A/N: Don't blame me. It was the angst. Plus, MIRANDA! XD
(To Tiamat. Because she told me that I needed more of the funneh. Here it is.)
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Once upon a time in a kingdom in the very far north where there are all sorts of things (like bears and big trees and rivers cold enough to freeze your eyeballs) there lived a Queen in a palace of crystal and ice. She was a very good queen by all accounts, and the people were fond of her. She taxed fairly, kept the courts of law in going order, and always had a kind word for the occasional orphan or two.
This country didn't think much of men at all, and so under the Queen there were four young women who saw to anything the Queen happened to overlook, but in a very polite way. They oversaw the accounts, they talked to the butler about the thumbprints on the armoire, and they made sure to order food in when none of them felt like cooking. They were all very nice girls, and they kept the place running smoothly.
Except for one.
Not that she wasn't a nice girl. She was a very nice girl when she felt like it, with a gentle word for anyone who deserved it. Few did. Yes, she was a tad harsh at times, but she was dutiful and quick thinking and the bravest person in the entire northern lands.
She could also hit a fly in the ear in the dark with an arrow.
Her name was Miranda, and she was the Queen's iron, spiky fist inside the velvet glove of diplomacy. Things may not have ever run smoothly around her, but there were no confusing loops and turns in the way. Just a straight path of carnage and bitchslapping.
Miranda liked a lot of things in life. She liked beer, she liked leather, and she loved the smell of unbreakable discipline in the morning. But she did truly enjoy going out for a good romp and a hunt in the wilderness every few weeks or so, and with that in mind, one of her sisters packed her a lunch full of apples and beef sandwiches and slightly brittle cookies from last night and sent her off to the woods.
Miranda shot at a rabbit, but the wind took her arrow and hurled it into a tree. She cursed around a mouthful of apple.
She shot at a boar, but a squirrel warned it away just in time, and right as it moved, the arrow flew by. She growled around a mouthful of beef sandwich.
And finally, out of desperation, she shot at a dopey looking goose flying overhead, and aliens abducted it right as her arrow loosed.
She ate her cookies. And swore a blue streak.
Miranda had been planning to spend the whole night out there, but now she was out of food and still hungry. Nothing seemed to be willing to be killed by her. She was about ready to break her bow in half and swear herself to a life of slingshots when a delicious smell took her nostrils by the figurative ears and jerked her attention southwards.
It smelled like meat. She ran in that direction quickly.
It was meat! An entire cottage made of meat! The roof was made of beef cutlets, the walls of spare ribs, and the door was an entire meatloaf, glistening in the sunlight (There was no doorknob. A bear had eaten it).
Miranda's mouth watered. Her entire life she had dreamed of an edible living space. Some nights she had lain awake, staring at the Crystal Palace, wishing that the entire thing had been made of Monterey Jack Cheese. She quickly ripped off the sausage weathervane, and went to eating.
And promptly was drugged into oblivion.
When she awoke, she was firmly tied to a pole, and a green-skinned witch was cackling evilly while stoking the fireplace.
"Soon now, my hungry pretty," she chuckled. "I'll have you for my summer's feast."
Miranda objected to this quite strongly. She had bitten herself by accident once. She had tasted delicious. No one was worthy of her.
"Sure as Soa FUCK NO!" she yelled, jerking at her bonds. "I have friends! PO-OW-ER-FUL friends! Who will SET FIRE to your precious MEAT CASTLE and RESCUE ME!" For added effect, she changed her volume at strategic points throughout her speech. It had seemed to have a devastating effect on her troops back home. She hoped that now would be the same case.
"Ee hee hee heee!" said the witch delightedly. "No one will save you!"
Fuck! Miranda thought intensely. What would Dart do?
And promptly she had her solution.
"Aggghhh!" she shouted suddenly. "I won't forgive you!"
The witch stared.
Miranda scowled. "EVER."
The witch kicked another piece of wood onto the fire, then started shaving a carrot.
Think, Miranda! her thoughts raced. What would I do?!
Revelation dawned.
"You don't want to eat me," she said quickly.
The witch's orange eyes narrowed as she slid a few onions onto a shishkabob skewer, "Whyever not?"
"I'm not kosher!" Miranda said triumphantly.
"Depends on how I kill you," the witch pointed out shrewdly.
"Are you a rabbi?"
The witch hesitated. "No-o-o-o…"
"Do you know a rabbi?"
The witch shuffled her feet, "No-o-o-o…"
Miranda grinned. It was not a nice grin. "It's your lucky day grandma, because I totally know a rabbi, and I totally know the way to his house. Untie me and I'll show you."
"Oh excellent!" said the witch, beaming. "I've been looking for a new rabbi! The last one barely got done making my house kosher before I had to eat him!" and with that, she magicked the ropes right off of Miranda.
Miranda waited until the ropes fell off. And then she cracked her knuckles.
In the end, she ate the rest of the meat house, because only that one bit had had the tranquilizers. And then she was really bloated for a couple of weeks, and became the only Dragoon with built-in potbelly armor. Haschel laughed. So she killed him.
The end.
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A/N: I just reached the seventeenth chapter of Gather up our Bones. TOO MUCH ANGST. I needed a break, and I think that I'm hilarious.