A Grim Fairy Tale

Chapter Twenty-Nine

"Duh! I was previously enslaved for entertainment purposes! I've performed in royal courts. At royal feasts, balls, jousts, and of course engagement balls and wedding feasts. I predict that this princess will be engaged before the night is over and married before the week is over."

"But she can't get married!" Alastor protested. "Not to someone she just met at a social gathering! That's ludicrous!"

"Perhaps but royal offspring don't usually have a say in their marriage. Take the king and queen of Austria for example. They didn't want to marry each other but they did anyway because their parents forced them into it."

"Do they at least have a good marriage?" Millie asked.

"If they did then the king wouldn't have spent a whole month screwin me."

"You went to bed with the King of Austria?!" Moxxie gasped in disbelief.

"Well he has a thing for freakshows and he promised me a good amount of diamonds so yeah."

"Blitzo you're vulgar beyond all reason." Alastor said.

"Ask me if I give a damn? Anyway the only love the exists between King Stolas and Queen Stella is the love they share for their daughter. Take her out of the picture and it's nothing but screaming and broken glass."

"Then I fell sorry for that princess." Millie said. "She could end up trapped in a loveless marriage."

"A loveless marriage is the least horrible thing that could happen." Blitzo said. "I know of one arranged marriage, where the king would regularly beat and rape his queen."

"Stop that!" Alastor said, almost letting his smile drop. "That's not going to happen to her! She may be proper but she wouldn't marry anyone for any reason other than love."

"Well how would you know?" Blitzo asked.

"Uh...I...Her parents married for love. That's what I heard. So she'll most likely marry for love too."

"Unless her stepmother convinces her father that a marriage of convenience is much more beneficial." Moxxie said. "You know I've heard a lot of people say that has become a puppet for his second wife. Whatever she commands, he obeys."

"Surely he wouldn't value his daughter's happiness over his wife's approval." Millie said.

"I don't know. As I said, I've never met either one of them but I have a heard a few rumors about the queen."

"What kind of rumors?" Blitzo asked.

"Well some villagers have speculated that the queen is a witch and that she probably cast a spell on the king. How else could he have brought himself to marry such a vain and cruel woman?"

This made Alastor worried. Very worried. From the first glance, he believed that Charlotte's stepmother was a witch and she could very easily enchant the king into forcing his daughter into a miserable marriage. Suddenly his mind began create a terrible vision.

Charlotte being forcibly wed to some royal but unsavory brute. He imagined her sleeping beside said brute every night, and waking up each morning to look at the terrible man. He pictured her wandering around the castle, trying to avoid her boar of a husband all day and then spending all night weeping over the true love she never had the chance to experience. And the worst possible scenario of all, married to a man who would raise a hand to her and maybe even force her into bed with him. He couldn't bear that. He wouldn't bear that.

"Alastor you've gone pale." Moxxie noticed. "Are you alright?"

"I'm fine." Alastor said. "I just think...I need some rest. I'm turning in early today. Don't bother coming in to check on me. I'll just be asleep and clearing my head."

"What about dinner?"

"Still not hungry." He went upstairs to where his room was. "Goodnight."

He went into his room and closed the door lightly.

"Hmmm...." Millie said thinking to herself.

"What are you thinking?" Her husband inquired.

"You don't suppose he's up to something, do you?"

"What could he be up to?"

"I'm not sure but I don't entirely trust everything he just said to us. I feel like there's something we're missing here but I can't put my finger on it."

"You're paranoid." Blitzo said. "He's a troublemaker but what reason would he have to make trouble now? And don't forget he skipped dinner so he must be very tired."

"I suppose."

Despite that, Millie could not help the feeling that mischief was going to be afoot this night. At first she tried to ignore the feeling. She ate dinner, conversed with her husband and Blitzo by the fire, even a read a little. However none of it could get her to shake that feeling, and when it gave her no more peace, she quietly crept up the stairs and peered through the door to Alastor's room. The bed was completely made, the room was empty, and the window was wide open.

"He's gone!" She cried.

"Who?" Blitzo asked.

"Alastor, he's gone. He's left!"

"When it's almost dark?" Moxxie asked. "On the night of a Hunter's Moon? He wouldn't."

"He would and he did."

"Why would he do something so foolish?"

"We can talk to him about later! Right now we have to find him!"

"Don't panic." Blitzo said. "Even if you know who is out there, he mostly targets the young and the naive. Like princes, maidens, and children."

"I'm taking no chances." Millie said. "Don't forget that monster tried to kill him years ago, and even though Alastor got away, creatures like him hold grudges. You two search by land, I'll search by sky."

At once her body began to change. It shrunk and morphed. Her bone structure re-shaping itself to fit her new form, every last strand of hair replaced by silver feathers, her mouth curving into a beak, her arms stretching into wings, and her feet sharpening to become talons. The female alp was gone and in it's place there was a female falcon. The only thing that remained the same were her eyes.

Then the falcon spread her wings and flew off to look for her ward.