A lily white hand slipped from behind the bars. Thin fingers wrapped around the poor prince, their touch so soothing and loving. Wonderful whispers of fairy tales galore and the beauty they could weave if only they had his pure heart. Stories of honest heroes fallen in love with princesses and of the happy endings that could be. If only the prince would sacrifice his heart. Their soft voices were enticing; gentle warmth radiated from them. Brown eyes turned in the weary face of my prince. A tear escaped those eyes as his desperate voice cried her name.
"Tutu." Ahiru. My prince held out his gloved hand to her. She would love him. He knew it. "Dance with me." His plea was simple, so simple. All that he needed to escape his misery, his fear, his loneliness.
Tutu hesitated and he saw fear in her eyes. Those lily white hands let go of him, their warmth suddenly gone. She was afraid of him. Of what he had become.
Tutu. Fakir. Rue.
They had all left him. The world had forsaken my prince.
Mirrors. Silver white mirrors revealed him. No. These mirrors only showed him of the prince of ravens. They were haunted images of him. They were of Rue; dancing the En Pointe with her. Such a beautiful ballad it was. Yet hollow. His hallowed form swung its raven wings and looked up toward a dark sky.
He gave a mournful cry as Tutu wrapped her arms around him. Those same lily white hands. That same painful feeling he felt every time he saw her.
Wait.
This isn't Tutu. And he looked again and saw it was only a white swan. No, a duck. A small yellow duck had taken the place of his Tutu.
Those black raven feathers shed from his body. His love bled and bled those feathers away. Words formed on his lips; despaired words.
"If you gouge out my heart, kiss it. Dye your lips red with my blood." Those words were never meant for Tutu. The yellow duck was helpless. It could not do anything to save him.
My prince had lost the will to live. To love. To my heart. He was mine. My Prince; my one and only Prince.