So here I am, sitting in a throne room, surrounded by finery and jewels and riches, and I supposed to marry a prince who is stupid enough to marry a girl because her foot fit into some glass shoe.

Well, aren't I lucky.


IF THE SHOE FITS


Seriously, who even makes shoes out of glass?

It's a waste of money, and uncomfortable as hell. Plus, if you have ugly feet, it's just rubbing salt in the wound.

That is, if your foot even fits in the first place.

Now, on to the prince. Real genius. Note the sarcasm. He didn't bother to ask if I'd been to the ball, didn't ask for a name, or an address, didn't question my apparent change in hair color, didn't ask anything at all. Never bothered to listen to my voice, never bothered to listen to the girl chasing after the carriage that carried me away, never bothered to even ask if I wanted to marry him.

Cinderella is lucky that they missed her.

I, on the other hand, am stuck here, with an idiotic, desperate-to-be-married pretty boy, and my next-door-neighbor is probably suffering from a broken heart.

I'm suffering from boredom. Cinderella is lucky.

Call me cynical, but Cinderella has had it better than me. Not that I mind much at all, she and I are made of different personalities and attitudes. She'd die of horror and starvation if she were me. I'd commit suicide if I were her.

The first thing you should know about us, is that Cinderella's real name is Hinata. Her Ugly Stepsisters, Sakura and Ino, are quite pretty, and while they have some unsavory bits, like all people, they also have some redeeming qualities. The Cruel Stepmother is a tough woman named Tsunade who isn't cruel, who simply wishes the best for her daughters and believes she is doing the right thing in regards to stranger-phobic Hinata.

Hinata has a cousin and a younger sister who live with a family friend, Kurenai, and her husband, Asuma.

Neji, her cousin, wrote a book about Hinata's life during the first year of their separation. He dramatized and exaggerated, and the result was enough money to take them all away from the city slums and into a life of finery. Neji, Hinata, Kurenai, Asuma, and Hanabi could move from the poor urban outskirts of the neighboring kingdom into a prosperous, central area.

But unlike Neji's book, life doesn't happen that coincidentally.

They knew years in advance when Prince Naruto would hold his ball. It would be on his seventeenth birthday, as per tradition, and if a young woman did not know the Prince's birthday, it was assumed that she would never marry.

A few months after Hiashi—Hinata and Hanabi's father as well as Neji's caretaker—died, Kurenai and Asuma came to take them away to their village across the boundaries of the kingdom. However, Hinata wanted to stay until the ball.

A year later, Neji created a story out of he and Hinata's correspondence.

Then he became Hinata's "Fairy Godmother", using money from the book to purchase her a ball gown and glass slippers for her dainty feet.

The ball came and went, and Tsunade thoughtfully kept Hinata away from the press and media, away from the overwhelming qualities of noble company. It probably didn't help Hinata's case that Tsunade was afraid, and genuinely believed that Hinata was worthy of the shoe.

My caretaker did no such thing.

Anko took one look at the procession and snorted.

"We'll not have them ruin you and degrade you with silly dances and ridiculous frills."

She believed the shoe wasn't worthy of me.

And that was that.

I went out to market, taking advantage of the empty streets to barter with merchants who had had no business the whole day.

On the way back, I bumped—quite literally—into a courier who took one look at the feet he'd nearly tramped on before dragging me with him, paying no heed to my groceries.

I went with him out of curiosity, and learned that, obviously, the Prince had read Neji's book, but not quite well enough; the next thing I knew, I was bundled up in a carriage, watching Anko and Tsunade bet on how long it'd take for me to escape. I was sitting next to the Prince I was supposed to marry, a Prince who was more interested in his rival, Duke Sasuke, than his bride-to-be. I turned once more to see poor heartbroken Hinata calling after the wagon, running on the dainty little feet that allowed her to walk on the death traps that fit onto my feet but did not fit my feet.

Not like the thick-soled leather boots I'd been wanting.

And now here I am, biding my time for the perfect moment to escape, because, really, as entertaining as it is to watch Prince Naruto's rivalry with Duke Sasuke, I'd much rather be in the woods, skinning a rabbit or hunting a deer for dinner.

Did I mention?

I came into the Prince's company in blood stained trousers and a boy's shirt. The courier only knew I was a girl because he knocked off my hat in the collision and my hair tumbled down with it.

And finally, I see my chance.

Off comes the dress my ladies-in-waiting fussed over. They took nearly two hours to put it on me "just right", and fifteen minutes later, I had it off, put on pants and a tunic, and hooked myself back into the dress that was supposedly "impossible" to deal with alone.

The heels I kick off, and I reach instead for a pair of boots I hid under the large hoopskirt of the ball gown. Tucked into my belt is a small hunting knife, and I embed it deeply into the solid oak table with a resounding thud.

Every eye in the court turns as I pick up one of the few whole apples and slice it in two with a crisp noise. Then I toss one half into the air and lob a dinner knife straight into its center, sending it bulls-eye into the target Prince Naruto and Duke Sasuke have been battling to hit with arrows, a type of weaponry neither has utilized before.

I yank my hunting knife out of the table and take a bite from the remaining half of the apple, chew, swallow, and grin.

"I'll be leaving now."

And no one gathers their wits fast enough to follow me.

Maybe Hinata will get her chance after all, because it seems Prince Naruto has a newfound interest in girls.

I smile again, taking another bite from the shiny green apple, because everyone knows you never eat the red ones raw.

The sour tang of the juice settles onto my tongue and I breathe in the familiar smell of forest.

They'll have a hell of a time forgetting Tenten the huntress, the other girl who fit into Cinderella's glass slipper.


A/N: So, this was an idea of Quicquidlibet's, but she's got way too many projects, way too little time, and I was running low on inspiration SO I borrowed an idea she's given up, and this is the result!