest Prince said to his brothers: “Stop! I think I hear someone crying and calling out. Do you hear voices? Let’s go where the sound is coming from and find out what it is!”

So the seven Princes rode through the woods until they came to the place where the seven Princesses were crying and wringing their hands. The young Princes were very surprised to see them. They were even more surprised when they heard their story! They decided that each Prince would take one of the poor Princesses home with him and marry her.

So the first and oldest Prince took the oldest Princess home with him and married her.

And the second took the second;

And the third took the third;

And the fourth took the fourth;

And the fifth took the fifth;

And the sixth took the sixth;

And the seventh, who was the most handsome, took the beautiful Balna.

When they got to their own land, everyone in the kingdom was super happy that the seven young Princes were marrying seven such beautiful Princesses!

About a year later, Balna had a little son. His uncles and aunts loved the boy so much that it was like he had seven fathers and seven mothers! None of the other Princes and Princesses had any children. So the son of the seventh Prince and Balna was going to be the next King after all of them.

They lived very happily for a while. Then, one day, the seventh Prince (Balna’s husband) said he was going out hunting. He went away, and they waited and waited for him, but he never came back!

Then his six brothers said they would go and see what happened to him. They went away, but they didn’t come back either!

The seven Princesses were very sad. They were afraid that their kind husbands had been killed.

One day, not long after this happened, Balna was rocking her baby’s cradle. Her sisters were working in the room below. Someone knocked on the palace door. A man in a long black robe said he was a Fakir (a holy man) and came to ask for something. The servants said to him, “You can’t go into the palace. The King’s sons have all gone away. We think they must be dead. Their wives don’t want to be bothered by your begging.” But he said, “I’m a holy man! You have to let me in!” So the silly servants let him walk through the palace. But they didn’t know that this wasn’t a Fakir. It was a wicked Magician named Punchkin!

Punchkin the Fakir walked through the palace and saw many beautiful things. Finally, he reached the room where Balna was singing next to her little boy’s cradle. The Magician thought she was more beautiful than all the other beautiful things he had seen! He asked her to come home with him and marry him. But she said, “I’m afraid my husband is dead, but my little boy is still very young. I’ll stay here and teach him to grow up to be a clever man. When he grows up, he will go out into the world and try to find out what happened to his father. I would never leave him or marry you!” The Magician was very angry when he heard this. He turned her into a little black dog and led her away. He said, “Since you won’t come with me on your own, I will make you!” So the poor Princess was dragged away. She couldn’t escape or let her sisters know what had happened to her. As Punchkin passed through the palace gate, the servants said to him, “Where did you get that cute little dog?” He answered, “One of the Princesses gave it to me as a present!” They let him go without asking any more questions.

Soon after this, the six older Princesses heard the baby, their nephew, start to cry. They went upstairs and were very surprised to find him all alone. Balna was nowhere to be seen! They asked the servants what happened. When they heard about the Fakir and the little black dog, they guessed what had happened. They sent people to look for them in every direction, but neither the Fakir nor the dog could be found. What could six poor women do? They gave up hope of ever seeing their kind husbands and their sister and her husband again. They took care of their little nephew and taught him everything they knew.

Time went on. Balna’s son was fourteen years old. One day, his aunts told him the story of the family. As soon as he heard it, he wanted to go search for his father and mother and uncles! If he could find them alive, he wanted to bring them home again. His aunts were scared when they heard his plan. They tried to talk him out of it, saying, “We’ve lost our husbands and our sister and her husband. You’re our only hope now! If you go away, what will we do?” But he said, “Please don’t be sad. I’ll come back soon. If I can, I’ll bring my father and mother and uncles with me!” So he set out on his travels. For many months, he couldn’t find anything to help him in his search.

He traveled many hundreds of miles and almost lost hope of ever hearing anything about his parents. Then, one day, he came to a country that seemed full of stones, rocks, and trees. He saw a big palace with a tall tower. Next to the palace was a Malee’s (gardener’s) little house.

As he was looking around, the Malee’s wife saw him. She ran out of the house and said, “My dear boy, who are you? Why are you coming to this dangerous place?” He answered, “I’m a King’s son. I’m looking for my father, my uncles, and my mother. A wicked magician put a spell on her!”

Then the Malee’s wife said, “This country and this palace belong to a great magician. He is very powerful. If anyone makes him angry, he can turn them into stones and trees! All the rocks and trees you see here used to be living people. The Magician turned them into what they are now. A King’s son came here a while ago, and then his six brothers came. They were all turned into stones and trees! And they aren’t the only ones! There’s a beautiful Princess living in that tower. The Magician has kept her prisoner there for twelve years because she hates him and won’t marry him.”

The little Prince thought, “These must be my parents and my uncles! I’ve finally found what I’m looking for!” He told his story to the Malee’s wife and begged her to help him stay there for a while. He wanted to find out more about the sad people she mentioned. She promised to help him. She told him to disguise himself so the Magician wouldn’t see him and turn him into stone too. The Prince agreed. So the Malee’s wife dressed him up in a saree (a type of dress) and pretended that he was her daughter.

One day, the Magician was walking in his garden. He saw the little girl (or so he thought) playing around. He asked her who she was. She told him she was the Malee’s daughter. The Magician said, “You’re a pretty little girl. Tomorrow, you’ll take some flowers from me to the beautiful lady who lives in the tower.”

The young Prince was very happy when he heard this. He told the Malee’s wife right away. They talked about it and decided that it would be safer for him to keep pretending to be a girl. He would wait for a good chance to talk to his mother, if it really was her.

When Balna got married, her husband gave her a small gold ring. Her name was written on it. She put it on her little son’s finger when he was a baby. When he got older, his aunts had it made bigger so he could still wear it. The Malee’s wife told him to tie the ring to one of the flowers he gave to his mother. She hoped his mother would recognize it. This wasn’t easy because the Magician kept a close eye on the poor Princess. He didn’t want her to talk to her friends. The pretend Malee’s daughter was allowed to take her flowers every day, but the Magician or one of his helpers was always in the room with her. Finally, one day, he had a chance. When no one was looking, the boy tied the ring to a bunch of flowers and threw it at Balna’s feet. It landed with a clink on the floor. Balna looked to see what made the noise. She found the little ring tied to the flowers. She recognized it right away! She believed her son’s story about his long search. She begged him to tell her what to do. She told him not to risk his life by trying to save her. She said that the Magician had kept her locked up in the tower for twelve years because she refused to marry him. She was watched so closely that she saw no hope of escaping.

Balna’s son was a smart, clever boy. He said, “Don’t worry, dear mother. The first thing we need to do is find out how much power the Magician has. Then we can free my father and uncles, who he has trapped in the form of rocks and trees. You’ve been angry with him for twelve long years. Now, be nice to him. Tell him you’ve given up hope of ever seeing your husband again. Say you’re willing to marry him. Then, try to find out what gives him his power and if he can die.”

Balna decided to listen to her son. The next day, she sent for Punchkin and spoke to him the way her son told her to.

The Magician was super happy! He asked her if the wedding could happen as soon as possible.

But she told him she needed a little more time to get to know him before she married him. She said that after being enemies for so long, their friendship needed to grow slowly. “And tell me,” she said, “are you immortal? Can you never die? Are you too powerful to feel any human pain?”

“Why do you ask?” he said.

“Because,” she replied, “if I’m going to be your wife, I want to know everything about you. If something bad is going to happen to you, I want to stop it from happening.”

“It’s true,” he added, “that I’m not like other people. Far, far away, hundreds of thousands of miles from here, there’s a lonely country covered with thick jungle. In the middle of the jungle, there’s a circle of palm trees. In the center of the circle, there are six pots full of water, stacked one on top of the other. Below the sixth pot is a small cage with a little green parrot inside. My life depends on the life of the parrot. If the parrot is killed, I will die! But,” he added, “it’s impossible for the parrot to get hurt. The country is very hard to get to. I have ordered many thousands of genies (magical spirits) to guard the palm trees and kill anyone who comes near the place.”

Balna told her son what Punchkin had said. She begged him to forget about getting the parrot.

But the Prince said, “Mother, I have to get that parrot. Then, you, my father, and my uncles can be free. Don’t be afraid! I’ll be back soon. You keep the Magician happy and keep putting off your wedding with him. Before he finds out what’s going on, I’ll be here!” He went away.

He traveled many, many miles until he came to a thick jungle. He was very tired, so he sat down under a tree and fell asleep. He woke up to a soft rustling sound. He looked around and saw a big snake. It was going to an eagle’s nest that was built in the tree he was sleeping under. There were two young eagles in the nest. The Prince saw the danger the young birds were in. He pulled out his sword and killed the snake. At the same time, he heard a loud whooshing sound. The two old eagles, who had been out hunting for food for their babies, came back. They saw the dead snake and the young Prince standing over it. The mother eagle said to him, “Dear boy, that cruel snake has been eating our babies for many years. You’ve saved our children! Whenever you need help, ask us and we will help you! Take these little eagles. Let them be your helpers.”

The Prince was very happy. The two eaglets crossed their wings, and he climbed on. They carried him far, far away over the thick jungles until he came to the place where the circle of palm trees grew. In the middle of the trees stood the six pots full of water. It was the middle of the day, and it was very hot. All the genies around the trees were fast asleep. But there were so many of them that it would have been impossible for anyone to walk through them. The strong eaglets swooped down. The Prince jumped down. In a flash, he knocked over the six pots full of water and grabbed the little green parrot. He hid it in his cloak. As he climbed back into the air, all the genies woke up. They found that their treasure was gone. They howled very loudly and sadly.

The little eagles flew away, away, until they came to their home in the big tree. Then the Prince said to the old eagles, “Take back your babies. They’ve been very helpful to me. If I ever need help again, I’ll come to you.” He walked until he got back to the Magician’s palace. He sat down at the door and started playing with the parrot.

Punchkin saw him. He came to him quickly and said, “My boy, where did you get that parrot? Please, give it to me!”

But the Prince answered, “Oh no, I can’t give away my parrot. It’s my favorite pet. I’ve had it for many years.”

Then the Magician said, “If it’s an old favorite, I understand why you don’t want to give it away. But what will you sell it for?”

“Sir,” replied the Prince, “I won’t sell my parrot.”

Then Punchkin got scared and said, “Anything, anything! Tell me what price you want, and you can have it!” The Prince answered, “Let the seven King’s sons who you turned into rocks and trees be free right away!”

“It’s done,” said the Magician, “just give me my parrot.” With that, he waved his wand. Balna’s husband and his brothers turned back into their normal shapes. “Now, give me my parrot!” repeated Punchkin.

“Not so fast, my friend,” said the Prince. “I want you to bring back to life all the people you have trapped!”

The Magician waved his wand again right away. He was crying in a pleading voice, “Give me my parrot!” The whole garden suddenly came alive. Where there had been rocks, stones, and trees, there were Kings, helpers, and important people. There were mighty men on prancing horses and fancy pages and many armed helpers.

“Give me my parrot!” cried Punchkin. Then the boy took hold of the parrot and tore off one of its wings. As he did that, the Magician’s right arm fell off.

Punchkin stretched out his left arm, crying, “Give me my parrot!” The Prince pulled off the parrot’s second wing, and the Magician’s left arm fell off.

“Give me my parrot!” he cried. He fell on his knees. The Prince pulled off the parrot’s right leg. The Magician’s right leg fell off. The Prince pulled off the parrot’s left leg. The Magician’s left leg fell off.

Nothing was left of him but the body and the head. But he still rolled his eyes and cried, “Give me my parrot!” “Take your parrot, then!” cried the boy. He twisted the bird’s neck and threw it at the Magician. As he did, Punchkin’s head twisted around, and he died with a scary groan!

Then they let Balna out of the tower. She, her son, and the seven Princes went to their own country. They lived very happily ever after. And everyone else went home.