The Next Cinderella

Chapter 10--Will You Accept This Lily?

Outside the academy, two royal carriages were stationed on the cobblestoned path. Fredrick emerged from one of them carrying a bucket of fresh lilies.

His opinion may not have mattered to either the prince or the 'Enchanted Kingdom VIPs,' but he still had every intention of doing impeccable work, so he removed each flower from the bucket and carefully dried each stem. He positioned each lily on a silver tray, and once he was finished there was a dozen of them, beautifully fanned out with the utmost precision.

When Fredrick returned inside, the prince and Gianni were making last-minute changes to the master list of contestants. He stood next them silently as was required by his lowly station, having now given up on changing a peasant's life or possibly his own.

"Not the one with the lazy eye," said the prince. "That's where I draw the line."

"Then who?" said Gianni. "The one who looked like she ate her own twin?" He gestured to the noticeably overweight girl, and puffed out his cheeks to drive the point home.

The prince appeared to be holding back a surge of vomit. "It's like the depths of hell in here," he muttered. He rubbed his eyes and reluctantly faced reality. "I suppose I'll just...see who inspires me in the moment."

Gianni cringed at the prince's spontaneity, as it directly conflicted with his calculated world of set rules.

"Relaxxx," Fairy Godmother cooed, awkwardly massaging Gianni's shoulders as a drunken old lady might do. "Pretty boy might surprise you with a captivating choice." She could see Fredrick approaching out of the corner of her eye, and before the girls could spot him she thrust her magic wand into the air. "Flowers!"

A moment later Fredrick appeared, and two simpleton village girls gasped in amazement. "Did you see that?!" the first one said.

"Right out of thin air!"

Fairy Godmother gazed at the wand in admiration. "This so-called magic really works..." She almost started to laugh but when she saw Gianni's glaring eyes she converted it into a burp. "Oh dear; excuse me."

"Just stick to the script!" he whispered.

She nodded and tucked the wand into her cloak, before focusing her attention on the scrubby-looking hopefuls. "There are fifty of you vying for the prince's heart, but there are only twelve lilies on this tray..."

Nervous gasps echoed throughout the hall as the prince made his slow approach. He sauntered past the queue with a judging eye, considering the D-list girls for a final time. One of the girls he'd noticed first was flirting with a B-list ranking; she was a sultry girl with pale blue eyes and golden hair that cascaded down her back. He stopped directly in front of her. "Your name?"

"Bella," she said, her throaty voice oozing with desire.

"Oh I bet you are," he answered lustily.

From the way the two were looking at each other, there was a reasonable chance they'd have a sexy throw-down right there on the academy floor. Instead the prince handed her the first coveted lily, securing her spot in the final twelve.

She accepted the flower humbly, and then waved it around smugly; clearly the wench to beat.

The prince offered ten more lilies to ten more girls who fell somewhere in the spectrum of 'average.' With one flower left he found himself in front of Myrielle. Apart from their initial library encounter, he was truly noticing her for the first time, or noticed her smell at least. He took a sniff. "Is that...turkey stench I smell?"

Myrielle stood proudly and nodded in confirmation. "Some men find the smell of meat to be extremely erotic." She stared at him directly and smiled, a master in faux self-esteem.

The prince's eyes widened at the ludicrous response. He wasn't sure whether to be indignant or laugh, but he was definitely sure that he didn't find her attractive. "Fredrick!" he called.

"I'm right here," said Fredrick, standing next to him with the silver tray in hand.

"What were you saying earlier?" said the prince. "About...mixing things up?"

Fredrick's defeated eyes immediately lit up, with his words to the prince having somehow made an impact. "I was speaking of diversity," he said excitedly. "And how the more people talk about this contest once it's over, the more they'll be talking about you."

The prince nodded. "So it would benefit me the most."

Fredrick grinned. "Absolutely!"

The prince kicked at Myrielle's bouffant skirt, dismissive and abusive all at once. "It could be entertaining; like that time we kept a monkey and taught it to dance."

Myrielle stood still with her head held high. There was no positive way to interpret the fact that she'd just been compared to a monkey, but if it gave her the chance to move on in this competition, she would "ooh ooh ooh!" and "ah ah ah!" to live to see another day.

Gianni hurried over when he noticed Fredrick's sudden involvement.

But he was already too late.

The prince grabbed the final lily and tossed it at Myrielle.

"Thank you!" she said breathlessly.

A jilted hopeful with a better body than Myrielle couldn't believe what was happening. "Is this a charity for village freaks then? Is that the kind of princess you want?!"

The prince snapped his fingers and the knights removed the outcast kicking and screaming. The prince sighed. "I suppose there isn't enough of me to go around." He turned to Fredrick. "It's time for my castor oil hair mask; let's go."

Fredrick suddenly had a certain lightness in his step, a complete reversal of how he'd looked and felt before being sent outside to get the flowers. As he made his way out of the academy, he caught a quick glimpse of Myrielle's expression. She was smiling at him warmly and mouthing the words "thank you" as he passed.

He said nothing in response but his face began to redden, a natural response to the extremely rare occurrence of kindness from a female.

Myrielle was feeling some lightness too, but it was intermingled with a heavy dose of strangeness. As she recalled the day's events, she'd escaped a charge of treason, beat out thirty-eight other hopefuls, and the prince had compared her to a monkey. From where she now stood, the path to earning a royal title and the power to help the kingdom seemed unclear. Not to mention nearly impossible. She didn't know how far she could get, but Fredrick was the one who had saved her. The decent part of her felt warm inside when she thought of his gesture, while the calculating side of her wondered if she could use him to gain some sort of advantage.

Before Myrielle could hatch a clever plan she was distracted.

"Turkey-smelling slob."

"In the ugliest dress ever made."

"Hahahahaha!"

At first the floating words and laughter seemed a mile away, but as she slowly emerged from her sea of thoughts she realized the insults and laughter were directed at her. It was Myrielle's moment to learn a lesson that would prove to define the Internet she would never live to see: the trolls will always come...

[WRITER COMMENTARY: I hope you enjoyed this chapter! I wanted to show both sides here, in terms of Fredrick's growing crush, and Myrielle who's totally oblivious to that, and so only thinks of Fredrick as a useful tool. Meanwhile there are 12 girls vying for the prince's heart. But does he even have a heart? ;-) More to come soon, keep reading! ]