Chapter 12

The carriage ride home was gloomy and depressing. Sera tried her best to not let Green and Phina sit in silence, but she was entirely unsuccessful. Of course nothing would work out properly, she thought glumly. Phina left the two at the farm and went back to the village. Sera hoped no one realized where Phina had been. No one in Tolerable, not even an important visitor, would ever go to a ball held by King Bertram. It was unheard of. Balls were for the nobles from Grandosa, the capital city.

Green walked straight to his bedroom and shut the door. Sera sighed, and then decided to make some tea. She put water in the kettle and, after stoking the fire a bit, put the kettle on. By the time she found the tea leaves the water was boiling nicely. Sera poured the water into a cup and placed the leaves in. After it had steeped a bit, she knocked on Green’s door with the cup in her hand.

He opened the door and looked at her quizzically before going to the kitchen and looking around. “You made tea?” he asked.

Sera nodded, and Green continued his inspection of the kitchen, eyes circling around the room again and again, his eyebrows pulling together in confusion. “Already cleaned up?” He kept scanning the room for something.

“No, I thought you’d want your tea hot.” Sera was becoming confused. Didn’t he want his tea?

“Broken pump? Smashed cups? Burnt tea leaves?” Each time Sera shook her head “no” Green looked more and more befuddled. He started scratching his head.

And then Sera realized what had happened and started giggling. “I made a cup of tea and didn’t burn the house down!” she shouted, throwing her arms up in victory. “No disasters or anything!”

Her waving arms knocked a clay plate off the table. Sera glared down at the broken pieces. Green was already handing her a broom, so she quietly swept it up. She looked up at him nervously, blushing from her mistake. Green smiled at her and quietly went back to his room, leaving Sera to finish cleaning up. After all the accidents over all the years a plate was next to nothing, and it wasn’t long before she was safely in bed.

Sera’s newly discovered good fortune did not extend to either of her caretakers. The next morning started well enough. She woke up, washed her face, got dressed and walked to the kitchen for something to eat. Green, oddly enough, was sitting at the kitchen table, tapping his fingers together. He looked well-rested and was dressed for working, but he was just sitting. Not doing chores, not fixing something, not making breakfast, just sitting and staring off into the distance.

With a sinking feeling Sera realized that he was moping. Phina had explained some days ago that after meeting with their love most people became gloomy for a few days, especially if they had to leave their loved one quickly. Of course, Phina hadn’t mentioned any details on how to deal with it, so it left Sera in the awkward position of wanting to get help but not wanting to leave Green by himself.

Resisting the temptation to tiptoe she was walking to the cupboard when Green said, “I’m going to marry her.” Sera jumped at the fierceness of this statement. She had never seen him look so determined.

“I’m going to marry her,” he repeated. “She doesn’t care about being a princess. She loves me and I love her. I just have to get her away from the king.”

With that Green stood up and marched out the door. Sera followed, terrified he was going to do something reckless, but he went straight to the wood pile and began to chop vigorously. This was not what was supposed to happen! Her uncle was supposed to mope and sigh, not plan and strategize and wield sharp, heavy objects.

Grabbing a shawl from the house, Sera ran to the village and to the Stemley’s house. Phina would know what to do. If the shouting was any indication, the Stemleys were busy preparing for a trip to the castle the next day, so they ignored Sera as she ran straight to Phina’s room and rushed inside. Pulling the door shut loudly, Sera looked around for her teacher.

Phina was staring into a bowl of water with tears running down her face. As Sera drew closer she could see it was enchanted with a view of the palace throne room. With a sob Phina handed her the bowl and flopped onto her bed. Reviewing the symptoms in her head, Sera came to the conclusion that the world was going to end. Or perhaps merely a plague or an earthquake, whatever was more painful.

Sera held the bowl well away from her body. Glancing at Phina, sobbing away on her bed, Sera weighed her options. She could throw the bowl out the window and comfort the distraught woman the best she could. Or she could look into the bowl and risk seeing something horrible.

Crying people were terrifying, she decided. With a deep breath, Sera marched over to the table, plunked the bowl down and stared at it. It was some sort of council meeting again, with the king and his advisors and some very serious expressions. After a few seconds of watching mouths move Sera stuck her ear in the water and listened. The water made everything sound dull and slippery, but she had no trouble understanding what was said.

Sir Audley said, “But sire, surely the prince should have some say in who he marries!”

In the silence that followed Sera could hear the king’s frown in the way the chairs creaked uneasily. Someone coughed awkwardly, and someone else began tapping their fingers. Then a crash that Sera recognized from her lifetime of accidents: shattered glass. With the rapid crunching footsteps and yells in the distance you didn’t have to be a genius to realize that the prince had arrived, most likely through the window if the noise was any clue. The prince did love to make an entrance.

“Father, you can’t do this!” Kennard shouted. “I won’t marry her and she won't marry me!”

With the squeak of wood against stone, King Bertram stood. “The treaty’s been signed, the girl is here, and I don’t care if she’s got purple hair and warts on her nose. You will marry her, Kennard. Tomorrow. You have no choice.” Sera felt her heart drop into her toes.

Kennard shouted something else, but it was lost in the commotion of doors banging open and armored feet clattering on the stone floor. Someone yelped and a vase or something crashed to the ground. The prince gave some kind of a war cry, there was a clang or two and then tremendous crash. Another door opened with a thump, armored feet thundered across the floor and then a thud. Sera pulled her ear out of the water just in time to see about a dozen soldiers dragging the unconscious prince out of the throne room.

Tomorrow. How was she supposed to fix the situation now? Sera’s arms suddenly felt very heavy and she slumped to the floor. It was then she noticed that Phina was no longer in the room. There was a thin layer of sparkling blue dust on the bed showing how the fairy godmother had left. At that revelation Sera crawled to the side of the bed and pulled the blanket over her head. Fairy godmothering was a lot harder than she thought and her only chance of getting help had just disappeared into thin air.

Author's Note

Has the plot turned suitably disastrous, or is it underplayed? Is there enough action or is there too much of a passive feel?