bananniewrites

[bananniewrites]

A Chilly Welcome Home

Princess Genevieve (16/?)

Genevieve rumbled along in the wagon with Matt and Rowan, finally on the path headed straight for home. But she wasn’t as excited as she wanted to be; instead, her thoughts lingered on Peter, whom she left behind. The town they dropped him off at faded further and further away until it was a tiny dot on the brilliant horizon, swamped with the hues of the sunrise. She squinted into the sun, watching the sun steadily float higher into the sky, turning the sky its usual light blue, until the cart’s passage into the forest filtered its beams. In the forest the air was cooler, and Gen remembered the cloak she still had. She wrapped it tighter, but wasn’t very cold.

Matt broke the silence. “So… are you excited to go back home? It’s been at least a couple of days since you were at King Ranthum’s castle, right?”

Gen thought for a moment. “I don’t know,” she finally said. “Time’s been kinda funny for me lately.” Another moment of silence passed before she asked, “Matt, why did you become a thief?”

He shrugged. “I was young and stupid and got myself into a bit of trouble with someone called The Weasel.” She snorted. “Laugh all you want, but they’ve got a criminal organization across Onirea and Kakor. Especially in Kakor. Some of the higher-ups are nasty little parasites. Anyway, I got into a bit of trouble and now I owe The Weasel money until they feel like easing up on me. What about you, Rowan?”

“Same thing, more or less,” Rowan called back. “Gave a bit of bad information and one of the higher-ups paired me with you. Said The Weasel was being ‘generous’ to pool our debts.”

They continued to roll along until King Omar’s castle came into view. It was surrounded by hills covered in fruit trees, gardens, and guards decorated with the kingdom’s colors: light blue, white, and dark green. The castle itself was painted white and the kingdom’s flags flew on the towering spires. On the flag was a horizontal light blue cross with a dark green border on a white background.

A guard came near and halted the horse. “State your business.”

“We seek an audience with the King and Queen of Onirea,” Rowan answered. “We have their daughter and we would like to take her home.”

The guard squinted at Genevieve, who took off the hood so he could recognize her, but he frowned. “Wait here,” he instructed the thieves, then marched to the neighboring guard and muttered something Gen couldn’t hear. The two guards drew near Gen, then the consulted one slapped the first upside the head. “That’s Princess Genevieve, idiot! The adopted one! We’re letting her in, too!”

The consulted guard turned to Rowan. “Is it just Princess Genevieve that you have sir?”

“Yes sir,” Rowan replied. The guard took hold of the reins while the first guard rang a messenger. The wagon continued to roll on its way into the castle as the messenger ran further ahead, and Gen watched the familiar scenery of the flowing fields where she used to romp and roam. Well-manicured grass on rolling hills and evenly-spaced trees with sprawling branches perfect for climbing and swinging on seemed welcoming, but Gen felt like a guest now instead of a returning member of the family. Maybe the guard who didn’t recognize her had something to do with it. Was he just new? Had they never met before?

Rowan leaned over towards Matt, his whispers just catching on Gen’s ears: “Matt, do you think they’ll still pay us? I mean we did return the princess safe and sound, but is that reward a promise the king intends to keep? I’m just thinking that if he saw the… posters… around town?”

“I dunno,” Matt whispered back. “If they do recognize us, we can apologize and promise that we can stop our…” Matt glanced at the guards leading the cart to the swirling iron patterns of the double doored gates of the castle, then continued, “...habits with the reward, as we’re only trying to pay off debts--”

“But how do we know they’re not going to throw us in the dungeon?”

A guard near Rowan turned to him, raising an eyebrow. “Why would Their Royal Majesties throw you two in the dungeon?”

“No reason,” Rowan blurted. The guard glanced between them, squinting.

“He gets nervous meeting royalty,” Matt reasoned quickly. “It makes him jump to wild conclusions.” The guard warily nodded and continued on until the cart came to a stop and they were ordered out. From there, they were escorted through another blossoming courtyard and through the great hall to the throne room, completely surrounded by guards.

The throne room was small but decadent; the walls had a light blue color laced with winding, dipping, dizzying patterns of gold that were lit by three candelabras on each side of the room and a chandelier that spat light but didn’t take up much space. The stone floor was mostly hidden by dark green carpet, and only betrayed itself at the candelabras so as not to drip wax onto the carpet. Across the throne room on top of carpet-covered steps and beneath elegant white silk drapes were two thrones, occupied by King Omar of Onirea on the left and Queen Adeline of Onirea on the right. 

Omar was brown-haired and whiskered, with grey peppered in to blend the color lighter than it was ten years ago. His eyes were dark brown like soil after rain and his mouth was set in an expressionless straight line. His jaw was not chiseled, but rather rounded out like baby cheeks. Adeline had hair, brown almost to the point of being black with one streak of white, criss-crossing in two braids and under a light blue veil. Her emerald eyes twinkled watching the formation proceed, and her parted rosy lips soon broke into a smile. She gripped the arm of her throne with anticipation. 

The formation stopped and with the guards nudging, Rowan and Matt each got on one knee to show proper respect. Nobody urged Genevieve to do the same, probably because she was a princess, so she just stood there trying not to look awkward. “Your Majesties King Omar and Queen Adeline of Onirea,” a guard in the front presented, “these two gentlemen have come forth to return Princess Genevieve. I expect they are also here for the reward you have promised for her return.” As the front parted, both of the monarch’s faces dropped in shock.

The king squinted. “Haven’t I seen the two of you before?”

The thieves glanced between each other. “What do you mean, Your Majesty?” Rowan replied as politely as he could. 

“The two of you are wanted thieves, are you not? In association with the crime lord… “the Weasel”, was it?”

“With all due respect Your Majesty,” Matt chimed in, “we are trying to pay off debts to the Weasel in order to get out of their association… if that makes sense.”

Omar rubbed his chin. “Yes, but at this point, you both would still have to face punishment for these crimes, even after cutting ties with this Weasel.” 

Gen darted her eyes from the king to the thieves and cleared her throat. “Dad-- er, Your Majesty, these two… fine gentlemen are the ones who…” Well, rescued wasn’t quite the right word. “...Helped me escape from the castle in Kakor.”

“I am aware of that Genevieve, but--”

“Actually, Omar,” Queen Adeline interrupted, “I was wondering how they rescued our daughter. If you would allow them, I would like to hear their story. Perhaps it could explain a few things for us such as why it is these two gentlemen who have her now instead of a knight, and why Princess Genevieve has returned… in the state that she is in.” 

She grimaced slightly, looking Gen up and down. Genevieve did not have the dress she was kidnapped in, but her slip, knickers, and a cloak that was not hers. Her curly tangled hair might as well have been a squirrel’s nest. Her face was smudged with dirt, although some days that was more or less normal. She looked more like she was robbed rather than rescued. That’s probably why her parents looked so shocked.

“Okay, so uh… I was with Clara, in the tower, aaaaaaaaaand I got bored. So I decided to escape. I climbed out the window, almost got caught by guards, I turned into a mouse, then these two--”

“You-- I’m sorry? You turned into a mouse?” The queen asked, trying to stay calm.

“Oh, yeah, I accidentally drank Clara’s rat poison instead of one of her potions, but it turned me into a mouse. Then I changed back at night.”

The king pinched the bridge of his nose and the queen stared at her with wide eyes and terse lips. After a deep breath the queen said, “alright. Please continue.”

“The wizard for Kakor took me to his office, and that’s where these two lovely gentlemen found me. This was while I was still a mouse.”

Matt added, “If I may clarify, we didn’t realize that she was the princess even after she changed back. That’s why we weren’t able to take her back right away.”

“I would think she would be more recognizable than that,” King Omar mused.

“...It was dark.”

“Even so. Did you escort her to the village, then?”

“We told her to run in the forest where she would have a greater chance of slipping away.” Rowan stomped on Matt’s foot and shot him a dirty glare.

“You didn’t go with her?” The king questioned.

“We were the distraction,” Rowan offered, “so the armies would be focused on us instead of her.” 

Genevieve was certain that wasn’t how it went down, but she didn’t want to get them in too much trouble, so she piped up: “they gave me this cloak before they sent me off.”

“Genevieve, dear,” the queen butted in, “may I ask, where is your dress?”

“Oh. I left it at the castle. It wasn’t comfy and it wouldn’t fit through the window.” Both monarchs sighed. “What?”

“All this time that you were having your adventures, you were in your underwear?” the king huffed.

Rowan leaned over to Matt. “I always thought it was a secret pair of pants.”

Gen frowned. “I wouldn’t have gotten out with my dress. What else was I supposed to do?” The king opened his mouth as if he was about to say something, but the queen put a hand on his shoulder and he stopped. “I know, I know,” Gen continued, “I’m supposed to wait for a knight to come and rescue me. And sure, I may not have come home as fast as Clara did, but at least I’m home! Isn’t that the important part?”

“You’re supposed to come home in one piece and your dignity intact,” the king seethed, “but it looks like you left it back at the castle along with your dress-- in fact, I’m not sure if you had any dignity to begin with.”

“Omar!” The queen hissed. “How dare--”

Gen saw red. “Oh, and what are you gonna do, order your knights to put me in time-out?”

“Genevieve Elizabeth Quire, that is no way to speak to--”

The king shot back, “No daughter of mine is going to be an embarrassment to my kingdom!” A small collective gasp rose in the room.

Gen blinked. How long has he wanted to say that? Her hands balled into shaking fists and her eyes started to grow watery. “Oh, I’m the embarrassment?” she spat. “Try the king that’s so used to having his daughters kidnapped but never questions why it keeps happening! Do you just allow us to be kidnapped at this point?” There were nervous glances among the guards.

“I’d like to see you try fighting off a horde of orcs!”

“Maybe I will!”

“THAT’S ENOUGH!” Queen Adeline roared, getting to her feet. For a moment, the room was dead quiet before she rubbed her temples and spoke again. “I’m getting a headache from you two. Omar, I need to speak to you in private. Guards, escort these two gentlemen to the courtyard while I discuss matters with the king. And Genevieve, just… go to your room. Please.”

Gen’s eyes stung with tears. She fled to a door beside the thrones and into a hallway, then flung open a wooden door wrought with iron and a small pink-stained window, slamming it behind her.

[bananniewrites]

A Word of Advice

Princess Genevieve (15/?)

Clara was marched once more to the castle, through dark and damp halls. But this time, instead of being led to a tower with her sister, she was forced down into the dungeon and into a dim cell. Sconces lit the walls, but not well; most of the dungeon was hidden in shadows. Guards pushed her into her cell and shut the door behind her, then walked away and disappeared from view. The lingering echo of the dungeon door slamming shut was the last bit of company she had before she was left in the silent darkness.

She groped around until she found the stone bench chained to the wall, the squalid slab that she would sleep on, and finally allowed herself to weep. Now that she was alone, she let the tears roll down her cheeks and the sobs shake her body. Clara folded her arms and laid her head on the bench. Where did she go wrong?

This wasn’t how it was supposed to go. She shouldn’t be here; she should be home already, with the king and queen with supper on the table. For all her lessons in this very field and meticulous planning, how did she fail so badly? What would her political espionage teacher say? Probably something like--

“Why are you crying?” a voice whispered behind her. She spun to find her teacher, clothed in dark robes and glowing with a mysterious, ethereal blue light. Her teacher was an odd creature to begin with: an anthropomorphic raven, a giant compared to regular ravens, but he was only a little shorter than Clara was. Instead of feathery wings, his grey leathery arms ended in talons. The only thing that was feathered and speckled with white was his face, betraying his stretched time upon the earth. Indeed, when he shuffled closer to her his weight shifted from foot to foot, his body swaying with each step like a little old lady. From his dark grey beak he whispered again. “Well?”

Although surprised, Clara sniffed and replied, “Well Clicker, I tried to use the skills you taught me to stall my wedding with King Ranthum and send a letter, but he locked me in here because he thought I was flirting with the jester.”

His eyes widened slightly. “But why are you crying?”

“Because it didn’t work! I was in a room where I could sleep comfortably and write, but now I’m stuck here in this dungeon until the wedding day with my enemy!” She took a shaky breath and a couple more tears dripped off her face. “I’ve failed. I feel like all my planning was for nothing. I should’ve done something differently.”

“Now Princess Clara, what do I always say?” Her teacher gently reminded her. “‘If you can’t learn from it or do anything about it, don’t think about it.’ What’s done is done, so spare that kind of talk for the next time you get kidnapped. You said something about a letter?”

“For King Omar, yes. The jester thought it was for my sister.”

“And did he deliver it?”

“I don’t know. I managed to pass it on to him, but I don’t know if King Ranthum’s guards will find him.”

Her teacher cracked a small smile. “This letter wouldn’t happen to say ‘please come and rescue me’, would it?”

“No Clicker, it wouldn’t. King Ranthum is up to something, and I believe it may involve my father somehow, so I needed to warn him about a potential trap.”

Clicker sat on the bench. “So what do you plan to do in the meantime? Escape, perhaps?”

“I don’t know. The last time I escaped my parents scolded me for it, but I don’t think a knight is coming this time. I would like to get out of the dungeon, at least.”

Clicker clicked his tongue within his beak. “Do you still have your daggers?”

“Just one. I gave the other to Genevieve in case she needed it.”

“One will do. You may have to use it.”

Clara was taken aback. “What? I-I can’t kill anybody,” she stammered. “It-it’s not right, I can’t have blood on my--”

“Hold on there, Your Majesty,” Clicker butted in. “I never said you had to kill anybody. A dagger is just a tool; however you use it is up to you. I knew a friend back in my younger days that could pick a lock with one, if you’re feeling inspired.”

“But what if I fail again? How can I know I won’t end up back here, or worse?”

“You’ll never know until you try. And if you end up back here again, think about what you accomplished, and learn from your mistakes. I’m sure King Ranthum is expecting an obedient, passive princess, not a queen that can stand up for herself. Surprise him.”

The blue light surrounding Clicker began to fade. “Listen Your Majesty, I don’t have a lot of time left. I used the wizard’s projection spell to talk to you, but it won’t last much longer. Now, you can do this. You can get out of here. I believe in you.”

“It’s not possible to just wait for the letter to get there, is it?” Clara pleaded.

“If you wait, then save a piece of wedding cake for me,” Clicker said, his voice disappearing with his form. Soon Clara was left in darkness once more.

She undid her dress to dislodge the dagger she was keeping in her bodice. She rested the blade in her palm, the metal warm from its hiding place. As she contemplated its usage, the air grew a little bit colder.

Genevieve sat in silence in the back of the cart with Peter, Matt guarding them by sitting idly between them. Rowan was absent from the cart and busy talking to a woman a little ways away, out of earshot, most likely about Peter. Matt and Rowan were hoping that she would take him off their hands in exchange for a bit of gold and the promise that he would be well taken care of as he worked. Peter glared at Gen, and Gen did her best to avoid his gaze by staring down into her lap or watching the sunrise.

The sky that Gen watched was quickly growing lighter, imbuing the heavens with yellows, pinks, and oranges more towards the horizon. It was a sight to see that could have been awe-inspiring if Gen was thinking about anything other than her choice to stick with the thieves’ plan. The sun, blazing orange like a pumpkin, peeked in the distant fields as Rowan came back.

“She’s agreed,” he confirmed cheerfully. “The work’s not the best, but there’s a few other kids who looked okay. You can make some friends.”

Gen’s throat clenched and her mind raced. Was this really right? Was she making a mistake? Is this what’s best for Peter? Was that for her to decide? Is it too late to reconsider?

Peter still didn’t look joyous. He was still scowling at Gen.

“Gen, do you want to say goodbye?” Matt prompted her.

“I’m really sorry,” she murmured.

Peter slid off the wagon, keeping his gaze on her. He finally hissed, “no, you’re not.” Rowan prodded him to keep moving, and Genevieve watched him be led away. She blinked tears out of her eyes, and they rolled down her cheeks.

Matt leaned back on the side of the cart. “Man. What a jackass. I, for one, am glad to see that bugger go, don’t you think?” He glanced over and saw Gen’s tears glistening and dripping down to her chin. He frowned. “Hey kid, don’t be like that. He’s a… he’s a schmuck, to be polite. A jerk. He can’t say you’re not sorry like that.”

“I think I’ve made a mistake. I’ve betrayed him, Matt.” She dried her cheek with the back of her hand. “I suppose he’s got every right to be angry with me.”

“Sure, but you’ve got the right to be sorry, even if you think you made the right or wrong decision. And you didn’t have a lot of options. Maybe leading him down the path he wanted just leads to more disappointments. We didn’t want him wandering around where he could get into trouble.”

“He said I’m just going to believe everything you say.”

Matt raised his eyebrows. “Well, it’s true, what we say. We try to be as honest as our profession allows us. At least I do. And if there’s a chance that we can help someone while we’re doing a job, we’ll do it, absolutely.”

Gen knit her eyebrows. “Do you do it to help or to get money?”

Matt shrugged. “Sometimes people pay you back with favors, so… uh… yes.”

Rowan jogged back. “Hey Matt, think fast.” A leather sack clinking with coins caught Matt in the chest, but Gen felt the blow; she was almost convinced of Matt and Rowan’s good intentions, but taking the money set her back on the fence. She curled up in the wagon and hugged her knees.

“Alrighty then,” Rowan announced. “Let’s get her home so we can get paid.”

“Of course I was talking about myself,” Matt clarified. “I like to help people. I don’t know about Rowan, though.”

[bananniewrites]

Things Go South

Princess Genevieve 14/?

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Gen’s sleep was interrupted when Peter shook her shoulder and threw off her blanket. “Come on,” he whispered, “we’re getting out of here.”

Gen shivered when he unwrapped the blanket, then propped herself on her elbows and squinted at him with bleary eyes. It was still dark; the sun outside had not yet made its appearance, but it began to turn the sky a lighter shade of navy. The thieves, Matt and Rowan, were still in bed, their backs to each other and still gently snoring. They were probably still tired after they had to wrestle with Gen to convince her not to fly the coop. They had explained to her their plan to take her safely home for the reward money and sell Peter off, hopefully to a better home, to finish off their debts.

But this morning, it was becoming clear to Gen that Peter wasn’t in the loop, especially that she remembered that he was asleep when the thieves came up with the plan. Peter tossed Gen her messenger’s bag and started to rifle through Rowan’s belongings, but Gen sat up. “Peter,” she whispered, then crawled nearer to him when he didn’t turn around. “Peter, I have to tell you something.”

“What is it?” He was still busy shoving as many trinkets and coins into his pockets as he could fit. 

“Well, Matt, Rowan, and I were talking last-- okay, stop. What are you even doing? Why are you taking their stuff?”

“Someone’s got to teach those thieves a lesson,” he muttered. “See how they like it when they find their stuff gone.”

“What-- no! Put it back!” she hissed. “Listen, Matt--”

“I’m not putting it back, they’re thieves! They spend all their money on drinks and women, you know that?”

“I heard them, they have debts to pay!” Gen spat. “That’s what I need to talk to you about.”

“Do you honestly think that--”

That was more than Gen could bear. She clapped her hand over his mouth, clamping down and struggling against his arms trying to free her from him. “Shut… up… and… listen to me! I was talking with them last night and they’ve come up with a plan. We’ve come up with a plan. They’re going to take me home and…” At that moment, it struck her that the news might be a bit painful to hear, especially that she agreed with the plan. The words knotted her throat before she managed, “they’re going to sell you off to a better home. Better than your pop.” 

She took her hand away, and Peter was silent for a few moments as his jaw hung freely. “But… you said that you would get me a job as the royal stableboy.”

Gen rubbed her arms. “I wanted to. There’s… there’s no guarantee that they’ll let you.”

“Can’t you advocate? Can’t you tell them what you’ve seen and what I’ve been through?” he pleaded. “Don’t you realize that my pop could wander in and take me back?”

“I can tell them what he looks like so that they’ll know how to avoid him,” Gen offered. “But I don’t know if the king will hire you like I hoped he might. I’m sorry.”

“So that’s it? You’re just going to take their side and believe everything they tell you? I trusted you, Gen! I thought you were actually going to help me, not--”

“What’s going on here?” Rowan’s voice suddenly jumped in. While Gen and Peter had been arguing, they hadn’t noticed the amount of noise they were making, nor the lack of noise from Matt and Rowan sneaking up behind them. Matt had his hands on Gen’s shoulders, and Rowan likewise had his on Peter’s. “Good to see you two are up early,” he commented to fill the silence between them all. “Means we can get moving. But first,” and he held out a hand in front of Peter, “empty your pockets, if you would be so kind.”

Peter glared at Gen with watery eyes as he took out the trinkets by the handful, and Genevieve had the awful sensation of being sick to her stomach.

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Clara mounted her horse alongside King Ranthum and his guards to ride around the kingdom. She was glad that no one caught her with her letter to King Omar of Onirea except for the jester, who thought it was for her sister. She still had it tucked under her dress shoulder, but considered slipping it up her sleeve so she could let it slide with the jester’s other envelopes according to their plan. But how would she move it from her shoulder to her sleeve with no one noticing?

She crossed her arms as if to hug herself, then gently tugged on the corner of the paper to pull it down her sleeve. However, the task proved to be a bit more difficult than expected; it would not slide easily and instead got stuck on loose folds of the fabric. Clara managed to wiggle it to her upper arm before King Ranthum, who was just in front of her, turned around with a suspicious look in his eye. “Is everything alright back there, Princess?”

“Er- yes, everything’s fine, Your Majesty,” Clara assured, trying not to stammer. “I was only trying to adjust my dress.”

His wary eye lingered on her for another moment before he mumbled, “alright,” and swiveled back to continue riding. Clara shivered and straightened, causing the letter to plummet to her forearm. Luckily, it didn’t peek out her sleeve where the guards could see. Now that the letter was in place, she took the opportunity to gaze out at the landscape.

To her right was the forest where Genevieve ran to escape, and to the left was the castle, soon replaced by rolling hills and distant craggy mountains as the horses trotted down the dirt path. If she strained to see over King Ranthum, a town with crowded buildings sat less than a mile away.

As the town grew near, Clara realized its squalid condition. Mud seemed to be everywhere; it covered the roads, people, and the bottoms of buildings. The people looked as ragged as their own clothes, which were torn, dirty, and dull. The merchants, or whom Clara assumed they were, wore colored clothes that didn’t look nearly so desperate for a mending, but even those too were faded. The merchants pulled carts filled with food and items worth selling, but Clara wasn’t sure if the other people could afford what the merchants had to offer. As the horses trotted by, some of the people gazed at them with contempt or fear, others with a subtle longing. Clara hid her hanging jaw behind her hand as she surveyed the sorry state of the town. The horses pressed on.

As they went along, Clara soon spied the jester with a big sack on his back. It wasn’t particularly hard to spot him, because his patterned clothes, while faded, made him stick out like a sore thumb. Clara figured this must be a chance to start the plan. “Jester?” She called out to him, and he glanced up, smiling. She dismounted.

Clara wasn’t entirely sure how to excuse the plan as an accident, so she started with, “how are you?”

“I’m well, Princess,” the jester returned, loosening his grip on the sack. “I’m just delivering mail-- oh no!” He had let go of the sack under the impression that it had been too heavy, and allowed the mail to spill out.

Clara bent down, now understanding how to act out the excursion. She helped shove the other envelopes back into the sack and slipped her own letter from her sleeve into the pile. By the time all the letters were in the sack, two guards and King Ranthum were towering over them, glowering. “Is there something wrong?” she asked them innocently.

“You’ve been acting suspiciously, both of you,” Ranthum growled. “If the two of you are going to flirt behind my back, then I have no choice but to intervene. Guards, arrest Princess Clara.” The guards grabbed her by the upper arms, one on each side, and hoisted her up back on her horse. 

“You honestly didn’t think that I would ignore the two of you whispering the other day?” Ranthum continued, huffing. “You and the jester planned this, didn’t you? You just wanted to tour the kingdom to see him, didn’t you? Well Princess, You are mine and no one else’s! There will be no more writing to him, visiting him, or sneaking him into your room. From now on, you are staying in the dungeon until our wedding day. Is that clear?”

Clara was stunned silent. She hadn’t been spoken to so harshly since her parents berated her for escaping the tower the first time she was kidnapped. She turned away, trying to hide the tears she couldn’t control.

“Guards, arrest the jester too,” Ranthum decided. “He’ll have a separate cell, but a shorter sentence. I’ll get bored without him.” He waited a moment. “Well?”

The guards shrugged. The jester was nowhere to be found. The guards spread out to scrounge for him, but he was already well on his way to Onirea, to deliver a letter meant for the king to Princess Genevieve.

[bananniewrites]

Jokes and Juggling Lies

Princess Genevieve 13/?

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Clara walked down the hallway lit by the bright morning sun, her footsteps echoing against the stone walls. She could feel the parchment of the letter tucked under the shoulder of her floral dress as it rubbed against her skin. Her heart pounded for fear of one of the guards noticing the letter, but she held her head high to feign confidence.

The king was waiting for her, just like dinner the night before. He stood and bowed. “Princess Clara.”

Clara curtsied slightly. “Your Majesty.” They both sat at their respective meals.

Neither of them spoke a word as they ate their breakfast, but Clara always glanced up at King Ranthum to see if he was ever watching her. He appeared to be busy with his poached eggs and fried bacon. Clara tried to occupy herself with her fried egg with cheese, potatoes, and bacon; the king was quiet compared to dinner, and the silence was somehow more uncomfortable than defending herself when he asked questions.

He finally swallowed and wiped his hands. “I apologize if my reception this morning was a bit chilly,” he started. “I was famished, and to tell the truth, I was hoping you would start the conversation.”

“How so?”

“Well, I was wondering if you had come to a decision about the marriage.”

Clara nearly choked; she hadn’t, too busy trying to figure out exactly what he was planning and how to stop him. She had a feeling that her father was in danger whether she agreed or not, and no knight was expected at this point, so it was up to her to warn her kingdom that a trap may be planned.

Until then, she had to stall for time. “Er… I thought about it,” she faltered, “and I was wondering if I could… take a tour of the kingdom?”

King Ranthum raised his eyebrows in surprise. “A tour of my kingdom?”

“Yes. You see, if I am going to be queen --your queen-- then I ought to know what’s going on around the kingdom. What kind of problems there are, what concerns and worries your citizens have… everything I can learn about and figure out how I can solve these problems once I have official reign as queen. Y-your queen, I mean.” She bit her lip, afraid that she might have asserted herself too high.

He frowned. “Our main problem is between our kingdoms, My Lady.”

“But perhaps that’s the reason for the tension,” Clara speculated. “Perhaps if I solve some of the prob-- er, any problems in this kingdom, then King Omar would soften because he sees that you care about your people. Tensions would then lessen.”

The king leaned back and thought. Clara attempted to appear excited and hopeful, but her real hope was that Ranthum wouldn’t be suspicious or think that she was being rude by assuming he wasn’t a good king. He shrugged. “Alright, why not? After our jester’s routine; I wanted him to break up the ice between us.”

Clara breathed a sigh of relief. Maybe she could find someone outside the castle who could sneak the letter to Onirea, and the jester could lift her spirits. If all went well, her father would find a way around the trap and bring her home with her mother and Genevieve. Dear, sweet Genevieve, with that feigning innocent look on her face when she swiped a pastry from the kitchen, and muttered to her sister if she wanted a piece. Clara always would, even when pretending to be mad, and after Genevieve broke off a generous helping, she would shove the whole thing down her gullet while scampering off… 

“Princess?” Ranthum asked suddenly. “Why are you crying? Is something wrong?”

Clara snapped out of her memories and realized that her face was tear-streaked. “Oh!” She dried her eyes with the napkin. “No, nothing. Just homesick, I suppose.”

Ranthum slapped his hand on the table with a bang and grinned. “We shall soon remedy that, my dear! BRING IN THE CLOWN!” Two attendants left to inform the performer that he should soon be ready. The king stood up and walked towards the door, but not before stopping by Clara and offering his arm. Clara didn’t want to be rude, so she carefully, tentatively, took it. 

They walked together through stone hallways and passages until they came to a small room with another entrance further away in a corner. A grand, tall chair stood against one wall, as did several smaller ones. Clara peeked behind her and found a few Orcish people finely dressed, and surmised that the smaller chairs must be for these nobles. The king held her by the first chair next to him, inviting her to sit. They took their seats, and the nobles filed in, leaving one of the lowliest of nobility to stand.

A mere moment later, the room filled with a cacophony of jingling bells as the famed jester of the court cartwheeled from the back entrance, tumbled in front of the audience, and jumped with his arms wide open. Clara clapped as was the custom back home, but the nobles and the king cheered and stomped wildy on the floor.

“I see we have a guest from out of town tonight,” the jester opened. “My Lady, Princess Clara.” He bowed until his chin touched his toes. “I assume this is yer first time seeing me?” Clara nodded. “Ah. It reminds me of m’ first performance. I’m getting dressed offstage an’ I turn to the costume wench, an’ I says, ‘look, I’m pretty nervous ‘bout going onstage for the king,’ an’ she says, ‘oh don’t be, the worst thing that can happen is gettin’ yer head chopped off.’”

His costume jingled as he stepped back, pretending to be in shock. The audience giggled. “‘How is that supposed to help?’ ‘Fear is hilarious,’ she says. ‘Did you see the look on yer face just now?’” The nobles chuckled.

“But she was right you know,” he continued. “I was in town when I heard about the inspiring captain-- maybe you’ve heard this before.”

The king gave a sly smile. “I’m sure Miss Clara hasn’t.” Clara’s worries of the intimate title were drowned out as the nobles joined in furiously, begging the jester to tell the story.

The jester blushed just a bit. “Alright, well, whenever this captain gets in a fight with an enemy ship, he asks one of the crewmen to bring his red shirt. The reason is this: if he gets hurt in battle, then his crewmen can’t see the blood on his shirt and they keep fighting. So the lookout calls to him, ‘a fleet of twenty ships from the north, Captain,’ and the captain demands, ‘BRING ME MY BROWN PANTS!’”

The audience erupted in laughter, doubling over and gasping for breath. Clara clapped her hand over her mouth, stifling snorts that would only be appropriate in this situation. Her cheeks burned from a frozen smile, and her sides were almost split. But at the same time, the king was right: any tension in the moment fractured, cracked and shattered. It was almost as if Clara could breathe for the first time. When was the last time she was in a situation where she was allowed to laugh?

The jester held his hat sheepishly. “I hope I haven’t offended you in any way, Princess.”

Clara attempted to speak in between giggles. “No, that’s-that’s okay. It’s a good joke.” She caught her breath. “Do you know any more jokes?”

“Do I!” he exclaimed. His face fell. “Do I? I’m getting older you know, so m’ memory is starting to go. So are m’ eyes; I’ll look at my wife in the morning, an’ I say, ‘ugh, how’d I marry someone so ugly?’ an’ my wife says, ‘that’s a mirror, hon.’”

And so it went like this for another ten minutes, and all the while it was clear that the jester was often in town when he heard these wisecracks. If he’s in town, Clara mused, could he hand off the letter? Don’t be ridiculous, Clara, she scolded herself. Why would the king’s own jester betray him? Even if he was willing to hand it off, would it even get to Onirea in time? But what if the king catches me? Can I trick the jester into sending it, then?

When the jester took his final bow, the nobles whooped and stamped before reconvening by the hall. The king joined them, but Clara approached the jester instead. “Excuse me, jester?” She began cautiously. “Do you ever make jokes about the king?”

“Sure do,” he replied, “but only when he’s not around. Why, you got more in that envelope?” He pointed to Clara’s shoulder.

“What! No, it’s- this is… for my sister, Genevieve,” she lied.

“Must be pretty important if it’s got a red seal,” the jester noted. Clara glanced at the king, nervous that he would look their way and notice the envelope too. “Yer Majesty, I can deliver that for ye,” he whispered in her ear, “but not now, he’ll think that you’re trying to reach King Omar. I’ll meet ye in town while you’re on yer trip with King Ranthum. We’ll bump into each other and drop our letters. Pick up an envelope with a white seal and make it look like it was yers. I’ll do the same with the red seal. Agreed?” Clara nodded, and they parted ways.

King Ranthum raised an eyebrow. “What were you two whispering about?”

“I… wanted to know the next time he could perform,” Clara fibbed. “He just told me to ask whenever I felt like it. He’s a great performer, you know. He makes me laugh.”

He rubbed his chin. “A bit of a flirt, if you ask me.”

“I have no interest in him romantically, if that’s what you’re concerned about,” she promised.

He gazed down at her, his face and tone grim. “I can assure you, my marriage will be a happy one.” He turned his glare towards the jester. “The jester will learn to appreciate the wife he has.”

Clara gulped. What kind of trouble had she got the jester into?

[bananniewrites]

Negotiations

Princess Genevieve 12/?

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Genevieve didn’t like the idea of being tied up, especially by two people discussing what to do with her and how to raise funds in the same conversation. She had fought with Matt to get to the door and received a bruise or two in the process, she was tired and betrayed, and she had no way out. Peter, her friend and helper, was still fast asleep. She gave Matt and Rowan a deadly glare while they secured her wrists together behind her back.

“Would you stop looking at us like that?” Rowan snapped. “You’re fine. We have a plan.”

“Does this plan involve selling me on the black market, Rowan?” she growled.

“It can wait until morning,” Matt insisted. “You need to sleep. It’s late.”

“And let you carry me off while I sleep? I don’t think so!” Gen protested. “I’ll escape one way or another. I don’t like being kept in the dark, and about my own well being!”

Matt cupped his hand over her mouth. “Would you keep it down?” he hissed. “People like their peace and quiet around here.”

She spat in his hand, and he pulled it away in disgust, shaking it off and wiping it on the bed. Gen turned her gaze to Rowan. “Those same people would be awfully suspicious if the person waking them up was tied up.”

“What about a gag?” Matt suggested. Rowan shrugged.

“I’ll pound the walls! A gag won’t help,” Gen huffed. She thought quickly for a way to stop them from binding her further.

“Maybe one of our belts?” Matt was proposing, but after some thought, Rowan shook his head.

“Listen, um…” Gen attempted, “what if… if you tell me what’s going on, what the plan is, then I’ll shut up. I won’t shout and try to get someone’s attention.”

Matt looked at Rowan, hopeful. Rowan returned his gaze, then stared at the ground, thinking. He finally glanced up at her. “No escape attempts?”

Gen frowned. “No promises. I need to get home.”

Matt pulled Rowan aside and whispered in his ear, then Rowan whispered in his ear, and they nodded in agreement. “Alright then, Your Majesty,” Matt said, “we have good news then. You’re going home almost first thing in the morning.”

“Really?”

“You get to go home and we get the reward, so it’s a win for both of us,” Matt continued. “Of course, it’s not exactly enough for us to pay off our debts, but people are willing to pay for extra hands on their farms. We figured Peter over there would be better off.”

Gen blinked. “What? No, Peter has to come with me. I told him I would find him a job as a royal stableboy.”

Rowan pinched the bridge of his nose and sighed. “Gen, I know you’re trying to be nice, but you can’t always bring-- you can’t… what am I trying to say?”

“There’s no guarantee that the king will give him a job,” Matt explained. “Those kinds of jobs are reserved for the best of the best and those that are loyal to him. Now I’m not saying Peter isn’t either of those things, but the king may not see things that way. And if Peter doesn’t get the job, we don’t want him wandering around.”

“Like us,” Rowan added.

“But he’s running from somebody who threatened to kill me,” Gen told them. “And that was when he mistook me for his maid. If he treats someone like that, how do you think he treated Peter?”

Rowan put his hand on her shoulder. “Princess, I understand that you’re worried about him. We are too. That’s why we want to hire him out to someone who can take care of him. Better than the man he was running from, even.”

“And if you can’t?”

Rowan pulled Matt aside, and they whispered between each other again. After a minute or two, Matt turned back to Gen. “If we can’t find somebody who will hire him, we’ll take him in. He might be too old for an orphanage now, but we can’t leave him on his own. Although that means we still have debts, so he has to be careful to stay out of the way and off the hook…”

“What about my potions?” Gen offered. “I haven’t used them, and I’m sure that we can make more somehow. They’ll probably sell.”

“Only if Peter isn’t hired,” Matt reminded her. “So you keep those for now. We’ll talk to him in the morning. Now go to bed, we’re all dead tired.”

Gen had expressed some difficulty getting up to get her blanket while her hands were bound, so Matt and Rowan both agreed that if she promised to stay the whole night, she could be untied. She crawled back to her blanket and wrapped herself up, and though it was uncomfortable to lie down, she made it work. 

Thoughts about the agreement still buzzed around in her mind. Maybe Rowan and Matt were lying about the whole thing, or maybe Peter would resent her for deciding what to do with him without consulting him. What if the toothless old monster he called his pop shows up and the thieves don’t know that he was the man Peter was running from?

She shook her head. She couldn’t worry about that now; Matt was right, she had to sleep. Gen stared into the darkness, waiting for her eyes to close and trying to keep her head clear. It was a while before she was able to drift off into a dreamless slumber.

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Clara awoke with a start when there was a knock on her door. Her neck was stiff and her head groggy, and she found herself sitting at the desk with a folded piece of paper in front of her. Somehow, the candles all around her were melted to stubs, but still lit and they threw light all around the room. “What is it?” she called out in a yawn.

“King Ranthum is inviting Her Majesty Princess Clara to breakfast and a jester routine in thirty minutes,” a voice outside her door announced.

“I’ll be there, thank you,” Clara affirmed. She could hear the footsteps die away, and she unfolded the paper. She then remembered that this paper was an urgent message for her father. Whether or not she could actually get this message out, she figured that she ought to write it anyway, in case that there was some way she could pass it along as the circumstances changed. 

She looked around for the longest candle, but they were all the same stubby length. So she grabbed one of the candles off the desk, tilted it, and let some of the melted wax drip onto the edge that closed the letter. There was no stamp to be found, only the candle holders. Clara snatched one off the nightstand and hurried back to the desk, where she found that the wax was doing a very strange thing.

At first, she thought that the ink was bleeding through the parchment into the seal. The wax, which had been white from the candles, was starting to absorb color. When she held the light closer, she found that the color couldn’t possibly be from the ink-- the ink was dark blue, but the seal was turning red: the color to code an urgent message. The wax’s hue swirled to encapsulate the entire seal except for two white streaks in the center. When Clara stamped the wax and lifted the holder, the white streaks were shaped in the letters of her initials, C.Q.

Well, she reasoned, if I can light these candles merely by clapping twice, then why shouldn’t the wax change color? Suppose it’s all part of the candles’ magic? Even so, a chill tickled down her spine.

Clara took a quick look in the mirror, and finding numerous ink stains on her face, she washed in the basin of water from yesterday. The water was swiftly turning dark blue as the color sank to the bottom in swirling plumes.

She shuffled through the closet and found a velvet, violet gown with its sleeves appearing to stop at the elbow, but drooping down to the knee. They sported embroidered white ribbon around the forearms and the hem of the gown, as well as where it stopped above the breast. This was an evening gown. Clara’s parents wouldn’t scold her for wearing it to breakfast; but if they were here, they might have that small grimace or forced smile they were always giving Genevieve because she might waltz in scratching her backside and her hair a mess. But Genevieve wouldn’t care. She’d just bid them good morning and scarf down her breakfast.

What about the king? Would this be too fancy for him so early in the day? Would he know anything about dresses, or would he care?

An idea struck her. There was one time one of the dukes from a neighboring kingdom stayed the night after having too much wine (her mother commented he didn’t just have a touch of the grape, he’d been smacked by it). Her mother recommended a pale dress with many twirling floral patterns to wear while the duke breakfasted and sobered up.

Luckily, Clara was able to find something very similar in the closet. Not too flashy, but nice enough for company. After all, she wasn’t that familiar with the king. She untangled some patches of her hair and finally slipped the letter under the dress’s shoulder. Hopefully, no one would notice.

[bananniewrites]

Ilkengrind

Princess Genevieve 11/?

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Rowan guided the horse along the dirt path with a lamp in hand as Genevieve, Peter, and Matt bumped in the wagon behind him. The roundish moon shone its bright light over the horizon, announcing the start of night. It was hard to see it peeking behind the increasingly dense forest, but Gen craned her neck this way and that, trying to get the fullest view.

Peter broke the silence. “So how did you guys meet?”

“It’s kind of a long story,” Gen started, giving up on the moon. “But I was in a castle in-- what was it, Kakor? Yeah. So, uh, I decided to escape, because screw that, but um… when I was trying to find my way out, I heard some guards coming, so I downed one of my sister’s potions. I think I passed out, or fell asleep, or something, but when I woke up, I was a mouse.”

“You were not!” Peter objected. “People don’t turn into mice!”

“Well, here’s where it gets interesting,” Matt butted in. “Me and Rowan were in the same castle, looking for stuff we could sell. We broke into their wizard’s office, where we found Gen, the mouse. Well technically, Rowan found her, but we ran off with her and some of her stuff. Around midnight at camp, Gen-as-a-human woke us up about the armies coming to get us. I think we split up after that.”

The wagon shifted to the right, off the main road to Onirea. “Where exactly are we going?” Gen questioned.

“It’s a small village called Ilkengrind,” Rowan replied. “We come here sometimes to sell our stuff. The black market comes by here every once in a while because it’s nice and isolated.” He glanced back at them, but kept his gaze towards Gen and Peter. “It also helps that a lot of the folks here don’t speak English. Ergo, me and Matt will do the talking while you two… you two stay quiet. Gen, you keep that hood up.”

“What are you going to do to us?” Peter demanded; it was a question Gen didn’t think to ask. Her throat suddenly grew tight. 

Matt and Rowan looked at each other, fumbling for words. Both of them kept beginning suggestions, but never finished them with a legitimate idea. Matt scratched the back of his head. “We’ll… we’ll figure it out when we get there,” Rowan mumbled.

The wagon kept rolling in the tense silence and the path opened up from the forest to quiet, empty fields. Matt reclined against the bales of hay, as did Peter; but Gen stared up at the night sky, where the stars were scattered like sand among the clouds, and the fat moon finally made its appearance. Together, they cast everything that could be seen in white, like ethereal snow. Back home, Gen only saw a portion of the starry sky from her window, but now, all the heavens were revealed to her. What wonders have been shown in the sky? What was up there? Or who? Are they watching her? Are they laughing, lamenting, waiting?

“Is someone up there?” Gen murmured. The silence remained, but the stars twinkled. She glimpsed at Peter and Matt, falling asleep on the hay, then back at the stars. “What do I do? What am I supposed to do? I want to go home.” No voice spoke to her. She sighed and sat up. “How much longer till we get there?” Gen inquired.

“Not much further,” Rowan insisted. “As a matter of fact, I can see the village now.”

They lumbered into the village among shanty houses on the outskirts of Ilkengrind, past better-built stores and cottages, and finally to a large building of stone; next to it, a stable with one lonely horse standing in mostly clean hay. Rowan unhitched the wagon outside the last stall, then led the horse onto the floor of hay. “Matt, go in with the kids and check in. One room, one night.” Rowan flung a small sack at him that clinked when Matt caught it.

“Come on.” Matt ushered a sleepy Peter and suspicious Genevieve into the stone building. A bell on a rope stood by the entryway, and it rang when Matt pulled on the rope. The interior was dimly lit by a single candle in the middle of the room, and a person lighting another candle didn’t add much light. Matt talked to this person in an unfamiliar language, and the person responded in a tired but friendly tone. Matt gave them something from the clinking sack, most likely coins, and the person handed back a small, glinting key.

“Where are we?” Peter mumbled.

“It’s an inn,” Matt whispered as he took one of the lit candles. “We’re staying here for the night. Gen, Peter, you guys sleep on the floor. Me and Rowan are taking the bed.”

“How come we have to sleep on the floor?” Gen whined.

“Because there’s only one bed, and I paid for it,” Matt replied. “Now hush. It’s over here.” He unlocked a wooden door and found a single bed, a moonlit window, and a chest at the foot of the bed. In the corner was a chamber pot on top of extra blankets. Matt spread them out on the floor. “There you go. Get comfy.”

Gen lay down on the blanket and wrapped it around her, folding the edge of the blanket over herself. It was nothing like the squishy bed back home, with her room being one giant fort made out of pillows and blankets. She thought back to when Clara taught her how to make a pillow fort, back when they were both young. That was such a long time ago. Gen hadn’t been living at the castle for very long at all, at that point. But she and Clara were practically best friends. Gen hoped she was okay; she missed Clara, and her pillow forts, and home. She did her best to hold back tears.

Heavy footsteps thudded by the door, accompanied by a yellow glow. “So what’s the plan, then, Rowan?” Matt whispered.

“Let’s talk outside the room, alright? It’ll be fine.” Their footsteps on the wooden floor died away as the door squeaked and closed behind them.

Genevieve got up with a start and tiptoed to the door, where their voices were muffled. She cracked open the door the tiniest fraction it could give while staying as quiet as possible. She then pressed her ear to the crack and listened.

“A hundred and fifty pounds?” Matt was saying. “That’s more than what Kakor was paying, wasn’t it?”

“Fifty pounds more,” Rowan confirmed. “That’s for either of the princesses’ return. I talked to a guy from the black market too, a few minutes ago. He’s willing to take her off our hands, is what he said.” Gen felt her palms grow sweaty.

There was a pause. Matt asked quietly, “how much is he offering?”

“Two hundred,” Rowan replied in the same tone.

A long silence ensued. Gen almost didn’t hear when Matt finally murmured, “It doesn’t feel right.”

“I know,” Rowan agreed. “She’s a good kid. I don’t know what they want with her. Tell you the truth, I don’t want to know.”

“How much do we need?”

“A hundred and eighty.”

A chill went down Gen’s spine. Please don’t sell me, she pleaded silently. She remembered the stars. Please don’t let them sell me, whoever is up there. Please don’t let them sell me.

“She did save our lives,” Matt considered, “back in Kakor with those armies.”

“That’s true,” Rowan admitted. “But we need the money somehow, so what should we-- hey, did you close the door all the way?” Gen backed away, her heart racing.

“I thought I did.” The door shut all the way, putting a cork in Gen’s knowledge of their plans. 

She rushed over to Peter on the floor and shook his shoulder. “Peter! Peter, wake up! We have to go!” Peter barely stirred.

The door opened and creaked shut, and Matt and Rowan stood in the entryway. Gen could pretend to be asleep, but she was too far away from her makeshift bed. Maybe the window could let her escape? She bolted toward the moonlight, and the two thieves bolted after her. 

She could only put one foot on the sill before Matt grabbed her around the waist and pulled. Both of them landed on the floor, but it knocked the wind out of Matt since Genevieve landed on top of him. She meant to shout “LET GO”, but only managed “LET-” before Matt clapped his hand over her mouth. They wrestled quite a bit, Gen kicking and elbowing, and Matt trying to hold on to her as if for dear life.

Finally, Gen broke out of his grasp and crawled as fast as she could to the door. But Rowan stood in front of her, his dagger drawn. Gen would have to fight him if she was going to get out of here. She leaned against the wall, using it as a crutch to stand up. “Princess, please don’t make me use this,” Rowan pleaded.

Gen weighed her options. She had fought off Matt in wrestling. That was more unarmed combat. She could fight Rowan, but when he had a knife, her injuries could far surpass scratches and bruises. Maybe he was bluffing. The hand that held the dagger was shaking. But her whole body ached, and she didn’t feel that she had the physical strength to fight anymore. She sank down to the floor, exhausted and defeated.

A grim look spread across Rowan’s face. “Alright. Tie her up.”

[bananniewrites]

On to Onirea

Princess Genevieve 10/?

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Clara paced around her room, the dinner with King Ranthum stirring in her stomach. What would happen if I was married? She thought. She lay down on the bed and tried to remember her lessons. When two nations form an alliance through marriage, they don’t fight each other unless there’s an acceptable reason, like if one of the leaders was murdered by the other. There are usually some negotiations before the wedding concerning the land. Both leaders agree that they’ll still have their own nation unless one of them can’t lead.

Wait a minute, that’s it! If one of the leaders were to die, with no heir to the throne, then the allied nation takes over. So if I married Ranthum, Clara thought, and if he murders my father, then Onirea would be his! Clara went back to her pacing. She had to think of a way to stop the wedding, warn her father, and get out of there. She wasn’t fond of the idea of claiming Kakor for herself through similar means. 

She glimpsed back at the desk. How hard would it be to send a letter back home, she thought.

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Gen’s stomach growled. Dusk had fallen, and she was lying on the bales of hay in the barn to hide. She hadn’t eaten since she was with Lauren, around midmorning. Her hunger distracted her, and the more she thought about it, the worse it got. She felt like her stomach was gnawing away at itself, impatient for its next meal.

The barn door opened with its usual croak, and Gen lay still, listening for footsteps. It was one person, crushing the straw slowly. Peter whispered, “Gen?”

“Peter?” Gen whispered back. She carefully peeked over the edge of the loft.* 

Peter was alone with a bowl and spoon. The bowl had something in it, but it was too dark to see. “I’ve got porridge for ya. It’s what we’ve got for dinner.”

“Thanks.” She reached down and Peter reached up, and Gen brought the bowl to the loft. The porridge was bland and goopy; Gen had a hard time putting it in her mouth, but she forced herself to shovel down at least half the bowl. It was becoming clearer throughout her time outside the castle that meals were rather hard to come by when you’re on the lamb.

“Peter, can I ask a question?” Gen asked.

“Sure.”

“Are you going to turn me in?”

“Well,” Peter started, “I thought about it, and I’m going to say no for two reasons. First off, it’s wrong. Second, any reward money I get, my pop’s just going to make me give it to him. Just a waste of time. Anyway, I want to show you something real quick. Come on down.”

Genevieve found the ladder and climbed down. Sneaking out of the barn, Peter led her to the stables where a horse hitched to the wagon filled with hay bales was waiting. 

Peter pointed into the town. “Just off to the right in a quarter of a mile should be a path marked with a sign that says ‘Onirea’. If I don’t wake up before my pop gets the guards, just take the wagon and go. I’ll say you stole it.”

Gen was rather annoyed that she was going to be taking blame in this escapade, but then again, what else could Peter tell his pop? She thanked him. “You know, my offer still stands. You can come with me if you want.”

“What about the horse? How will she get back here?”

Gen thought for a moment. “She could live in Onirea. I know the horses are well cared for.”

“And my pop?”

“Peter, how can a man be your pop if he mistreats you like this? There are better options out there if you just go for it. You need to get out of here, and this is the perfect opportunity.”

“He’ll be real mad if I go,” Peter mumbled, unsure.

“But can anybody defy the king?” Gen asked. “Your pop can’t touch you if the king says you’re the new royal stableboy.”

Peter slowly nodded. “Alright. Yeah, why not? I’m done with this dump. Let’s go, tonight, even. I don’t know when exactly my pop will go to the guards, but it’ll be tonight, so we gotta go before he goes or comes back. Come on.”

The dim, twilight sky shadowed the two as they crept to the wagon. They glanced all around them, but the toothless old man was nowhere in sight. Peter mounted the horse, and Genevieve clambored in the back with the hay. Peter clicked his tongue to start the horse moving, and they rolled away towards the town square.

Gen pushed the bales in front of her to make a hiding space, but it was clear that the wagon was starting to draw attention from the last of the villagers still out and about, lamp-lighters, shady figures leaning on empty market stands, and armed soldiers. Gen hid her face.

“Peter!” she whispered. “Is it possible to go any faster? People are staring.”

“If I go any faster, they might get suspicious,” he whispered back. “Just act natural.”

Genevieve slunk back against a bale, but found it hard to relax. Some of the shady figures were on the move, and the soldiers started whispering to each other. She picked at the stray bits of straw poking out of the bales, then pulled them out one at a time, and wrapped them around her finger. Her fingers trembled as she began tying knots in the straw.

“We’re getting close,” Peter whispered. “The path is just around the corner.” Gen could see it too-- the arrow-shaped sign marked “ONIREA” was just a small distance away. She looked back behind her to make sure nobody was following them, then froze. The old man with the missing teeth was standing next to one of the soldiers, shouting about something, but pointing right at her.

Gen whipped around. “Peter, are you sure we can’t go any faster? I just saw your pop. He was talking with a guard and I know he saw us.”

Peter craned his head around to confirm, then cursed under his breath and gave the horse a small kick to hurry from a trot to a canter. The breeze strengthened when they picked up speed, and Gen’s tangled curls fluttered as they blew past the sign. The road grew bumpier as they crossed onto the dirt path.

Gen heard hoof beats behind her. A soldier on a brown horse galloped behind the wagon, gaining on them. Peter glanced behind him, and the horse picked up the pace. The wagon breezed past a rectangular sign that said “Welcome to Onirea”, and the soldier finally screeched to a halt, letting the distance between them grow.

“Peter!” Gen cried. “He’s gone! He stopped!” The horse slowed and finally stopped, and as the two of them gazed behind them, they breathed out laughter of happy relief. “We should keep going though,” Gen decided, “because we don’t have a light, do we?”

Gen was right. There was no lantern to be found, and the sky was changing from a dark blue to almost black. Gen and Peter were almost nothing but silhouettes. 

Peter urged on the horse, but when it moved a few steps, it nickered and started to move backward. He gave the horse a small kick. The horse would not move. “Come on, Bella, what’s wrong? What is it, girl?”

There was a small click, and a burst of lamplight illuminated the dark. The one who held the lamp wore dark clothes and a bandana over their nose and mouth. On the other side of the wagon was another, similarly dressed. They both held up small, glinting knives. “Alright, boy, off the horse and into the cart,” the lamp holder growled.

“Gen, run!” Peter shouted, and Genevieve scrambled to get off. But the second bandit rounded the wagon, caught her on the back of her slip just as she got down, and hoisted her back on. The lamp holder joined them with Peter in front of him, with a knife at Peter’s back. Peter climbed on, and sat shaking like a leaf in the wind.

“Stay here in the cart and make sure they don’t leave,” the lamp holder instructed the second bandit.

“How come I have to keep watch?” the bandit whined. “Why can’t I ride the horse?” Genevieve puzzled over their voices. They sounded awfully familiar…

“Because I’ve got the lamp, and I know where we’re going,” replied the one with the light. “Besides, you’re probably too big for her. You’d snap her spine in half.”

“I would not!”

“Would so,” he teased.

“Hold it, hold it, hold it,” Gen interrupted. “Matt? Rowan? Is that you?”

Peter stared at Gen. “You know these guys?”

The lamp holder waved his hand away. “We met briefly a day or two ago. Now Matt, stop sniveling and get in the cart. I know a quiet place we can stop for the night.” Rowan grabbed the reins and led the horse slowly along the path, the wagon trailing behind him.

[bananniewrites]

Enemy Territory

Princess Genevieve 9/?

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her downstairs to the dining room, where a table laid with a banquet more than fit for a king and the eldest princess was laid before her. The king of Kakor was seated at the opposite end of the table, with a smile spreading across his face. It was hard to tell whether it was sly or gracious, but he stood up and bowed. “Princess Clara.”   

 She curtsied stiffly. “Your Majesty.”

 “I must say, that’s a lovely dress you’re wearing. Won’t you sit down?”

Clara’s dress was made of sapphire-blue silk petticoats, but underneath she had hid one of her daggers. She sat down. “I must say, Your Majesty, your courtesy tonight has been… how do I put this?”

    “Unusual?” The king took a sip of wine.

    “Unusually early. These kidnappings were starting to become something of a routine, a game, even. Oh, I don’t mean to sound rude, but one can guess how these things go; your army kidnaps me, I stay here for an hour or a day, a knight of my kingdom comes and takes me home. But this time, you switch my prison cell for a suite, and bread with water for an evening dinner.”

    The king raised an eyebrow. “You think I’m not capable of common courtesy?”

    “I know you are,” Clara replied. Butter him up, don’t ruin this! She thought to herself. “It’s just… refreshing, to have a little change every now and then, don’t you think? This was a good idea.”

    Servants entered with the entree and set the plates in front of the king and Clara. Roasted mutton, mashed potatoes, and boiled cabbage wafted to her nose, and her stomach rumbled after being fed only bread and water. Had Clara been alone, she might have stuffed her face (and her mother might even reason with this), but in company of the king, she tried her best to carefully eat one forkful at a time. The king was served roast suckling stuffed with potatoes, onions, and brussel sprouts.

    They both ate in silence for a while, enjoying their meal. Clara was about halfway through her mutton and well into her potatoes when the king set down a drumstick and began, “Now Princess, I understand that our kingdoms haven’t always been on good terms.”

    Clara could remember the times her father grumbled against him, calling him his sworn enemy, and mentioning him whenever he was rallying troops. She swallowed her potatoes. “I can concur, Your Majesty.”

    “Please, call me Ranthum. I’ve tried to reason with King Omar, but he seems just too stubborn. I’m hoping I can get through you.”

    Clara frowned. “This wouldn’t be caused by all the times you held me captive, would it?”

    Ranthum chuckled. “Our feud has gone on a bit longer than that. But I believe that as heir to the throne, you have the potential to make peace between our kingdoms.”   

    She nodded cautiously. “When I become queen to take over for my father, yes. But I have to be of age before that happens, and I predict many years will go by before I have to step in.”

    “There’s a quicker way, you know,” Ranthum said. “Some kingdoms join their children in marriage to join or ally the nations.”

    Clara set down her fork. “Is this what you intend to do? Am I to marry someone from your kingdom?”

    Ranthum shrugged. “I have no children to marry off nor a queen to have children with. It would seem that I’m the only option.” He took a bite out of his suckling rib.

    Clara’s mind raced. Marry him? Have children with him? At her age? How could she agree to this? She tried to stay calm as she asked, “What’s the minimum age here to be married? I may be too young.”

    “Sixteen.”

    “Oh, er, I’m actually only fifteen,” Clara lied. “I suppose that marriage will have to wait.”

    King Ranthum sat back. “Funny. I seem to recall that you had your sixteenth birthday just a few months ago. Didn’t King Omar of Onirea make a huge celebration for it?”

    Her father did make a big deal out of it, because while the minimum age of marriage was eighteen, suitors were allowed to court a princess once she turned sixteen. This allowed two years for the two of them to get to know each other and make the overall relationship smoother. Clara remembered a few young gentlemen from far away and neighboring kingdoms trying to flirt and make conversation with her, but she participated mostly out of tradition and politeness rather than true interest.

    Clara gulped. “That was my… fifteenth birthday.”

    “You’re not a very good liar, Princess,” Ranthum commented. “If you would rather let our kingdoms’ tensions rise than marry me, I completely understand. I just wish you were honest with me, like I’m sure your parents have raised you.”

    This comment struck a nerve with Clara, though she didn’t exactly know why. With a sharp inhale, her knuckles turned white in her clenched fists, but she had to keep the quiet facade. She attempted another loophole. “How would you get my father’s permission, then? He would never agree to this.”

    “I have my ways,” the king replied ominously. “I’m sure your father and I can come to some sort of agreement. All in all, it’s up to you.”

    Clara sat still for a moment, plotting her next move. “I’ll need time to think about this,” she finally decided. “Would you excuse me?”

    “Of course.”

    She stood up and hurried out of the room, closing the door behind her. In her second thoughts, she should’ve just walked out in order not to reveal her racing heart and beads of sweat dripping down her temples. There was definitely something wrong the way the king had confidence in her father’s blessing. His plan was to marry Clara no matter what, but peace couldn’t be the only reason. If he wanted peace, then he probably would’ve discussed with the queen instead… right? No, he probably would’ve come to Clara.

    What was she missing? If they were planning something, maybe they would talk behind her back. She put her ear to the door. She couldn’t hear anything; the door was too thick.

    A voice behind her made her jump. “Ma’am?” It was a guard. “May I escort you back to your room?”

    Clara swallowed her pride. “Of course. Thank you.” She wouldn’t find anything here anyway. As they walked back upstairs, Clara felt she could confirm the feeling that the king was hiding something, if a guard was this cautious about her eavesdropping. If it wasn’t anything she couldn’t hear, why would he stop her? Then the guard must know something…

    “May I ask a question?” Clara prompted.

    “Uh… sure, I guess,” the guard mumbled.

    “Why did you stop me from listening in?”

    He looked askance. “I thought it would be rude to eavesdrop.”

    “On all accounts, sir, he is my enemy. I’m not expected to trust him. If it makes you feel any better, I didn’t hear anything.” 

    When they reached her room, Clara locked herself in and took out a new sheet of paper. She wrote:

    -- The king means to marry me by any means possible

    -- says he wants to make peace

    -- knows about my 16th birthday celebration

    -- definitely hiding something

    -- he “has his ways” for Father’s blessing

    -- is Father in danger?

    Clara reflected on the last note. What would it take to make the king of Onirea agree to the marriage of his enemy and his daughter? What if he does agree?

    -- what would happen if I was married?

[bananniewrites]

A Change of Plans

Princess Genevieve 8/?

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“You’ll probably have to hide here in the barn or in the wagon tonight,” Peter explained to Gen. “I have a feeling that somebody’s looking for you, probably my pop. I know he mistook you for Eloise.”

“Who is Eloise, anyway?” Gen inquired. “Is your pop going to find her and realize he messed up?”

“She was the house maid, but she died a little more than a year ago. Fever took her. Pop’s gone a little loopy in the head, if you ask me. Old age, you know?”

“Gosh, I’m so sorry. Did he really treat her like that? Threatening to beat her if she didn’t work?”

He shrugged. “Sometimes.” He thought for a moment. “She’s in a better place now.”

Genevieve felt a lump swelling in her throat. There was a chance she would go home, back to swiping apples from the kitchen and climbing trees, where her greatest worry was keeping up with her lessons without getting bored to death. But Peter was stuck here, under the scrutinous eye of a half-blind monster who beat the housemaid. How many times has he belted Peter? Even if he wasn’t that great to Gen in the past, is it right to leave him here?

“Peter…” Gen started, just as he was about to leave. She paused, but she decided that she had to offer, “Peter, come with me. To the castle, I mean.”

“What?”

“I can’t leave you here and… not feel bad about it. Maybe I can talk to my fath-- the king and see if you can stay with us. Maybe he can at least hire you on.”

He sighed. “Gen, that’s really nice of you, but-”

“PETER!” his boss shouted, much closer this time. “Where are you! I thought I told you to get that hay on the wagon!”

 Peter pointed to a ladder leading to an upper floor and whispered to Gen. “Up there, quickly.” He then shouted back, “Working on it!”

Gen scrambled up the ladder and found bales of hay, neatly tied in bundles and stacked high. She could hear the barn door open with a croak, and dove behind a stack. The straw on the floor below her rustled, and the old man’s crotchety voice asked, “are you in here?”

“Yes, pop,” Peter answered innocently. “I was just about to get the bales to put on the wagon for tomorrow. What’s the news today?”

“Well, Sir Wallace of Onirea returned saying he was chased by a monster in the woods. Said it had the body of a bear and a face of a badger.” He cackled. “Then he went along the main road and met some Kakorish soldiers. Heard they beat him up pretty bad. Might’ve even killed him.”

“That’s awful,” Peter commented. Gen could feel her stomach turn.

“What else? Oh yes, the kingdom of Kakor is offering a reward for Princess Genevieve of Onirea. A hundred pounds. Imagine what you could do with that, boy!”

He cackled again, but Peter said nothing for a minute. Gen’s stomach continued to churn and it started to creep up her throat. She only barely heard him murmur. “A hundred pounds?”

“There’s even a poster.” There was a light crinkling of paper. “I think I’ll get supper started, maybe give Eloise a break-- God rest her soul.” The old man’s last comment sent a shiver of paralyzing terror up Gen’s spine. The barn door croaked, and his rustling footsteps died away.

“P-Peter?” Genevieve stammered.

“Hm?”

“Maybe I should… stay in the barn tonight. I think your pop overheard us earlier.”

“Alright then.” Peter’s voice was quiet, absent. He had been that way since he heard about the reward. Gen made a silent note to herself not to sleep tonight; if he or his pop left, it would almost certainly be to turn her in. She started to wonder if the horses knew the way to Onirea or if she would have to figure out the directions herself. How easy would it be to steal the wagon?

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Earlier that same day, Princess Clara was escorted down the hall to a lavishly furnished room. Silk canopied the single bed, colorful rugs covered the floor, a desk sat in the corner, and a tall closet stood across from the bed. All of the furniture crowded the room, making it feel smaller than the last. The one glaring feature of this room was the notable lack of windows.

“There’s clean dresses in the closet,” one of the guards was saying, “and a water basin on the nightstand. Dinner will be in about two hours. We’ll escort you there.”

“Where does the light come from?” Clara asked. “There’s no windows.”

“Clap twice and the candles light themselves.”

Clara squinted. “Pardon me?”

The guard clapped twice and sure enough, ten candles were suddenly aflame in a combustion of light: two candles on the desk, two on the right of the closet, one on each side of the bed and on each side of the single door, and two handheld candle holders. “And of course, you can have the door open if it’s not bright enough,” he added.

“Thank you,” Clara said, surprised at the magic and hospitality. The guards nodded, satisfied, and shut the door behind them.

In the dimmer bedroom, Clara immediately sat down at the desk and searched through its drawers. There was paper, ink, and quills. She wrote, Day 2 of being captive. My new room is much fancier than the dungeon I was held in last night, but a prison’s still a prison. The only difference is the strange hospitality the guards and seemingly the king of Kakor is showing me. There has to be something up his sleeve to make me stay here, some sort of plan, but I can’t possibly know at this time. No knight has come. Could this be what the king has planned? Part of me wishes I had disobeyed my parents and tried to escape on my own, just like Genevieve. How I miss her! How I miss my freedom, my home! 

Clara paused to wipe the tears from her cheeks from the reminder of Genevieve and home, but continued: There must be something the king knows that I don’t, if he’s this gracious on the second day. If worst comes to worst, I still have one of my daggers. God, give me the wisdom to know when to use it. 

She wrote all of this in about half an hour, then stood up to stretch. That’s when she realized why there were two candles next to the closet: they were positioned above a mirror just taller than her. Clara peered in to examine her face and make sure there were no ink smudges. Besides being horribly messy, she knew they would reveal she had been writing, and should they decide to see what was written, would anything she wrote be enough to incur their wrath?

There were some smudges on her cheeks when she had wiped her eyes, as well as on her fingertips. She rushed to the basin to scrub her hands and face. As she tried to get the ink stains out, she remembered how Genevieve would intentionally dab ink on her face. Genevieve said it was to look like she was doing her work when she really wasn’t, and Clara had pretended to be mad because it was wrong, but now she smiled at Gen’s past cleverness. Her heart ached for those moments now. 

But all Clara could do now was wait either for a rescue or the king’s next move and go from there. Knights don’t usually take this long for a rescue, and the king of Kakor isn’t holding her captive in the traditional manner of a cell block in a tower. Sure, there weren’t any windows to climb out of, but the security seemed a bit lax. It’s almost as if… as if…

...As if he’s not expecting a knight to come.

But her parents implied that she needed to sit tight and wait for one whenever she got kidnapped. On the other hand, what is she supposed to do when that doesn’t work? She crossed over to the closet and opened its doors. She would just have to figure out the plan for herself and fight from the inside.

This is what her lessons had been for. Not the ones teaching her how to be a lady, but the lessons she would need to be prepared for the politics of her position. Strategy, persuasion, and sometimes stealth had all been part of this particular curriculum. Clara just didn’t think that she would have to utilize these skills so soon in her life.

The first step, of course, was to gather information. With this in mind, Clara began to hold up different dresses in the mirror. It would be important to make a good impression.

[bananniewrites]

Bear Trap

Princess Genevieve 7/?

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Two Orcish soldiers knocked on Lauren’s door. When she opened it, one of them asked her in a gruff voice, “We’re looking for a Princess Genevieve. Is she here?”

“No, she’s not here.” Lauren leaned on the doorframe with her braided hair loosened and bags under her half-shut eyes.

“Search the house,” the other soldier commanded. Genevieve was not there, and hadn’t been there for some time. Lauren had sent Gen away with some supplies and a warning not to stick around for the experiment, saying that she got punchy when she was frightened. After she left, Lauren was able to complete the whole experiment with solid conclusions that the pollen of a certain flower did produce hallucinations (and rather frightening ones at that). Her home became a mess in the midst of the event and she didn’t have time to clean it up; and whatever hadn’t been upset in the experiment was turned over by the soldiers. They looked in cabinets, behind the bed, under Archimedes, under the table, and behind the door. They didn’t find Genevieve. 

“Do we report back to the Captain?” asked the first soldier. 

“Not yet,” the second replied as they unsheathed their sword. “We need to ask the witch a few questions first.”

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Genevieve plodded her way through the safe path Lauren had shown her. There were stones in the dusty path that she needed to be careful around, but the road winded on the edge of the forest and away from the swamp. The sun shone through the leaves of the trees on either side, casting Gen in a bright golden-green glow. Emerald shadows mottled the path like the spots of a cow. Gen reminded herself to remember this place if she ever came back this way.

Merchants sometimes traveled this route to avoid the main road where bandits were likely to attack. Gen wondered if she would meet any; if she did, then they could help her get back to the castle or let her hitch a ride into the next village on their wagon. Or maybe the least they could do is give her directions.

But nobody except Genevieve arrived into the outskirts of the village called Bear Trap, and the square was somewhat busy in the early evening.  People jostled by her as she tried to navigate the crowd, and she got elbowed, kneed, and pushed until she scrambled into a horse stable. Rubbing the forming bruises, Gen glanced around for somebody who wasn’t busy for help, and at that moment, a voice rang out above the din. 

“Attention everyone, attention!” a town crier announced. “The Orcish kingdom of Kakor is looking for Princess Genevieve Quire of Onirea. There will be a hundred pound reward to those who bring her back alive.”

Gen remembered what Lauren told her about muddying her face to look less recognizable, and bent down to run her thumb in the dust and brush it across her cheeks. But then…

“She is described as having blonde curly hair, freckles, blue eyes, a crooked nose, and… a mostly pale complexion. Again, the reward is a hundred pounds if she is alive and brought to the kingdom of Kakor.”

Crap. That did sound like her. She resented being called out for a crooked nose (it was only slightly off) and her skin was a little more tan from playing in the sun, but otherwise, it was a pretty good description of her. So much for dirt. Asking for directions will give her away, and now she has to hide. Perfect. Just what she needed right now.

The crowd resumed the hustle and bustle, with a few folks peering about for the girl the crier had spoken of. Genevieve stalked her way around the corner of the stable to delve in the shadows, but nearly bumped into an old man. He had white, wiry hair, a few teeth left, and only one good eye; his right eye had clouded over. “Eloise!” he barked at her. “Eloise! Where on earth have you been? You think you can sneak around an’ laze about? Git to work before I belt ya!”

Gen stepped back in surprise; even though she wasn’t always known as royalty, she had never been treated this harshly, ever. Any insult done to her was usually subtle, like mistaking her for someone else or trying to steer her interests towards tea parties and petite things. “What did you just say to me?” she quivered, trying to stand her ground. She was going to be tough, not some little damsel in distress.

The man grabbed her by the wrist and started to drag her off, at which she instinctively shrieked and pounded against his arm. A tall, lanky boy with sandy red hair poked his head around the other corner. “What’s goin’ on, pop?”

“Stupid wench thinks she can disrespect me!”

The boy took a glance at Gen, squinted, and said, “I’ll take care of this, pop.” Then he grabbed her wrist.

Genevieve was at once frustrated and frightened. Frustrated because she didn’t like being handed off, and between two males; frightened because it was two males, one who had just mentioned belting her. She had witnessed a belting only once back at home. It was a young disobedient servant, but she was told princesses don’t get whipped like that, so she hadn’t been afraid until now. And she heard whispers of what dangerous men can do to female royalty.

She was not going to let that happen. She grabbed whatever seemed like a weapon-- a hand sickle in this case-- from just outside a stall and brought it down as hard as she could.

The boy barely dodged. “Jeez! I ain’t trying to kill you, Gen, calm down! Don’t you remember me?”

Gen still held out the sickle defensively, but took a closer look at his face. Small memories from the orphanage bubbled to the surface of her consciousness, memories of running around outside and roughhousing with the boys. Now one of the boys stood out in particular, one with sandy red hair and turning around when he was called…

“Peter? From the home?”

“Yeah.” He herded her inside the barn away from the stable and the town. The floor was completely covered in straw, and square windows let the evening light stream in. “Did you really forget about us with all your time being a pretty little princess?” He hissed as soon as the door was shut. 

“Hey, my sis— Princess Clara is the prim and proper one, not me,” she shot back. “For your information, I’m the rebellious one of the royal family. You don’t see me waiting around for a knight in shining armor, do you?” Gen felt guilty when she said it because it felt like insulting her sister, but she continued. “I still climb trees and fool around with some of the kids in the castle, just like I did back at the home. Besides, it’s not like we were best friends. I seem to remember that you used to pick on me. But I recognized you, didn’t I? So no, I didn’t forget you with all my time being rebel royalty.”

Genevieve could guess that Peter’s face wasn’t red just from sunburn. “Why do you get to be royalty?” he snarled. “Don’t you realize that any of us would’ve killed for that chance? To be the son or daughter of the king and queen?”

“What are you moaning about? You got adopted too, didn’t you?”

“No,” Peter mumbled. Genevieve raised her eyebrows in surprise. “I was hired as a stableboy. There’s a difference.”

“Then… why are you calling that slimy, one-eyed, one-tooth son of a… hag witch your pop?” Gen’s voice became gentle and more confused than angry.

Peter shrugged. “It’s not like I got a better one.” He sat down against the door with a sigh. Gen joined him a few feet away. They sat in silence a few moments until Peter asked, “do they shower you with love like people say they should?”

“The king and queen? I don’t know, not really. The nannies do that, and Bessie, the cook. She’s a good friend, I guess. What about your… boss?”

“He’s my boss, he doesn’t kiss me on the forehead.”

“Is he nice, at least?”

“Nah.” More awkward silence.

The boss’s voice barked outside, “PETER! Where’s the clean hay? It’s got to go on the wagon for sunrise tomorrow! Can’t starve the king’s horses!”

“King’s horses?” Gen repeated. “Which kingdom is the hay going to?”

Peter slumped. “Onirea.” His eyes widened. “Say, wait a minute…”

Genevieve smiled. “You mind if I hitch a ride?”

[bananniewrites]

Revelations

Princess Genevieve 6/?

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Genevieve couldn’t believe her ears. After a terrifying night in the woods and passing out at Lauren the witch’s cottage, Lauren just asked her to go back into the woods and bring back the flower that caused the horrifying visions in the first place. What on Earth was she going to do with it?

    “But first, let’s have some soup,” Lauren said, and fetched two bowls from her cabinets, laid them on the table, and ladled a generous amount of the steaming broth into each of them. Gen’s stomach growled when she remembered the tiny portion of rations she ate last night. The soup had some sort of shredded meat stewing around as well as carrots, apples, and potatoes. There were onions in there too; Gen didn’t like onions and she would usually pick them out, but at this point, she didn’t care. She ate every last scrap in the bowl, and it filled her belly just like it should. 

    While she ate, Lauren explained how they would retrieve the flower: Lauren would come with her into the woods, find one of the glowing flowers, then place a sack over it very carefully. After that, they would cut the stem and carry the sack right side up and the bulb upside down. All the while, both of them would wear strips of cloth over their nose and mouth, a little bit like bandits. “If it makes you feel better,” Lauren offered, “you can hold the lantern while I pick the flower.”

    “But why are we doing this?” Gen asked. “Why do we need it?”

    “Like I said, there’s plenty of evidence that the pollen is causing these hallucinations,” Lauren reminded her. “But I want to be absolutely sure by doing an experiment and taking more notes. Everything must be controlled to ensure that nothing else interferes. Got the lantern?”

    The lantern lit, they tied the cloth around their faces and their cloaks around their necks, and Lauren took the sack as they closed the door behind them. Genevieve saw wondrous gardens of all sorts of vegetables, herbs, and fruits being watered by the still-pouring rain, but she wasn’t able to look for long before Lauren encouraged her beyond the raving rose bushes and into the woods.

    The familiar sulphurous smell hit Gen’s nose even with the cloth around her face, but the woods weren’t quite as dark as the night before. The trees provided some shelter from the rain under its thick canopy, but the rain still found its way in steady drops. Trekking further, Genevieve found that the smell most likely came from a swamp that she could see some distance away that she didn’t see last night (because it was so dark).

    Lauren stopped Gen’s footsteps by saying, “just point out the glowing flower when you see it.” 

Gen glanced around and recognized a cluster of the bioluminescent bulbs similar to the ones she walked into yesterday. They were dimmer in the lantern’s light, but definitely the same. “Here.”

Lauren spread the opening of the sack over the bulb. While she worked, Gen looked around with the lantern. She half expected to see Poss Ossm or one of his audience members, but there was nothing but trees and swamp vegetation. She peered just a little bit further, then gasped. Lauren came near to see what the matter was. 

Of all the things Gen saw last night, only one of them was real: the corpse. It didn’t look nearly as gory or ghoulish as before, but Genevieve still recognized her kingdom’s crest on its chest, and the face of a knight she used to see once in a while. His name might’ve been Kalor or Havish, she couldn’t remember. But she knew that this was the knight Clara once spoke of because he rescued her, and Gen knew him from memories of him sneaking apples from the kitchen for her. Now, the rain pattered around them like God’s tears. 

Lauren put her arm around her. “I’m sorry.”

Gen sniffed. “I feel like I should’ve known him better. He’s been good to me and Clara.”

Lauren nodded in silence. For a while, the only noise to be heard was the rain hitting the leaves and dripping around them. Lauren broke the silence. “We should head back.” She ushered Gen through the rain and back into the cottage, where they hung their cloaks to dry and wrapped themselves in towels. 

When Lauren opened the sack, she found that to her dismay, the flower and therefore the pollen was wet, and they would have to be dried before any experiments could proceed. “Well, that’s alright,” she reasoned. “Gives me time to prepare.”

“Lauren?” Gen asked timidly. “Am I gonna have to breathe in that pollen again?”

“No, Your Majesty,” she affirmed, “I’m going to experiment on myself. When it’s dry, of course.” 

A soaking wet tabby cat as round as a globe squeezed through the window next to her, climbed onto the sack, and sat down. “Really, Archimedes? Right where I’m working?” Lauren picked him up and he let out a groan as he was scooped. He was relocated on the bed, and he was either satisfied or too big and lazy to move. He whipped his tail around.

Lauren decided to change the subject. “Did I ever tell you that Princess Clara came through here once? She was escaping a tower.”

This stunned Gen. Her prim-and-proper sister, escaping on her own? Not waiting for a knight? Not staying behind? “Yeah,” Lauren went on, “she was a little younger than you, I think. She had her dress over her nose, said she hated the smell of the swamp. She asked for some of my vegetables. Such a polite young lady. Archimedes liked her well enough, though he wasn’t as fat or grumpy back then. Weren’t you, you fat little grumpy-pants?” she cooed at Archimedes. “Yeah, if I pushed you down a hill, you’d just keep on rolling, huh?”

“I don’t get it,” Gen pondered. “Why would she stay behind now and wait for a knight instead of striking out on her own? What happened?”

Lauren sighed. “I don’t know. Hopefully nothing she can’t recover from. Hey look,” she said as she pointed out the window. “I think the rain stopped. Which reminds me, the Orcish kingdom is after you, right? Because a princess doesn’t usually come all the way out here without good reason.”

“Yeah?”

“They’ll be looking around here, so you should hide or get a move on. I can supply you with food, medicine, potions, anything like that. Then I can show you a safe path into the next village, and then I think you can find your way from there. Don’t forget to smudge your face so no one recognizes you.” She opened her cabinets and started pulling things from the shelves to aid Gen for the journey.

Another soldier brought another bit of bread and some water to Clara at noon. She was reading her book again from the beginning. “So did you come up with a decision about the room?” he asked.

Clara had thought for a long time. The bedsheet rope had still been there due to carelessness on the soldiers’ part, and she thought about escaping like Genevieve, she really did. She remembered the first time she went off on her own and had her little adventure and journey back home. Back then, she thought her parents would be happy to have her back. Overjoyed, even.

But instead, they were… upset. They said they had been worried sick, she could’ve gotten hurt, she wasn’t at the tower where the knight was supposed to rescue her, that she wasted his time. Then they sent her to her room.

They still said that they loved her and that they were just worried, but after all that, it just didn’t stick. And now when she glanced at the rope, she could feel tears welling up in her eyes. She wanted to be free; she wanted to go home. But to go home would be the king and queen taking turns berating her. So there she stayed.

And now with escaping off the list of options, the room with the comfier bed did sound nicer. “I’ll take it.”

“Oh! Excellent, I’ll spread the word.” Then he left. Clara could hear him muttering behind the door to his buddies, so she pressed her ear to the door and listened. “Wait, we’re not guarding her door in the other room?” he was saying. “What about a key?”

“It can only be locked from the inside. She’s gotta have her privacy, you know.”

“And let her wander around? Aren’t you worried she’ll escape?”

“The hallway will still have guards, duh. Besides, if she wanted to escape, she had her chance. The king says he trusts her enough to ease up a bit.”

Trust. Clara was learning about trust; how to gain it, exploit it if she needed to. All for the game of politics that she would have to play someday. Perhaps tonight at dinner with the king.

[bananniewrites]

The Witch’s Cottage

Princess Genevieve 5/?

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Clara woke up the next morning after having the strangest dream. She had been at a wedding altar to be joined in holy matrimony, but the groom appeared Orcish and wore a crown. Why was she marrying the enemy king? But then someone burst through the doors. It was a knight in armor, the one whom her parents told her would rescue her. Was this the one she was expected to marry? The knight panted under the visor like he was out of breath, and removed his helmet to reveal… Genevieve?

A clap of thunder woke her up. The sky was gray with stormy clouds, and the sound of rain pattered outside her open hole of a window. The rain created a puddle in the room just inside the window. It was overcast on a vast forest, a distant village, and her own castle far, far on the horizon. But no knight. Clara sighed and picked up her book. In almost no time at all, she reached the happy ending and closed it. She was starting to see what Genevieve meant about the boredom.

There was a knock on the door. A soldier popped in with a tray of bread and a glass of water for breakfast, then set it down on the empty bed. “Erm… the king would like to make you an offer, Miss Clara,” he mumbled. “He thought since… you know, the rescue’s taking a bit longer than usual, maybe you’d like a comfier bed just down the hall. The room’s a bit smaller though, hope you don’t mind.”

“I’ll consider it,” she replied absently as she gazed out the window.

“Right. Just knock when you’ve made a decision. To be honest, I’d spring for the comfier bed if I were you. These ones aren’t the best.” He was just about to walk out, but then he turned and added, “oh and one more thing Miss Clara, he’d like you to join him for dinner tonight.” And he left.

Clara turned the thought over in her mind. Why is the king being so nice? And only after a day? Did they find Genevieve? Did something happen to her?

Genevieve’s eyes were bathed in the soft gray light of the morning rainstorm when she awoke. A mouth-watering smell of soup kissed her nose and her hazy vision allowed her to see dried herbs hanging all around the ceiling. The walls were made of earth and lit candles were all around her, nearly burnt to stubs.

For a moment (not quite remembering the night before), it seemed to Genevieve that she must have gotten home somehow and was in the kitchen. But why in the kitchen? “Bessie?” she called out weakly. “Bessie? What happened? Am I sick?”

“You might want to take a closer look around you, hon,” a vaguely familiar voice answered. Gen blinked a few times and slowly sat up to realize precisely what the voice said next: “you’re not in your kitchen. You’re in my house.” Sure enough, the earthen walls made up one big room, with the bed Gen was lying in on one side and a tiny kitchen on the other, and a fireplace between the two on Gen’s right: the door stood on her left.

The owner of the voice was a woman with a streak of white in her otherwise raven hair, braided in the longest braid that Gen had ever seen. She was slightly stout, but mostly tall judging from when she stood up from a wooden rocking chair. Her eyes were kind as she walked towards Gen and felt her forehead with the back of her hand. “How do you feel?” she asked.

“Okay, I guess. Just kinda tired.”

“Any nausea, headache, dizziness?”

“Nuh-uh.” Gen slouched and brought her hands to her lap, where she found that she wasn’t wearing her usual slip, because it didn’t have poofy sleeves like this thing she was wearing now.

“Oh yeah, I thought I might wash your clothes since it had… um… a bit of a stain in them— I won’t tell if you won’t. They were also a bit dirty, so I might as well. I let you borrow one of my nightgowns.” She stared off into the distance as she listed her chores on her fingers: “did the laundry, soup’s in the pot, cuts are bandaged…”

The last task she listed made Gen carefully roll the sleeves back to check her arms. Lo and behold, her arms were wrapped in tight, winding cloth that was slightly bloodied in some places. Those stains were a dry reddish-brown. She was starting to remember the thorns she got the scratches from.

“Oh yes,” the lady remembered. “Do you recall what happened last night, how you got here?”

“Well, I was in the woods, and a talking possum kept asking me a bunch of questions-- sorta like a game you know-- but it was so that I could get out of there alive. Uh, saw a corpse-knight-thing, I freaked out and ran at a couple of walls made of vine-things… aaand I got tangled in thorns. That’s about all I remember.”

She nodded. “Sounds pretty wild. I did hear some screaming and I did untangle you from my rose bushes. I apologize about my bushes by the way-- they’re supposed to keep thieves out, but they don’t really know who’s a thief and who’s not. You looked pretty rattled, so I thought I’d take you in for the night.” She tapped her fingers on her chin in thought. “You know, you’re not the first person to come in as you did, seeing strange things and all that. Everyone’s seen different things, but the thing that really gets me is that their clothes --including yours-- had this strange bluish dust on them. What do you think that’s about?”

Gen’s eyes lit up. “Oh! There’s these glowing flowers in there. I think I bumped into a few of them and the pollen got on me.” The woman crossed to the kitchen where she had a little notebook and quill, and scribbled a note. “Uh, sorry, who are you?” Genevieve asked a bit sheepishly. “I probably should’ve asked earlier.”

“No no, that’s my fault. My name’s Lauren. You’re Princess Genevieve, right?”

“Is it that easy to notice?”

“Only when you wipe away the dust and grime on your face. Otherwise it’s surprisingly difficult to recognize you. They only showed you once or twice to the common folk, didn’t they?”

“Once.” Gen remembered that time. It was when she was first adopted, and she was scrubbed, bathed, and dolled up to stand on a balcony above dozens of people. The king had made some sort of speech honoring her, but Gen didn’t really listen, and it wasn’t that long anyways. She probably stood on that balcony for three minutes before being ushered off again. She was more often mistaken as one of the servants’ daughters.

Lauren took notice of Gen’s crestfallen face and sat at the foot of the bed. “Hey. If it makes you feel any better, you can use that anonymity to your advantage. If enemies are looking for you, they won’t know if it’s you or someone else.”

“Thanks.”

“One more thing. If anybody asks, I’m definitely not a witch.”

Gen raised an eyebrow. “Are you a witch?”

Lauren gave out a long, suffering sigh. “I get a lot of crap about being a witch. People think it’s serving the Devil and eating children and whatnot. That’s not really my style. Sure I make potions and do a little magic here and there, and I have a cat… somewhere… but overall, I’m trying to help people. Like you, for example. I’ve made salves and medicines, and I used one of those to help speed up the healing process for your cuts. See your hands? They’re all better. I’m really more of a magic doctor than a witch. My methods are just unorthodox.”

Gen slowly nodded, trying to put the pieces together. “So when you were curious about the pollen, you’re just trying to figure out if there’s an antidote or something?”

“I wanted to see if there was a connection between the pollen and the sightings,” Lauren corrected. “I have a theory. My cat, Archimedes, left a while ago-- probably to dig in the trash, that must be why he’s so fat-- well, before I washed your clothes, he was rubbing his face all over them. A couple minutes later, he was swatting at the air and hissing at random objects, just going completely bonkers. I think… since everyone who had the pollen on their clothes saw weird things in the woods, that the pollen causes hallucinations.”

Genevieve blinked. “You mean to tell me that Poss Ossm and all his story-creatures and the corpse aren’t real?”

“Probably not. But I have to be sure.” 

Lauren pressed her fist to her lips in thought, occasionally muttering under her breath. But Gen covered her face with her hands. “I peed myself at a hallucination. How could I be this stupid?”

“You’re not the first person to wet yourself, hon,” Lauren assured. Then her face brightened, and her smile turned sly. “But a lady faces her fears for the greater good, does she not?”

“What do you mean?”

“How about a shot at redemption? I’ll need your help for this experiment. I need you to go back into the woods, pick one of those flowers with the pollen, and bring it back here.”

“...You need me to do what?”

[bananniewrites]

Trivia Night

Happy 2021! Princess Genevieve 4/?

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The forest, deprived of moonlight, made Genevieve nearly blind as she picked her way in the direction that Rowan and Matt pointed out for her. She wanted to run because the Orcish army could be on her tail, but almost every time she broke into a sprint, she collided with a tree. A thick, sulphurous smell hung in the air, and the best light source in the forest was the faint, bioluminescent glow of thorny-leaved flowers popping up in clusters. They reminded Gen of wild clover, and though she bumped into a few of these, she didn’t mind the dust clouds of pollen they gave off; she just walked through them, no problem.

The darkness seemed to swirl at her feet and the roots knotted and spiraled to trip her up. Shadows moved with a life on their own. Genevieve thought she saw faces in the bark of the trees, and heard giggles when she turned her back. The wind howled too much like someone grieving. She thought this couldn’t be real, that maybe she was still back at the camp having a nightmare. She pinched herself-- still awake.

Was this the dark part of the woods that Clara warned to stay away from? Then again, how could she tell? It was dark everywhere! And it was eerily quiet…

A shadow moved above her, and all of a sudden, a creature popped very close to her face, and she yelped. She fell backwards and scuttled a few inches away before getting a good look at what startled her. It was a large possum with a wide toothy grin and a thick pink tail curled around… well, something, Gen thought. He couldn’t have been floating in midair. It held a twig in its paw and held the end to its mouth.

“Hiya, hiya, hiya!” it announced with the tone of a town crier, but the speed of a scammer. “Welcome to another night of Forest Trivia! I’m your host, Poss Ossm. We’ve got a new contestant joining us tonight! What’s your name, kid?” It pointed the end of the twig towards her.

Genevieve blinked. Clara and numerous servants and nannies always told her not to talk to strangers, but never said anything about talking possums. “Er… Gen?” she said hesitantly.

“Is that ‘Er, Gen’ or just ‘Gen’?”

“...Gen.”

 “Where ya from, Gen?”

“The… Kingdom of Onirea.”

“Wonderful! How do ya feel about making out of the woods alive?”

“I would like that very much,” Gen answered, more confidently this time.

“All you gotta do,” Poss Ossm explained, “is answer the question given to you. Three correct answers let you out and three wrong answers get you stuck here with us! ISN’T THAT RIGHT, FOLKS?” The forest erupted in a monstrous chorus of inhuman howling, whooping, and cheering that made Gen’s heart jump. It started to pound when Ossm announced, “let’s get started!”

He disappeared for a moment, and a tree danced out of the darkness. It had the figure of a young woman, some years older than Gen. Her skin was composed of rippled bark, her legs melted into her roots, and the leaves above her made up her hair. Ossm reappeared next to her. “This lovely young lady is a creature commonly derived from Greek mythology, and she makes her home specifically in oak trees. What creature is she?”

Gen remembered this lesson back at home when she was taught stories of ancient civilizations. She knew nymphs were nature spirits, but she might have dozed off when getting to the small details. Did nymphs get any more particular? “Nymph?” She guessed. 

“Nearly,” Ossm considered. “What do you guys think, is that close enough for you?”

The forest rumbled like thunder, and the tree lady bowed her head. “Sorry, that won’t do it for us.” Tree roots knotted into an X on the left. “We were looking for ‘dryad’. Let’s go to the next question.”

The dryad disappeared as well as the possum, and a small flame seemed to float in midair some distance away. Ossm dropped beside it and grinned with sharp teeth. “Let’s try something a little bit more local. This is a will-o-the-wisp. There are many legends of the wisp being a goblin-like fairy or a wandering soul, and so on and what have you. But generally, why is it a bad idea to follow one of these creatures?”

Thank God they went local, Gen thought. She was more familiar with these tales because the kitchen maid, Bessie, always told stories like these while she prepared a meal on a stormy day. Gen gave the answer just like how Bessie warned her: “you can get stranded on a cliff or stuck in a swamp, usually while it’s pitch black out!”

“Ding-ding-ding-ding-ding! That’s correct!” The forest cheered, and on the opposite side of the X, a thick wall of tangled vines and roots thinned the slightest bit. Gen thought, maybe I can break through? She tried to get up, but found her left foot snagged— no, ensnared— in a thick root. It was coiled around her ankle. “Don’t go away yet, ‘cause it’s time for the lightning round!” Ossm declared. 

“Lightning… round?” Gen mumbled. A flash of lightning lit up the dark woods, and for a split second Gen thought she saw a hunched over figure. It glinted with the white bolt of light. 

“For this round,” Ossm announced, “we’re keeping the wisp around. Give as many answers as you can think of. We’ll stop when you get one wrong, but every right answer will count as a second chance— if you get an answer wrong later, you can use your second chance to guess again with no penalty. You have thirty seconds. Are you ready?” A low rumble of thunder bellowed.

Genevieve jumped but nodded, unsure of herself. 

“What else is the will o’ the wisp called?”

“Faerie fire? Er… jack-o’lantern… willy thing?”

“Ooh, sorry, you were doing good until ‘willy thing’. Also, that’s gross. But the good news is that you’ve earned yourself two freebies. Are you ready for the next question?”

With two freebies, Gen had a much better chance of getting out of here. She took a deep breath. “I’m ready.”

“Who… is this handsome fella?” Ossm pointed to a hunched over figure in rusted metal armor, pierced by a long shaft and pinned to a tree. Dried blood stained his wound, and parts of his flesh were eaten away by the passage of time and desperate scavengers, revealing clean white bone. They lifted his face to give Gen a better look, and the details of his decomposition were too horrific to describe here. On his chest was her kingdom’s crest.

Genevieve screamed so loud it traveled through the forest and woke a few villagers. Her knickers grew warm and wet, and the familiar stench of urine assailed her nose.

“Sorry, we don’t take screaming as a viable answer. You’ve still got one freebie left--”

“GET ME OUT OF HERE!!!” Gen shrieked, and flung herself at the wall of vines, and miraculously found that she passed right through it, and another appeared ahead of her.

She could hear Ossm behind her mutter, “who names their kid that? Who names their kid ‘get me out of here’?” He called out to her this time, “okay, that was the last of the freebies, so you really want to be careful with your answers!”

But Gen wasn’t listening. She shot like an arrow to the next wall, and Poss Ossm’s voice was fading in the distance. Drops of cold rain pinched her arms and face. When she reached it this time, the wall of vines twisted around her hands, her wrists, her arms! Pulling them off was no good; they grabbed on tighter, grew thorns and slashed at her skin. She tried pushing herself through the thicket. Her hair became caught on brambles, the thorns scraped her fingers and pricked her cheeks. She was sure a vine had a hold on her right ankle. She yelped and screeched as the thicket became thicker and started to encompass her.

Someone was barking orders somewhere outside the thorny enclosure in an unfamiliar language. The vines tightened around her, but when the voice became sterner, they gradually loosened and set her on the ground. There she knelt, shaking and scared out of her mind.

The rain came down heavier now, in bigger drops and greater numbers. Gen picked her eyes from the spotted ground to the owner of the voice standing in front of her, who was holding a dim lantern, but put it down to examine Genevieve. Gen was vaguely aware of the person asking her a question, one she should’ve been able to answer, but she was dumb with shock. They embraced her and murmured gentle words. It was either magic, exhaustion, or both that made Gen immediately nod off on their shoulder.

They picked up Genevieve and stooped to grab the lantern as well. It was just about pouring now, and they went inside the house to light the candles. It was going to be a long night.

[bananniewrites]

No update this week because of the holiday. Stay safe out there you guys!

[bananniewrites]

An Odd Game of Charades

Princess Genevieve 3/?

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The two thieves stopped at the edge of the woods, hunched over and panting like dogs. “Okay,” the first breathed, “okay, I think we lost ‘em. You good?”

The other nodded. “Still got the goods?”

The first held up a sack and the messenger bag, then gently scooped the mouse out of his breast pocket and presented it in his palm. The mouse was rather frazzled, being bounced around in a pocket, hanging on for dear life to not fall out. The thief had taken the mouse from the wizard’s lab, but what he didn’t know was that he wasn’t just a thief anymore— he was an accomplice to the escaped prisoner, Princess Genevieve.

Genevieve had tried to escape, but accidentally drank the wrong vial and turned into a white mouse. The vial, ironically, was supposed to be used to poison mice. On the thieves’ great run, Gen wondered if Clara forgot to take it out, as it would’ve been more useful for her (being scared of mice). She glanced between them. Not exactly her vision of a knight in shining armor, but beggars can’t be choosers. 

When the thief presented Genevieve in his palm, his partner looked at him, skeptical. “A mouse? What do we need a mouse for, Rowan?”

Rowan slumped. “You really have no imagination, do you, Matt? This little guy was found in a wizard’s office. Think about that for two minutes and tell me you don’t want to show him to the world.”

“So he’s a lab rat. So what?”

“‘Lab rat’? First of all, he’s a mouse. Second, he freaking nodded at me! It means he’s got… er… what’s that word?”

“Disease?”

“Sentience! Idiot. He thinks like a human! He can understand us! In fact…” He set down Gen and began tracing letters in the dust. “Maybe he’s got himself a name. He can just hop on the letters and spell it out.”

Gen was feeling much better now that maybe she had a chance to explain what was going on. If she could spell her name, maybe they could also stop calling her a boy. But should she? If she told them who she was, would she be ransomed or returned? Would they even believe her?

“Right, you update your resume for the nut house while I find firewood,” Matt sneered, then walked into the woods. 

Rowan harrumphed and glanced down at Gen. “You know I’m not crazy, right?”

Genevieve thought for a minute, and got an idea. She dug her hand in the dust, then dragged out three small words: “wait for Matt”.

“Of course!” Rowan cried. “Then I can prove that I didn’t teach you anything, that this is all you! Ooh,” he realized suddenly, “I should help make the fire. It’s getting dark.”

So Rowan left Gen to further ponder what to tell the thieves while they brought scanty amounts of sticks, piled them together, and used Clara’s flint to spark a tiny flame to feed. They ate Clara’s rations for their dinner, and fed some to Gen before turning their attention back to the alphabet Rowan had traced. “So,” Matt started, “Rowan thinks you’ve got a name?”

By now, Genevieve had come up with a plan. She nodded and hopped on the alphabet while Rowan spelled: “G… E… N. What kind of a name is ‘Gen’?”

“I believe it’s pronounced like a ‘j’,” Matt corrected, eyes wide at the extraordinary rodent. 

“Wait, you’re a girl?”

Genevieve nodded. She hadn’t spelled her entire name to avoid tipping them off. She continued to trace pictures in the dirt: a stick figure, a plus sign (for a moment, it was mistaken for a ‘t’), then a vial. This shape was trickier to understand: she made a very deep ‘U’ then drew bubbling circles above it. When Matt fished out one of the potions, she confirmed his guess. She drew an equal sign, then sat at the end of the equation, her arms spread wide. 

“So if I’m getting this right,” Rowan guessed, “you were a human at first, then the wizard made you drink a potion that turned you into a mouse?” She shook her head and pointed at herself. “You drank it? You meant to be a mouse?”

Gen was about to write “accident”, but she wasn’t sure if this would clear anything up, so instead she went with “wrong potion”. A chorus of “ohhh”s rose up. 

“Well, what do we do with her now?” Matt asked. “Is she going to change back? Does she need to go home? Does she come with us?”

Rowan sighed. “I think it’s too early to make any decisions. We don’t know if Gen’s like this forever, and even if we can put on some sort of show, nobody’ll be in the square right now. We’ll have to wait till morning. If she turns back, we’ll just see if we can get her back home. I’m turning in for the night.” He picked up some of Genevieve’s underclothes and draped them over the mouse, then laid himself down and waited for sleep. 

Genevieve was happy enough to snuggle into her enormous, soft underwear. By the fire, it was warm, and soon she drifted off. 

She dreamed that night. She saw a knight from her kingdom battling his way into the fortress. He fenced away two soldiers, but never made it to the entrance before being peppered with arrows. Then Genevieve herself, raising a sword, charged into the fray on horseback. For Clara. The horse reared; Gen tried to hold on but slid off the back end and fell, her sword clattering away from her. A soldier raised a spear, and just as it was brought down on her, she woke up shaking. 

She found that the world was not so big anymore, and when she wrapped her arms to hug herself in fright, she had knees to bring to her bare chest. She examined her arms and felt her face. Yes, she was back in her own body. The moon was as bright as the sun and in the highest point of the sky, bathing everything in a pale, ethereal glow. The fire was a pile of coals, glowing scarlet. Crickets chirped frantically, and somewhere, a lone night-bird sang full of hope. The woods remained dark, untouched by the moon and unwilling to reveal its secrets. 

Genevieve stood up and gently shook out the dust out of her clothes, afraid to wake the still-sleeping thieves. She would easily make her way into the village if she waited, and from there she could make her way to the castle. But these men were likely wanted by the Orcs. They’ll probably be in the village looking for them, and her. And what if the thieves should recognize her face? Would they still bring her to the castle, or would they keep her until the kingdom paid them? She had to remember that they stole Clara’s bag to sell its contents; she couldn’t guarantee that they’ll let her go without thinking of some sort of contribution. They weren’t that stupid. And yet... 

Rowan had understood her. He made the effort to get to know her. And Matt was the one who suggested taking her home, and Rowan had agreed, but they expected some village kid, not the princess.

In the corner of her eye, Genevieve spotted multiple torchlights in the distance, steadily coming closer. Instinctively, she shook the shoulders of Matt, then Rowan. “Rowan! Matt! Wake up, they’re after us!” She slung the bag over her shoulders and shook them again, and they roused in confusion. She pointed towards the torchlights and whispered, “someone’s coming!”

They saw the lights and rose quickly to gather their things. Matt muttered, “why go all this way for some magic stuff and a mouse?”

Then Rowan got a good look at Genevieve, now human, and his face grew tight with horror. “I’m starting to get an idea. Come on!” He took her arm and the scruff of Matt’s neck, and together, they sprinted further into the woods.

About half a mile in, they paused to catch their breath. “Matt,” Rowan gasped, “we’ve… we’ve got the princess. That’s why… why they’re chasing us.”

“Maybe we can hold out-?”

“No! No, no, no, that’s-that’s suicide. I hate to say this, ‘cause I don’t want to leave her alone, but… we might be better off without her, and vice versa.” He turned to Genevieve. “Okay, if you keep going in that direction, you should eventually reach the next village. People have seen… things in there, especially at night, so just keep running and you should be fine. Here,” he unclipped the sheet he wore as a cloak and threw it around her. “It’s been a pleasure, Your Majesty. Stay safe.”

Gen was shocked to be called by a formal title, as it was so rare to meet people who would call her that. She managed to mumble, “thank you.” Rowan and Matt bolted in the other direction, and Genevieve yelled after them, “God bless you!”, because that’s what people always said before they left. But as she ran deeper into the woods and the more she thought about it, the more she really meant it.

[bananniewrites]

Questionable Life Choices

The second installment of the Princess Genevieve Story

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Clara sat alone on her bed and tried to read, but her mind strayed to the thought of letting Genevieve escape. While trapped, Clara was relatively safe in her cell, but Genevieve was out there, sneaking around the fortress and the forest exposed to Lord-knows-what. She tried to dismiss her worries; she had advised her to find a different path once the forest grew dark, and gave her her bag filled with everything to prepare her for whatever may lie ahead. Besides, Genevieve was a bit rougher, so surely she can be tougher than her… right? Some time had passed; Clara wasn’t sure how much, but it felt like a while. She could see the shadows becoming longer. She hadn’t heard hoof beats or seen any shining armor (or even dull armor), so the knight was taking a while to come. This was fine, Clara said to herself, it usually takes time. Sometimes a day or maybe two at most. There was a knock at the door. Another guard of the Orcish army entered with a plate of two small loaves of bread and two glasses of water. “Dinner,” he mumbled. He glanced around and eyed the unoccupied dress on the floor. “Er… weren’t there two of you?” “Genevieve decided to escape,” Clara explained calmly. “I presume she got bored and went out the window.” The guard set down the measly meal on the empty bed and stuck his head out the hole, then inspected the bedsheet rope. He muttered something in his own language, which might loosely translate to, “I knew we should’ve put bars on that window,” as well as some curses for good measure. He then turned to Clara with a dark look in his eye. “Where is she going?” “H-home, where else?” Time to sound the alarm. He rushed out of the room, barely remembering to lock the door again, and bellowed down the halls, “THE NEW ONE’S ESCAPED! SHE GOT OUT!” He continued down the stairs: “THE NEW ONE GOT OUT!”

Genevieve wasn’t having any better luck. She hadn’t been caught yet, but she could’ve sworn she walked this hallway before, and concluded that she was lost within the fortress. So maybe she needed to go in the other direction. And there it was: two grand wooden doors leading outside, guarded by two Orcish soldiers. The exit. Gen thought about what to do. She could find something to throw and create a distraction, but she needed everything she had in her bag, and there weren’t any stones around to throw. Maybe a potion can sneak her through? As she rooted around in the leather messenger bag, she heard a voice shout down the hallway, “HEY!” There was no time to think. Gen blindly reached for a potion, uncorked it, and put it to her lips. It had a harsh taste, and her throat burned. She took a closer look at what she just drank, and through her blurring vision, she made out the words, “MOUSE POISON”. Would Clara have been in this situation, she might have said something like, “horror of all horrors!” because the mouse poison was most certainly not meant to be ingested by anyone. That’s why it was called poison. Genevieve, on the other hand, might have said something a lot more colorful and salty had she not immediately passed out on the floor. When she regained her senses some time later, the room spun so fast that she wished she was still unconscious. She put her hand on her forehead and found it strangely very hairy. When she took her hand away, it was pink and clawed, not like a human hand. She tried to say, “what on Earth?” but her voice came out hoarse and shrill, and it didn’t sound like words at all. There was a dish as big as she was, and when she peered in, she saw the reflection of a white mouse peering back. Gen screamed, or rather squealed, and fell backwards to find a thick pink tail. She realized that she was on a wooden table strewn with parchment, quills, vials of fluid, and a few flickering candles. All this was enormous and overcast by a man, staring down at her and grinning. “Why, Princess Genevieve!” he exclaimed. “You’re awake. I was hoping you could answer a couple of questions before I tell you what happened. Is that alright?” Gen tried to ask a bunch of questions of her own, such as “where am I?” and “am I dead?” as well as, “who are you?” But it just sounded like a bunch of squeaks. The man seemed to take this as an answer. “Excellent!” He scrawled on some parchment and slid it towards her, then spilled seed on two sides. There was one word on each side: “yes” and “no”. “Now then,” the man continued. “Can you understand what I’m saying?” Gen wasn’t sure if she should trust this guy. If she said yes, he would know that she can understand him, and he might treat her as a threat. If she said no, then he won’t tell her anything. She very carefully crawled to “yes”, then nibbled some of the seed. She was kind of hungry. “Alright then,” the man said. “If you can understand me, my name is Drevart Alabaar. I’m the wizard for the Orcish kingdom of Kikurg, and you’ve been in my office for about ten minutes. Some soldiers saw you drink this potion—” he fiddled with an empty vial, “—and turn into a mouse. So they came to me to make sense of it, but I couldn’t give them any answers while my subject was unconscious. Nobody knew, including myself, if you were an actual mouse, or if you kept your human mind. The other question was whether the spell was temporary or permanent. But now that I know you have your human mind, I will tell the king.” Before Genevieve could jump off the table, Drevart grabbed her and stuffed her into a thick-barred metal cage, then latched the door. “You will be staying here while I run off. And remember,” he smirked as if to mock her, “a lady does not make trouble.” He left the room. Genevieve cursed. How could she have trusted him? After all, she never made it to the exit; who would’ve taken her outside the fortress? This wasn’t fun enough to be Heaven. But then again, how was she supposed to know the poison wouldn’t kill her? But Genevieve was no lady. She would be making trouble if it meant saving herself. And she had made plenty of trouble before, so why on Earth stop now? She tried poking her head through the bars. She remembered Clara saying, while listing all the reasons why she was scared of mice, that they can squeeze their bodies through any hole they can put their heads in. First came her head, then shoulders, then she pushed with all her might, to find that her body slipped through like butter. Drevart was pretty stupid to leave her alone. She escaped once, of course she’d try again. And Clara would’ve gone on and on about how biased his experiment was or something like that, after all her studies with their own appointed wizard back home. Clara’s bag! Can’t leave that behind. Oh, and the clothes. Gen could see them neatly piled on top of the messenger bag. Yeah, that would be awkward if she ever changed back. She jumped down on the chair, dropped down its leg, and scurried over. She probably should’ve realized how big it was now, perhaps ten or twenty times her size. She tugged on the strap, but it didn’t budge. Drat! How is she going to move it? A sharp sound of breaking glass pierced her ears, and in a fright, she darted into the bag to hide. Genevieve never liked sudden, loud noises; she wasn’t frightened as much as startled, but they always hurt her ears. When she peeked out, there was a broken stained glass window and a face poking in. On the floor around the desk was a hooded figure, crawling around. “Can you be any louder?” the face out the window hoarsely whispered. “Are we in the throne room?” “I told you, you idiot, we’re not going for the throne room,” the one on the floor hissed as it stood up. “It’s gonna be stuffed to the gills with guards. Some of this magic stuff will sell for a healthy sum.” Gen could hear glass tinkle together, probably getting scooped. And then: “my my, what do we have here?” All at once, the bag moved under her, making her stomach drop as it was picked up. A giant hand fondled the vials and stole the knife for the intruder to announce its presence, then it went back in. The hand’s fingers danced through the rations and when it rested on Genevieve’s white fur, it stopped thoughtfully and ever so slowly cupped itself. Genevieve hopped on. The hand brought her to the inquisitive face of the thief: scarred, pale, with thawing eyes from cold calculation to wonder. Any ordinary mouse would squirm out of his hand, but Gen stared straight at him, unmoving. She was scared, but not because she was held. She was scared because she was being held by someone who could leave her behind or worse, kill her. Though she trembled, Genevieve stood up straight and looked him in the eye. “You are no ordinary mouse… are you?” he whispered. She shook her head. “Right then, we’re taking the mouse.” He carefully slipped her into his breast pocket and slung the bag over his head. He picked up the underclothes and showed them to his partner in crime. “Should we keep or sell these?” At that moment, the door burst open with the wizard and a guard. “Okay, Prin— HEY!” The thief ran to the window and dove head-first, but his partner had no intentions of catching him. “OW! Go, go!” They stumbled with their treasure and poor Genevieve, and sprinted into the forest, the beginning of the sunset tailing behind them.

[bananniewrites]

A New Kind of Hero

There was an elegant city that stood at the bottom of a treacherous mountain, and in the town, there was a man. Perhaps you heard of him. The people in this town certainly had; the man was a war hero named Oreh. Never once had he tasted bitter failure. He had rolling hills for muscles and a face chiseled by gods. The wealth he had was more than he could fit in his pockets. Women and men alike fawned over him and followed him wherever he went. Perhaps a quarter of his time was spent being swarmed by admirers. The poor asking for help on the streets would be nearly trampled by Oreh’s crowds. But why should he care? That wasn’t his problem.  He loved the attention everyone gave him. It left him no time to worry about other people.     This story begins when the ruler of this area called to him. He said to Oreh, “The Witch of the White Mountain has plagued us for weeks; she has sent rains in attempt to flood us, and stolen coin from our citizens. She delivered bees to sting and frost in the heat of summer. We fear she may kill us if you do not defeat her and bring back her head.” The people thronged him and pleaded, “please stop her, don’t let us die!” Oreh did not question the ruler and accepted the challenge, then set off on his journey up the mountain.     The expedition started easily as a path up the side and winding around the base, steadily inclining upward. A warm breeze told that summer was still with him, even as he gazed upward of the White Mountain’s snowy peak, whiter than the fluffy clouds overhanging the city. The dark, grey, craggy rock stretched into the sky for miles. But Oreh ignored the scrawl on the mountain that spoke of a peddler that tricked and cheated gullible travelers. Had he listened and taken that advice, who knows what would have happened. But he didn’t, and here we are talking about it.     The strange peddler had many shiny objects and colorful bottles on his rickety wooden cart, items that pleased the eye. Until it saw the price tag, of course. Such as it happened to Oreh. He was entranced by the glint of gold, the shine of silver, the rainbow of glass bottled potions and elixirs. “Perhaps I could help you?” the shady merchant asked.     “What do you have to get me to the top of the mountain?” Oreh requested.     “This one,” the salesman decided as he held up a lime green bottle. “It will make you feel lighter than air itself.”     “And how much will this cost me?”     “Depends. How much you got?”     Oreh ended up giving all the money in his pockets for the little bottle. And when he drank it, not paying attention to the peeling label revealing a skull and crossbones, he did feel light… light-headed, that is. He felt dizzy and extremely sick. Far above him, he saw a small flash of a blue light, and he vomited the contents and his symptoms cleared.     The anger in his body was a storm. His eyes were lightning, flashing in rage. Thunder in his voice boomed, “I want my money back. Now.” He was a whirlwind, charging at the peddler, only to face plant against the wall of the mountain when he ran through thin air of where the peddler used to be. He stepped back, holding his hurting face, to behold the words in front of him: “I told you so.” He grumbled and continued on.     He was about halfway up the mountain when he encountered huge boulders. He scoffed and said, “The witch thinks rocks will stop me?”     “Why wouldn’t they?” a strange, deep voice asked. The boulders shifted to life to create legs, a body, arms, shoulders, and finally, a head. On the head formed a jagged face. Oreh’s strength was useless against this golem, no matter how much he pushed back and fought. It pinned him down and held him in its clenched fist, and it climbed up the mountain to a large clearing and a cave in the wall. “The man you wanted, mistress,” the golem boomed.     “Thank you Clark, I’ll take it from here. You’re dismissed,” a female voice rang. Oreh was set down away from the cliff, and he saw the Witch sitting on the edge, with a scepter on the other side. He drew his sword.     “You’ve been torturing the town with your evils,” he complained. “I’m here for your head.”     “They are not intended to be evil, Oreh. I was trying to help them. The rains and the bees to make their crops grow, the frost to keep them cool, taking money from the rich to give to the poor. Just as I was trying to help and challenge you, coming up the mountain.” He swung, but missed. When he swung again, his whole body became immobile. “You were never meant to succeed at those trials, Oreh. The whole point was to fail.” She gazed at him with kind eyes. “And it’s okay to fail sometimes.” But he only became angrier, and with all his might, he broke free and collided his sword with her scepter. Her weapon glowed a bright white, and struck Oreh on his skull, and he fell, unconscious.     When he awoke, the witch was still sitting on the edge, watching the sun rise on the elegant town Oreh had come from. He crept closer to her, being careful not to get within her attacking range. But she seemed calm. “It’s a lovely view from here,” he commented cautiously.     “It’s a lovely town,” she agreed, “but not lovely townspeople.”     “What do you mean?”     She shook her head. “Most of them are so shallow. They follow the wealthy, the famous, the strong, while trampling the poor, the unnoticed and the weak beneath their feet.” She stood up. “But on the other side of the mountain is a town I do admire. Come.” He followed her into the cave, through winding halls, to another clearing overlooking a shabby village.     “Why this one?” Oreh asked. “It’s so dull and drab. Who would want to live there?”     “Look over there.” she handed him a spyglass and pointed. “One person’s strength can’t lift a beam off a person’s leg, but many who work as a team can lift it off and give aid. And over there,” she pointed in another direction, “some are helping their poor build shelter, giving food, and spare change.” She turned back to him. “Do you see what I mean?”     “I think so. But how can I help the people in my city?”     She smiled. “Tell them the reasons why I sent the rains and the bees and such. Your people didn’t appreciate my help because they misinterpreted it. Then come back so you can live in the other town, the one I showed you. I think you’d be much better off there.”     So back he went and did just that. They were shocked at the reasons the witch gave them, and disappointed at his condition and decision to leave. But the folks on the other side of the mountain recognized how much he must have changed, having heard of him as an ignorant celebrity and now knew him as a kind, helpful, and valued member of their community. And they called him Oreh, a different kind of hero.