The Curious Tale of the Starry-Eyed Princess

Chapter Two

Prince Garytt of Stuwart woke the entirety of the castle with his screaming.

The servants down the hall all look around at each other, none of them wanting to go and assist the prince. The woman with the most seniority among the servants eyes the boy with the least. "Weren't you about to say, 'It can't get any worse?'"

The others murmur in agreement.

"Hey, he didn't know the prince would react to the flooding like this!" The boy's friend says, puffing out his chest. "It can't be that bad on the top floor of the castle, anyhow."

The woman rolls her eyes. "Fine. If it's not that bad, why don't you two dumb sheep go and assist the prince with his wailing?"

The first boy glowers at the second, but they both leave the room in a rush — better to not have to deal with an angry boss and a prince's temper tantrum.

With much hesitation and even more dread, the boys follow the screaming down the hall and to the ornate doors that they practically have to push each other through.

"Do something about this!" Garytt screeches the moment the door is open, collapsing onto his bed.

The boys eye the short, fair-haired prince for a moment before starting to look around. There's a molded vase that looks vaguely like a human heart holding some fake roses on his dresser, a drawing framed on the wall that looks somewhat like a cat with horns and a snout (though the prince is known for screaming that the childhood portrait is a dragon), and that was just the prince's "art." The entire room has a faint smell of apples and vanilla, a scent Garytt himself devised. Nothing seems any more out of place than normal...

The boys exchange a look. Do they dare ask?

"Oh, shut up you dweeb." The little hand mirror sighs on the dresser, next to the frightening vase. "It's not like the world's ending."

"No, you shut up!" The prince grabs a pillow and tosses it in the direction of the mirror, but it barely makes it past the bed. It lands face-up with a sort of poem embroidered on it. The first boy reads it and cringes — first off, hair is not supposed to be used for embroidery no matter what the prince deems as "perfect thread," and that is definitely not how poetry or the word "eureka" works.

"Whatever, loser." The blurry surface of the mirror almost looks like it's displaying a tongue sticking out at Garytt. "Guess I won't help you, then."

"Help with what?" The second, impulsive boy who got them into this mess in the first place asks. The first boy glares at him yet again, understandably.

"Can you feel the moisture in this room?" Finally the prince rises from his bed, running over to his wall. He's graceful, but in that annoying, on-purpose sort of way. "Have you seen the edges of my precious portraits starting to curl?"

The boys look at his mangled — yet sometimes weirdly adorable — portraits of dragons and unicorns and abstract scribbles, and see nothing wrong. Luckily, both the first and even the second are smart enough to keep their mouth shut.

"Mildew is already starting to flourish in my fine wardrobe!" Garytt moans, throwing open a door to a room larger that the one they're standing in, and filled with clothes.

The first boy wonders how there isn't mildew already growing in that crowded closet. How do you even come to have that many tights?

"And my poor kitten is suffering the effects!" He runs over to a large pillow, and plucks from the middle of it a creature of sorts. By definition it would be called a gryphon as it's easy to see that it's half cat and half bird, but it is sorely lacking in both the feather and fur department, mostly skin instead.

The second boy wrinkles his nose. Looks like that cat has more problems than the odd weather lately.

"What is a lowly prince to do about such despair? All I want is peace!"

Both boys are equally in amazement at how such a drama prince could think he wants peace instead of his constant state of theatrics.

"Will you let me just tell you how to fix it already?" If the mirror could slap, it sounds like that's exactly what it would be doing to Garytt about now.

"Finding another person to fix this mess!" The prince cradles the supposed gryphon in his arms as he dances about. The creature looks like it would much rather thrown out of a window than stuck in the prince's arms at that moment. "You are brilliant, my mystical mirror!"

"That wasn't what I —"

Garytt runs over to his dresser, leans over the mirror — frowning for a second because he can't see his own reflection, which still manages to disappoint him to this day — and says, "Mirror mirror on the wall, who's the most powerful of them all?"

"First, I'm not on a wall I'm on you cold, hard, stinking dresser. Get me up on the wall and maybe then I'll answer you."

"Oh. True. The proper qualifications have not yet been met for such advice. Servants, please take care of this." The prince waves vigorously at the boys and the mirror, then returns to stroking his skin-gryphon.

For a moment the boys stare at each other, then begin finagling hanging the picture up by balancing it on the portraits, before the prince yells at them to get their filthy hands off such precious art. Then they start talking about getting a hammer and nails, and the prince gets upset at them destroying his perfectly painted walls because such young, deviant boys must search for destruction at every chance they get. Finally, the boys settle on just holding it up to the wall.

"Fine," the mirror spits." I'll tell you to get you out of my hair for a few minutes, or few days if I'm lucky. The most powerful person in existence is the sorceress who lives on Wolf's Fang Island, to the east. Not too long a trek."

"Did she cause the flooding?" The second boy asks.

The first boy kicks the second's shin.

"I like you," the mirror announces. "You ask sensible questions, even if too many of them. No, she is not at fault. It is the dragon who dwells in Marshmallow Caves in the mountains to the west."

"Marshmallow?" The second boy whispers.

The first boy shrugs. "It must live in a marsh full of mallow or something."

"Oh, brilliant!" The prince bounces. "A short escape from our flooded castle. Boys, get my carriage ready!"

"Um, m'lord?" the first boy dares. "The carriage won't work, there's two feet of standing water. The horses had to be moves to higher ground."

"Oh, fine." Garytt frowns. "I suppose we'll have to settle on a boat then. Go get one ready, and prepare for a grand adventure."

"Adventure?" The second boy gets excited.

"Yes, you will be rowing the boat. So exciting, yes?"

Both boys wilt.

"And get my singing rope while you're at it." The prince taps his lips. "And my metal rose."

"A metal rose?" The item is so absurd, it's the first boy that asks.

"The rose is a perfect weapon, it flatters anyone." The prince winks at him, and then walks over to his wardrobe. "Now, what to wear..."

The boys barely resist rolling their eyes while they exit the room. As they go about acquiring a boat and finding the strange items the prince must have to begin his adventure, they whisper plans to get out of the adventure. They've both heard rumors of others who disobeyed the prince eventually becoming a part of his art...

They settle on coming with him.

Little do they know as they prepare the beginnings of their quest that the dragon at the heart of it all is just beginning to realize its mistake...