Deciding that she was princess, and princesses do NOT swim through disgusting drains, Rosella smoothed
out her skirt, and began marching toward the drawbridge. The two knights guarding the portcullis dropped
their conversation to yell out to the intruder “halt, who goes there?” It was in fact what they would have said
to anyone approaching the gate; anyone that is, until she came closer, and they recognized her to be the lovely
princess Rosella. “Princess!” they exclaimed in unison, suddenly fumbling their spears, armor clanging as
they straightened up their spines to a posture worthy of royalty.
Rosella kept her nose elevated, and didn’t even dignify the bumbling guards with a response, feeding into her
royal status. She figured the arrogance would work in her favor, while she normally would have giggled and
gotten into mischief with the guards as she often liked to do. They didn’t seem to notice the difference, and if
they did, neither had the guts to show it in front of the fairest maiden in all of Daventry. All breath was held
as her slender body slinked past the suits of armor. Rosella let out a tiny giggle as she passed them, more a
reference to her personal victory than anything to do with them, but they would never know this. The guards
exchanged uneasy glances at each other, neither daring to breath, until the last click of Rosella’s high heels
was heard.
Happy to know that her father had not spread word to the entire castle about her grounding, Rosella pulled
rank two more times as she made her way through the halls of the castle toward the magic mirror.
Apparently, the king had not thought that it was possible for his daughter to actually get out of her room, and
thus nobody beyond her brother Alexander who put her there, needed to know of her confinement.
While she felt a twinge of guilt at making the guards squirm in their heavy armor, she realized that it had to be
done. The land of Tamir was counting on her success in the matter. And it was rather funny, she giggled to
herself. Pulling the tarp off the magic mirror, Rosella stared into the swirling colors, concentrating on her
memories of