Ashley Beach-Author and Storyteller

Prince Gabriel grew up in the light and love of his parent’s love. He never doubted their love for each other and saw how their love made their kingdom and realm blossom and thrive. He and his sister Julianna had always been close too, and it was hard to imagine what a life without her and her love would look like. He had been given the gift of magic that made flowers grow and bloom in even the hardest ground. A magic he never saw as princely, but one that would save his realm on more than one occasion. As years in the Spring realm passed,  their light began to wane and they couldn’t figure out how or why their sunlight was losing it’s strength, though they had a feeling the reason lied in the depths of the winter realm and the rule of the snow queen. His parents tried to convince him not to go. They were afraid that something might happen to him. The heart of a springling was a delicate thing. One touch of ice in his veins, and his heart would be forever altered, if not lost completley. He convinced them he would be alright and that he was the best person to set out on this quest. They said they’re goodbyes and watched him go.

The winter realm was no easy trek. It was cold and barren and hard. The complete opposite of his realm of sunshine and light and flowers. If not for the magical cloak their healer had given him, he would have frozen to death his first few days in the realm. Finding any amount of warmth and food was difficult and on top of that,  there seemed to be a snow beast in the realm that could easily spot his sunkissed skin against the white wintry snow. In his attempts to discover the source of his realms waning power and stay hidden from the snow monster, Gabriel stumbles across a beautiful snow maiden, hurt and unconscious. She is unlike anything he has ever seen. Her pale shimmering skin the picture of a fresh blanket of snow. Her hair a pale blond that looked almost white in the pale winter sunlight. Her eyelashes flutter open and he is caught in the endless crystal blue of her eyes that pulls him into the depths of their icy pools. His world will never be the same.

Prince Gabriel left his home and the warmth and love and safety of his family to journey to a cold and barren place. A place that had been a long time without the presence of The Great Mage and His Son. He stumbled across a beautiful woman who he later discovers is the daughter of the snow queen. Her story was so much different than his. She had been cursed as a child. Her mother had banished her when she was very young. She was left to raise herself and fight for her survival in the cruel and harsh world of winter where people only saw her as a monster. Cursed. Banished. Unlovable. Condemned. Monster.

When Gabriel saw Erianna, he saw nothing but pure beauty. A beautiful, rare rose that had managed to bloom in the midst of a cold and barren land. A unique and exquisite snowflake that brought beauty and grace to the world around her. Even in her monster form, he saw only beauty. He loved her, heart, soul, and mind, and loved her with an everlasting, unchanging love, regardless of her cursed and fallen state.

Our Great Prince sees us the same way Gabriel saw his beloved princess.  Our Prince also left his throne and his loving father to traverse a fallen and broken world to find us and save us from our cursed state. Unlike Gabriel, whose eyes only beheld Erianna’s beauty the first time he saw her, our Prince was there when our beauty was carefully crafted and created. He has seen our beauty and loved us with an incomprehensible love since before the beginning of time. Even when we were cursed and sentenced to an eternity of banishment, he loved us still and made the journey from his realm into ours to find us and rescue us and restore us to his love and to his kingdom. 

Gabriel’s heart was pierced by the ice poison he was so warned about entering his heart and it took the love of a princess and a drop of her blood pierced by a thorn to bring him back and restore him to his glorious self. Our valiant Prince was also pierced by the poison and hate of this world. When He came only to love us, we betrayed that love time and time again and ultimately pinned him to a cross out of our hatred at his attempt to love us. We didn’t like that a prince would come to this earth and declare his love for us. That meant that we had to make a choice–to continue to love ourselves or the harsh lovers that loved with a conditional love on our looks or status in the world, or turn our hearts to a genuine lover whose love was unconditional and pure. We hated that his love required a change in our own hearts so we barred ourselves against him. It was easier to view ourselves as unlovable and be loved by an absent lover than believe in the great love of a prince. The enemy does everything in his power to poison our love against him, but His love never changed even when we pushed him away or tried to deny our own love that he had awakened within our own hearts. He didn’t turn his back or run away when the rest of the world left us for dead. He left his home for us. He left his throne for us. He fought against the greatest powers and evils in this earth to bring us home and restore our hearts to him. He literally moved Heaven and Hell to bring our hearts back to him and poured out his love upon the earth with the drops of blood that were the result of a piercing crown of thorns upon his head as he lifted his eyes to his father and cried out for him to forgive us despite crucifying his son on a tree.

The love that Gabriel showed Erianna is great, but is merely a drop in the bucket compared to the infinite and boundless love of our Mage’s Son. Our Prince loves us so much more deeply and passionately than we could ever imagine or comprehend and gave us the ultimate picture of love when he sacrificed himself to save us. He wants nothing more than the heart of his beloved bride. The heart that was promised to him when it was beautifully created before the beginning of time. The heart that was meant to be his and his alone for all eternity. He loves you, beloved. He wants you. He desires restoration in the relationship that was rent and divided in the garden.

Where is your heart today, on this day we celebrate love and relationship? Has your heart been mishandled or betrayed or cut to pieces by the cruelty and selfishness of this world? Has it been abandoned or misled or become so guarded you’re afraid to let even the idea of love enter it again?

Regardless of where your heart has been. Regardless of what other lovers it has pursued. Regardless of how many times you’ve abandoned it or put it in the hands of others, there is a Mighty Prince who loves you, heart, body, mind and soul, and He is longing for you to return to him so he can show you the love he’s been waiting to share. It doesn’t matter how many years have passed since you last saw or spoke with your Beloved Prince, He never sought love elsewhere. He’s been waiting for you and has never let the love in his heart go out for you. He has always been waiting for you to return to him and like a love who has been missing for many years, his heart and eyes will be filled with the most radiant light and joy when he sees his beloved return home.

There is a great and mighty Prince who is waiting to love you. Let your heart be loved by him today. Give him a chance to show you what true love really looks and feels like. Make Him your ultimate valentine today.