The Masked King: A Trump Fantasy AU

~4~

A/N: Here's another chapter, guys! I hope everyone is doing alright in the aftermath of this extremely emotional election. We can never be truly satisfied with the outcome, but we can choose not to let it affect the way we lead our lives. Stay strong, America. 

The first thing that I noticed about Washadonnie was the noise. 

Children laughed, horses neighed, and street vendors loudly advertised their wares. In comparison to the quiet town I had come from, it was an absolutely overwhelming blanket of sounds, sliding over my ears and gradually worming its way into my brain. 

Already exhausted from the train journey, which had lasted a full twenty four hours, I found myself simply unable to take the exclamatory nature of the capital's bright colors, shapes, and sounds. 

As I walked through the crowded, smelly streets, clutching the cloth bag that held my life savings and my entire wardrobe as I desperately searched for an affordable inn, I spotted a group of three men dressed in Amaerica's signature red, white, and blue approaching me. 

Royal guards. 

I naturally put down my head and quickened my pace as they grew closer. They were perhaps the most hated and feared group of people in all of Amaerica. Roaming the streets with cudgels and blunt swords, they spent their lives doing the King's dirty work. Sometimes, they'd beat people half to death and leave them in the street, yet, their actions could not be questioned. After all, they were servants of the Masked King. 

My fears began to subside as the guards walked toward me, talking amongst themselves as they casually strolled toward the center of the city. They were probably just returning home from their posts closer to the city's numerous walls. They had no reason to stop me, or question my very ordinary actions. 

How wrong I had been. 

Their conversation seemed to grow more urgent, more purposeful, as they neared me, now less than three yards away. One pulled a scrap of paper out of his paper and showed it to his two colleagues, who both nodded in assent. 

"Hey, you! Stop!" another one of them yelled, suddenly turning my greatest fears into reality. 

I froze on the spot, lifting my gaze to meet the cruel scowls of the three guards, who looked down at me as if I were a cockroach beneath their boots. 

"Are you this girl? Iridanna Wolflight?" The first guard turned his piece of paper around so that it was visible to me, and I gasped at the sight of a picture of myself, captioned with my full name and age. 

"Yes, sir," I gulped. 

This was all so wrong! What did the King of all people want with me!?

I continued to watch the guards, my muscles tensing up as I trembled with fear. 

I was about to be beaten. 

Or worse. 

The third guard stepped toward me, reaching out with his dominant hand. I prepared myself for a solid punch to the stomach, but I soon realized he was planning to do nothing of the sort. 

He wanted to shake my hand. 

Bewildered, I took his hand and shook it quickly. 

"Congratulations, Miss Wolflight," he grinned, exposing a mouthful of rotten teeth. "You are the Masked King's new Royal seamstress. You are to report to the palace immediately." 

"R-Royal seamstress?" I stuttered. The suddenness of the whole situation certainly wasn't helping my disoriented state. "Forgive my ignorance, but...I didn't know that such a position existed." 

"It does now," the guard chuckled. "Come on, girl, the King doesn't like to be kept waiting."