As the months passed Darin continued to think about the little girl. He wondered what her name was and what her life was like. How was she faring? He wanted to find out, but he was always being watched these days. He knew the name of her town though, what she looked like, and that her grandmother's last name was Goldensneed. All he needed was an opportunity to go check on her and he was fairly sure he'd be able to track her down.
That opportunity did not come easily though. In fact, it may never have come if not for a bad case of the sniffles that winter. Half the castle it seemed like came down with it all at once- stuffy or runny noses, watery eyes, coughing, and extreme fatigue. Two of Darin's guards got sick, and while Darin did feel bad for them, he used the opportunity one afternoon to finally slip away when his guard fell into an exhausted sleep after a particularly bad coughing fit.
It had been 7 months since he had last stepped foot into the secret passageways that fateful day. Still, he remembered it well enough, and soon found himself taking the same exit near the stables that he had so long ago. Only then, there hadn't been a foot of snow on the ground.
"Ahh, cold cold cold cold cold!" Darin exclaimed as a pile of snow dropped down on him when he opened the hatch. Yes, June was a much better time to ride out than January.
Running to the stables, err, loping to the stables through the thick snow took a bit longer than he had anticipated. Luckily no one was about to see him, well except for Tom.
Darin had just reached the back entrance to the stables when Tom came out leading a fully saddled Fallfa behind him.
"Tom!" Darin yelped in surprise. "Wow, was I that obvious?"
"Yep. I saw you coming from the tree line, and I figured you'd be needing your trusty steed." Tom said with a grin. "You better hurry though, Mr. Harris is sick but still up and around pretty often, and that trail you left is anything but subtle." He indicated the path of churned snow in the otherwise untouched expanse behind them.
"You're right. Thanks a million Tom!" Darin replied as he mounted up and set off to find the village of Meadowsoft.
YOU ARE READING
Little Red Riding Hood and the Prince
FantasíaOnce upon a time, a little girl in a red hood found herself in a whole lot of trouble and was saved in the nick of time by a brave woodsman... right? Or is that really how the story goes? In this fairytale mashup you'll find that things happened a...
