"Even the tyrant Ironheart could ask no more," said she. "Lead the way, Spirit, and I shall tell him that I have finished my task."
Traveling by a short road known only to the Spirit, the princess reached the Westland Kingdom the next day, and was on her way to the castle when the women went down to the fields to work. They regarded Yvonne as one they had never seen before, and she was puzzled for the reason.
"Alas!" cried the Spirit sadly. "You are fair of face no longer, Yvonne. They do not know that they have ever seen you before." Then straight past the guards and into the presence of King Ironheart the Spirit led her.
King Ironheart cried out in fury as the princess entered the throne room. "Old crone!" he exclaimed. "How dare you to come into my presence? Do you not know I cannot abide old age or ugliness? You shall be punished."
"Old age," echoed the princess. "I am not old. I am Yvonne, the Beggar Princess, whom you bid turn the desert plain into a wilderness of forest and build therein a splendid palace for you."
Then the cruel king laughed heartily. "Never," cried he, "have I been so diverted. Go at once to the mill in the forest where the sun rises, O Yvonne, Beggar Princess, and at the very sight of you the walls will fall. Tell Prince Godfrey that I have departed his land and have betaken myself and soldiers to the splendid palace which you so kindly built for me. However, let me first reward you with this gift." Before the princess was aware, he had flashed a mirror before her face.
Yvonne gazed spell-bound as she beheld her changed image.
"Oh!" cried she, "you are more cruel than I had even supposed. But for you I had never known how hideous I have become. Truly I am the ugliest woman in all the world!" She wept and covered her face that she might look no more in the mirror which King Ironheart continued to hold before her gaze. The Spirit, with pitying words, led her from the castle and tried to comfort her; but at the sight of her changed image, Yvonne's courage had fled. Even when the glad shouts of the Westland people told her that Ironheart was departing the kingdom, she did not smile. She wept all the way as she journeyed sadly to the forest where the sun rose. She now longed only to free Godfrey and then to die.
"For," thought she, "though he be gallant enough to wed me in pity for my hideous countenance, I love him too dearly, and I could not bear that all the world should look with loathing on his queen."
Late one night the princess entered the forest where she had gone so often to seek the herds, and at midnight she stood before the mill. It was dark and dreary looking as ever, and no sign nor sound of life could be seen about it. Standing close to the window-like opening she began to sing: