The Flame of Love

Once there lived a blacksmith, with his son, in the Carpathian Mountains. From childhood his son hammered iron with the father in a forge. The father was a good blacksmith but the son turned out to be better. He took a red-hot iron from the fire with his hands, bent the iron, and didn’t feel any pain. The story spread over the Carpathian Mountains about his famous son. From other lands people came to the forge in order to see the blacksmith’s son. He had such a wonderful talent despite the fact he hadn’t seen anything beside his forge.

Years went by and soon he became a very handsome young man. One princess learned of the beauty and unusual hands of the blacksmith’s son. She saddled a horse and went to search for happiness. The blacksmith-father didn’t allow women to ride up to the forge but he couldn’t ban the princess from doing it.

The princess found the way, rode to the forge, and came up to the young man: “Shoe my horse, please, because when I reached you he had lost all his horseshoes”, she said. The young man had never seen the strange woman and he was rooted to the spot and couldn’t tear himself away from beautiful princess.

The angry father pushed his son: “Why do you waste time? You are asked to shoe a horse and not to look at her”.

Son went to the fire humbly and threw the horseshoes into it. But he couldn’t keep his eyes off the beauty of the princess face.

Father came up to the young man once more and pushed him again: “My son, I’ll punish you for such bad work! Look! The horseshoes are boning out now and you do nothing”.

The young blacksmith pushed his hand into the fire calmly, but all of a sudden he shouted with pain. “What’s the matter with you?” asked the young princess. The girl was very disappointed when she saw the burnt hand of the blacksmith son.

Looking at this scene, his father said: “You felt in love with her my son! What a pity! You could be a famous blacksmith all over the world! You could take the red-hot iron with bare hands and not feel any pain. But I see… The flame of love overcame you! It’s the strongest flame in the world — the flame of love!”