A/N: Am I the only Temeraire fan who, upon first hearing Naveen address his ugly, monkey-like valet 'Lawrence' groaned, "Lawrence? Are you serious?"

I mentioned this on deviantart and a fellow deviant, whitelyte said, "CROSSOVER!", and I replied, "oh, okay!" So here it is, my first crossover, dedicated to whitelyte. :)

For those who don't know me yet: English isn't my native language, therefore grammar mistakes might occur, even though I have a brilliant British beta, Michael (much thanks for your help again, Michael!). I haven't seen TPatF in English only in Hungarian, and I must admit that trying to write Tiana's South American English gave me a headache. Michael tried to help me with it, but since neither of us are from the USA, we can't be a hundred percent sure we got SAE all right.

Disclaimer: The Princess and the Frog belongs to Disney. Temeraire belongs to Naomi Novik. I'm just fooling around with these two universes. :)

Now, let's get started!

A Chinese Prince in New Orleans

Chapter 1

It's Reality, Face It!

Dr. Faciler's voodoo emporium, New Orleans, 1912

For those who don't know him, let me introduce Dr. Facilier, and let me do it in the past tense – in a minute you will understand why.

So, Dr. Facilier was a mad magician who had taken it into his ugly, Jafar-look-alike head to rule over the city of New Orleans.

At the beginning of our story, this mad magician was deeply immersed in working his voodoo magic on Naveen, the prince of Maldonia, and his valet, Lawrence, both of whom he had evilly tricked. Those unfortunate souls had absolutely no idea that they were mere puppets in the hands of our mad magician who, by the way, also liked to give himself formidable nicknames – or at least nicknames he thought formidable.

Years earlier Dr. Facilier had spent weeks and weeks to come up with a decent nickname, but eventually he had decided that 'The Dark Lord' sounded boring, not to mention that it was already taken by a certain someone in a galaxy far, far away. Dr. Facilier was by no means a courageous man – he knew that the Sith wielded power just as dangerous as his own voodoo magic. The Sith were definitely not to be crossed. Therefore Dr. Facilier had chosen to be called 'He Who Has a Formidable Big Gap Between His Front Teeth'. When one of his demon friends died of laughter upon hearing his self-chosen nickname, Dr. Facilier fumed a bit, then chose another title, 'The Shadowman'.

Yes, 'The Shadowman' was definitely a worthy nickname for someone as powerful and evil as him – thought he. But he was gravely mistaken, for he was not nearly as talented a magician as he believed himself to be, and all of his demon friends laughed behind his back at his plans of ruling New Orleans. But Dr. Facilier was too dumb to notice that. Our sorcerer thought himself cunning and could not imagine that anything could go wrong with his current little magic experiment. Again, he was completely wrong.

Had Dr. Facilier been a proper voodoo magician, he need not have written down the names of his 'puppets' in order to enchant them, but he was a bungler, only he would never have admitted that to himself. Or to anyone else.

Currently our dumb and bungling magician was holding a paper in his hands, murmuring in himself the names he had written down on it – the names of Naveen and Lawrence.

Have I mentioned that Dr. Facilier was quite bad at spelling too? Well, he was. That was why the paper he was clutching held the names 'Naveen' and 'Laurence'. Had he had enough sense to question Prince Naveen's servant how exactly he spelled his name, he would not have got himself in trouble. But this way he did. Problem was, it was not only he who got in trouble due to his bungling sorcery.

"Lawrence into Naveen, Naveen into a frog. Lawrence into Naveen, Naveen into a frog. Lawrence into Naveen, Naveen into a frog," he murmured without really letting out a sound, only his lips were moving, forming the silent words, again and again and again.

Just when the prince and his servant were beginning to get bored and planning to excuse themselves and leave, a red comet swept out of Dr. Facilier's index finger, flitted across the room, twirled around the astonished Naveen, swirled around the dumbfounded Lawrence, then hit Dr. Facilier in the chest.

"Damn," was all The Shadowman could utter before he was reduced to a pretty heap of ash on the floor.

His demon friends were rolling on the floor laughing.

The only remaining flesh and blood person in the room did not laugh. He had no reason to.

oOo

The balcony of the La Bouff residence, a few hours later

Tiana heaved a sigh. Life was so damn unfair! The fact that she was a woman, and a black woman at that, did not mean she had no right to buy the old mill and make her dreams come true! Her tiny hands clenched into fists, imagining that she was squeezing the necks of those blasted realtors.

Suddenly her father's gentle face appeared before her eyes, and Tiana snapped out of her reveries. The realtors in her imagination gasped as she finally released them, but so did she upon noticing an ugly little frog sitting on the balustrade. How on earth could a frog get so high? She bent over the balustrade and glanced down into the depth below her friend Charlotte's balcony. There was no way the frog could have climbed up here, especially because it was nothing but a mindless animal.

Perhaps she had only imagined the frog like she had imagined choking the realtors. Yes, Tiana was quite sure she had just imagined it, therefore she refused to look in the frog's direction – if there was a frog at all – and lifted her eyes to the starry sky instead. The Evening Star twinkled merrily above, filling her soul with hope and some warm and fuzzy feeling she had not felt since her father died.

"Please," she muttered, "I want that restaurant. Please, please, please!"

"Give up, sweetie, it's only a star, it won't hear you," came a voice from her right.

Tiana turned around, her eyes searching for the source of the voice, but there was no one but the ugly little frog on the balustrade. She made a grimace. She was indeed imagining things… It must be the stress, she concluded. The stress of having been turned down by the realtors, damn them!

She drew herself up like the princess she was dressed up as and elegantly straightened the tiara on her head, intending to march back into Charlotte's room.

"Forgive my boldness, dear lady, but I feel the need to point out that your dress is very indecent," came another voice from nowhere, and Tiana once again doubled back, desperate to spot the speaker.

"Indecent? Eh," said the first voice, just as disembodied as the second, only a little younger, more boyish. "She's pretty damn hot in that dress, I'd say."

"Hot? Excuse me, sir, but only whores wear dresses that do not cover their shoulders," came the other, slightly deeper voice.

"Whores?" Tiana snapped, her eyes racing around the balcony in vain. There was no man in sight who could have addressed her – but perhaps it was better, for if the speaker had been a real man and not a figment of her imagination, she would very likely have broken his nose for the insult. "Who are you? Show yourself!"

"I am down here, dear lady, and pray do not be angry, I did not intend to offend you, I only found your clothes most unusual," said the deeper male voice again.

"Unusual? That's quite a common ball dress and very hot indeed," replied the younger voice.

Tiana was close to tearing her hair, and even closer to going mad. Invisible men were talking to her, insulting her, asking for her forgiveness, praising and criticising the princess costume Charlotte had lent to her… "What the hell is happenin' here? Who are you?" she shouted.

"I am Prince Naveen, honey," came the younger male voice, "but I have lost my beautiful body. A shame, because you can't see it and admire it."

"Prince Naveen?" Tiana frowned. "Ain't that the prince the newspapers wrote about? Eh," she waved her hand. "The stress is indeed gettin' to me, I'm talking to someone I never seen and don't see even now!"

"Of course you don't see me, as I have lost my body, haven't I just told you?" the young male voice said, sounding slightly miffed.

"Of course, you're a ghost prince and this frog here will surely turn into another prince if I kiss it," Tiana snorted.

"Well… I seriously doubt that," the frog replied.

Tiana's eyes widened. There was no mistake this time, she had seen it. The frog had replied.

No, she shook her head. That was completely out of the question! Such things only happened in Charlotte's fairy tale books, not in reality!

"Yeah, I too doubt your kiss would turn him back into a prince," came the younger male voice, "because this guy here isn't a prince in the first place."

"I beg to differ, sir," the frog said impassively. "The Chinese Emperor has formally adopted me, therefore I am a prince. From a certain point of view."

Tiana decided it was time to scream.

oOo

Waterloo, 18th June, 1815

"Honestly, I don't understand what old Boney's waiting for," an irritated voice spoke up to his right. "It's nearly ten, we're getting bored here."

"Oh, I bet he's chickened out," a fierce female voice replied. "Let us not wait for him to attack, let us attack first, Granby!"

"Patience, Iskierka, please!"

Lawrence blinked several times to chase the evil little sparks still blurring his vision.

"Hey, what happened to Laurence?" someone shrieked right behind his back – an exasperated female voice.

"Well, thank you for your question, I'm still in one piece," Lawrence muttered and dusted his suit, still feeling quite disoriented. He craned his neck a bit to look at the source of the previous voice and was encountered with a pair of grey eyes gleaming with fury.

"I have asked you about Laurence, our captain," the woman said, her tone downright threatening. The pistol she was pointing at him looked even more threatening.

"Wait, wait, fair lady, and point that thing elsewhere!" Lawrence begged.

"I will point it elsewhere once you have told me what you have done to Laurence!" she snapped.

"But I am Lawrence," the valet stammered. You usually need to stammer if you have a pistol pressed up to your throat.

"Laurence? You?" the woman laughed coldly. "Laurence is tall and handsome, while you…"

"…you look like a monkey," a deep voice said, its strength and resonance suggesting that it was coming from someone of considerable size.

Lawrence slowly turned his head, and the first thing he spotted on his right (how on earth had he missed it a few seconds ago?) was an enormous red dragon with formidable yellow eyes, giving him a curious look. Steam was issuing from its back at several places. Beyond it there were dragons as far as the eye could reach, and on them and around them there were soldiers running, hanging, climbing or loading their weapons. They were all wearing funny bottle-green uniforms. There was no doubt – Lawrence was at the middle of a battlefield, in the middle of an army about to give battle.

The valet laughed nervously and loosened his tie. Surely that voodoo magician must be playing a trick on him… this could not possibly be real! It was surely a nightmare, a hallucination, something he would soon awaken from…

"So," the earlier deep and resonant voice spoke up again, sounding horribly and frighteningly close. A shiver ran down Lawrence's spine as he realised that the resonance had partly come from under his sizable bottom, meaning he was sitting on the source of that intimidating voice.

Sweating profusely, he turned fully back, away from the girl pointing her pistol at him from behind, only to be faced with something much, much more frightening: a black dragon head with a pair of dark blue eyes glinting with annoyance and teeth bared at him menacingly – each tooth the size of a grown man's forearm, not to mention razor sharp.

"So," the dragon repeated, "what the hell have you done with my Laurence?"

Lawrence decided it was time to faint.

oOo

The La Bouff residence, 1912

"No, no, no, this can't be happening to me!" Tiana shouted as she ran back into Charlotte's room. "There ain't no speakin' frogs, frogs simply DO NOT SPEAK!"

"Well, that is because I am not a frog," came the deeper male voice from the balcony, and a series of funny squelching noises indicated that the amphibian was hopping closer, following the girl into the room. "Let me introduce myself. I am Captain William Laurence of His Majesty's Aerial Corps. Recently reinstated and at your service, my lady. Please call me Laurence."

After she had run into the room, Tiana turned her back on the frog. Currently she was staring at the floral patterns of the wallpaper, determined not to look in the amphibian's direction. She would be risking her sanity if it turned out that the frog was still there, that it was real in the first place…

"See? Now you know both of us," the other, younger male voice spoke up, only not from behind her back. It sounded as though the young man – if he existed at all – had been standing right before her, between her and the flower-patterned wall, only a few inches away. Tiana could almost feel the warmth of his breath on her cheeks… it was almost exciting… There was only one tiny problem: there was absolutely no one whose breath she could have felt. She was staring at thin air.

"Both of you?!" she gasped and whirled around, away from the source of the disembodied voice. If she had to choose between two evils, she would choose the smaller, and talking to a frog was still somewhat more realistic and less insane than talking to thin air, wasn't it?

Her glance fell upon the little frog currently seated on Charlotte's vanity. Seeing that she was finally giving him attention, the frog rose to his hind legs and bowed slightly as only a knight in shining armour would. "Yes, gentle lady, you know both of our names, but we have not had the pleasure of learning yours."

"Honestly, you're talking as though you had just stepped out of a history book. Or one of Shakespeare's plays. You sound much more prince-like than… him," Tiana grimaced, jabbing her thumb in the direction the invisible prince had been just a few seconds before.

"Are you claiming that this formally adopted prince who is a mere captain is more prince-like than me?" the younger male voice huffed. "Let me remind you that I am Prince Naveen, a prince by blood, and my blood is bluer than any you could possibly imagine!"

The frog on the vanity rolled his eyes. "For your information, sir, I have a little blueness in my blood too. My father's family are of Plantagenet descent and my father is the eleventh Earl of Allendale."

"Hah, I still win! I'm a born prince!"

Both Tiana and the frog rolled their eyes at this.

"Don't say you're not impressed by it, honey," Prince Naveen's voice carried on. "Every girl is impressed by me!"

"I would probably be impressed, if one, you weren't as taken with yourself as you are, and two, you were at least visible. But this way I'm certain I'm just imaginin' this whole madness," Tiana threw up her hands in defeat. "Neither of you are real. God, I sure hope no one ever finds out I'm talkin' to a frog and a ghost at the same time!"

"But that is exactly what we have tried to explain to you, fair lady," the amphibian, who was allegedly called a Captain Laurence, said plainly. "I am no frog, I am a man, and so is our invisible prince. It all comes down to some nasty magic."

"Magic?" Tiana arched an eyebrow at him. "Honestly… do you think I'm five years old?"

"No, you have too big boobs for that, you look like a grown woman," Prince Naveen opined.

The frog sighed. "Pray do not listen to him, dear lady. If he is indeed royalty, he should be ashamed of his choice of words. He talks like a common seaman."

"I might talk like a common seaman, but you, my friend, called her a whore," Naveen pointed out.

"…for which I can never excuse myself enough," Laurence bowed once again. "I fear I am a little lost in your world and unfamiliar with your customs and fashion."

"What do you mean, you're lost in… our world?" Tiana frowned.

"I am not from this world, gentle lady," Laurence replied. "Or at least… not from this age."

"Told you, honey, it's magic," said Naveen.

Tiana ignored the prince's comment. "Then… where… or when are you from?" she asked the frog, knowing that the mere question was ridiculous, but she could not help it, something deep down told her she could trust him. He seemed sincere and more gentleman-like than anyone she had ever met. He seemed so unreal that it simply had to be real.

The amphibian cleared his throat. "I am from Britain, and from about a hundred years earlier than your age. At least if what Prince Naveen has told me on our way here was true and we are currently in 1912. Are we?"

"Y…yes, sure we are. But… what do you mean by 'on our way here'?" Tiana knitted her eyebrows. "Your way from where? And why have you come here in the first place? I mean… why here of all places?"

"Why, why, because I have been invited here by Mr. La Bouff," Naveen replied matter-of-factly.

"Not exactly," Laurence said. "It was I. I wanted to find a high enough place to have a decent view of this city and your balcony seemed a perfect vantage point."

"Yeah, just because he didn't believe me that we were in New Orleans and had to find out for himself," Naveen complained.

"You cannot blame me," came the frog's reply, "everything that has so far happened seems too… unbelievable. At one moment I was sitting on my dragon's back at Waterloo, waiting for the battle to begin…"

"Wait, on your… what's back?" Tiana's eyes widened.

"My dragon, fair lady. Temeraire."

"Oh, quit the fair lady, call me Tiana," the girl waved. "But… a dragon? Are you jokin'?"

"I can assure you I am not, Miss Tiana. And I would gladly tell you everything of His Majesty's Aerial Corps if I were not in a hurry to get back. The battle cannot start without Temeraire!"

"Wait, just wait a minute!" Tiana held up a hand. "You mean, you were peacefully waitin' for the battle of Waterloo to start, when… Hey, wasn't that the battle in which Napoleon was defeated?"

"DEFEATED?!" Laurence gasped. "He was defeated? At Waterloo? Oh, thank God!" He ran a green hand across his green brow and his spindly legs trembled as though he were close to collapsing.

Tiana bit into her lower lip. "Perhaps I shouldn't have told you that…?"

"Well… perhaps," Laurence said, still somewhat shakily. "I am glad to know it, but… knowing the future can be dangerous. I would be much obliged if you did not tell me anything else of Britain's history in the next ninety-seven years."

"Dangerous?" Naveen snorted. "Honestly, if I were in your place, I'd ask the girl to tell me everything she knew!"

Laurence gave the source of the disembodied voice as stern a look as a frog could muster. "I would rather not. Knowing the future might urge some to want to stop it from happening, and it could have unforeseeable consequences."

Tiana gave the frog a little smile. "I like the way you think, Laurence. You're real wise."

"The guy must be really old to be wise," Naveen laughed. "Really, how old are you, Captain Laurence?"

The frog straightened his back. "I am forty this year. I mean… I was forty in 1815. At this year I am… one hundred and thirty-seven."

"Well, that's old enough to be wise," the prince said, only to get a scolding look from Tiana – as much as she could send someone she didn't see a scolding look.

"Well, you were fixin' to tell me how you got here," she turned back to Laurence. "Please, continue."

"As you wish," the frog nodded. "So, I was sitting on Temeraire's back, waiting for the Duke of Wellington to give us the signal to attack, and then I felt some funny, dizzying, ticklish feeling, and in the next instant I was pulled into a tunnel that practically spat me out in a room. In the next instant I was transformed into a dark-skinned man, but only for a second, I only had time to see that my hands turned darker… then the next moment I was a frog. I can tell you no more than that."

"Well, I can," Naveen added.

"I was certain you'd say that," Tiana sighed. The guy was apparently enamoured with his own voice and could not keep his mouth shut for a single second… "OK, Prince Naveen, speak!"

"So, I was peacefully sitting there in Dr. Facilier's voodoo emporium, waiting for him to turn me into a very rich man, and then boom!, someone else ran into my body and shut me out! My beautiful, precious body was taken from me, my soul was cast out of it, and then, when I tried to admire my body from outside, it was suddenly turned into this… this abomination! And I even lost my valet, Lawrence!"

"Lawrence?" Laurence and Tiana said in unison.

"Oh, damnation," Laurence cursed. "The name. It's the same."

"Do you think… it has something to do with the backfired magic?" Naveen gasped.

"Quite clearly yes," Tiana said tartly. "But perhaps this Dr. Whoever can change it back?"

"He can't," Naveen sighed. "He's dead. His own magic killed him."

"Oh. I'm sorry," Tiana bit into her lower lip. "No, I'm not sorry for him, but I'm sorry for poor Laurence."

"Only poor Laurence? And me? And me?" Naveen asked almost angrily.

"Well… perhaps. A little," Tiana shrugged. "So, if the wizard is dead, what can be done?"

"I think you should kiss him," replied the prince. "You know, like in the fairy tale…?"

"Yeah, sure," the girl rolled her eyes.

"What fairy tale?" Laurence blinked.

"Haven't you heard of the Brothers Grimm?"

"No," Laurence shook his froggy head. "Not really. There are not many libraries in Australia…"

"Australia?" Tiana frowned. "But haven't you said you were from Britain?"

"I… ah… never mind," Laurence waved and his tiny green shoulders sagged in defeat. He looked so vulnerable and pitiable that Tiana's heart went out to him. For a fleeting moment she felt an urge to gather him into her arms and give him a warm and friendly hug. Then she reminded herself that he was a frog, a slimy frog, even if he had a British nobleman's spirit trapped inside the amphibian body.

"Well, the Brothers Grimm published a fairy tale book, and one of their tales was the Frog Prince," Naveen began in his most annoying know-it-all style. "In some versions of the story a princess has to kiss the frog to transform him back into a human. Hey, why don't you ask Tiana to kiss you?"

The frog's already bulging eyes bulged even more. "Your highness, you cannot be serious…?"

"But I am! She kisses you, you turn back into a human, and hopefully I will get my body and my servant back!" Naveen explained.

"Hah, as if I would ever kiss a frog," Tiana snorted.

"But… if it turns us back…? Would you not be willing to help us, dear lady?" Laurence said, his voice even more pitiable than his appearance.

"It's Tiana, haven't I told you?" she sighed. "And don't give me that sad puppy look!"

"I am not giving you a sad puppy look," Laurence shook his head, "I expect I look more like a sad frog."

The girl crossed her arms. "All right, all right! Do tell, what do you look like in your human form? Just so that I know what to imagine while my lips touch your ugly green slimy lips…"

"It's mucus, for your information," Naveen chimed in. "Not slime, mucus."

"Whatever," Tiana waved impatiently. "So, how shall I imagine you, Laurence?"

The frog drew himself up and clasped his hands behind his back. "Well, I am quite tall with broad shoulders. My hair is blond and I wear it in a queue. My eyes are blue. Some say I am somewhat handsome…"

Naveen chortled in the background. "Not stuck-up at all, eh?"

The frog sent the invisible prince a condescending look. "Miss Tiana asked me to describe myself. I only said the truth, sir. In every respect."

"Aha, and you expect us to imagine you looking all peeeerfect," the prince drawled. "Tell us at least one of your flaws, and then we might believe you're telling the truth."

The frog's tiny hands balled into fists, then he took a deep, calming breath and carried on, "I am proud. Possibly more proud than I should be. I am stiff more often than my service requires it. And I am a goddamn sentimental romantic and have a tendency to ruin the lives of everyone I care for. Enough of my flaws, your royal highness?"

"Er… actually, I only expected you to mention a flaw in your appearance…"

"Sure, because only appearances matter to you," Tiana huffed at the source of the prince's voice. "You don't care nothin' for people's feelings, I've heard your parents disowned you because of your extravagant lifestyle… you're a leech on society, Prince Naveen, and you should feel ashamed of yourself!"

For a long moment silence hung in the air – probably Naveen was feeling ashamed, or probably he was searching for a proper retort. Eventually it was Laurence who spoke up, "Well, my back is not exactly pleasant to look at. I was once flogged in Africa."

"In Africa?" Tiana gasped. She could not help but think of all those poor Africans who had been transported to America to be slaves, flogged and tortured in every possible way… At that moment her heart went out to Laurence even more than before. "But… why?" she asked.

"Because I loved my country too much," Laurence replied darkly, and there was something in his eyes – something secretive and something sadder than anything Tiana had ever seen in a man, let alone in a frog.

"Well, I will help you then, so that you can go back to Waterloo and help your country," she said, forcing her voice to sound determined although she felt too touched to be determined. "Come on, pucker up."

A relieved and grateful smile spread on Laurence's green face and he obeyed without a word. As she leaned closer, Tiana closed her eyes, trying to imagine the tall, handsome, blond man who not only spoke but also looked like someone who had just stepped out of a romance novel. Strangely even in her imagination, there was some sadness glinting in his eyes.

Their lips touched, and Tiana felt caught up in a whirlwind that she believed to be the magic turning Laurence back into Laurence and giving Naveen his body and his valet back.

Then she opened her eyes.

She was blinking at Charlotte's vanity, only from a wholly new perspective – the piece of furniture seemed so very tall and Laurence, still in his amphibian form, was blinking back down at her.

"What are you doin' up there, and why am I…?" she began, but as soon as her eyes fell upon a mirror, the words froze in her throat. From the mirror a pretty little female frog was looking back at her – as much as a frog could be called pretty. She was definitely prettier than Laurence, but… she was a frog!

Tiana screamed like she had never screamed before, and turned her back on the mirror, hopping, hopping away from it, her heart racing frantically, her mind completely shut down, all she still knew was that she had to flee from this whole nightmare…

...and she hopped over the balustrade. Problem was, there was only bottomless abyss beneath it.

oOo

A/N: chapter two coming soon. Until then, please, leave a review! :)