A future husband has been chosen for Princess Alda; it is Prince Magnus. The King is getting ready for his daughter’s wedding and handing down the crown to his future son-in-law. Government ministers and advisors are making preparations for the royal nuptials. A circus troupe also arrive for the celebrations. A chance meeting between the Princess and a circus artist in the palace garden threatens to disrupt the wedding plans. The stranger gives the Princess a heart as a gift – because she does not know what that is. There is order in her father’s kingdom, and there is security – but no-one has a heart. The heart allows the Princess to talk with the grass, the trees and toads, and the silenced child inside her starts to remember her late mother. When the King discovers that, he gives an order to cut it out of her chest, but the royal husband-to-be hides the girl to fight for her new-found heart.