The Three Lights: The One True Threesome

Sangria, the quietest of the three maids who always hid behind her thick-rimmed glasses, had tucked herself away in the castle's attic. She was sure no one would find her there.

She was wrong.

"Sangri~iiiiiiia!?"

Her quill nearly snapped in half as she looked up in surprise as the attic door creaked open and two heads popped up.

"What are you two doing?" Sangria asked as she desperately tried to hide the papers in her hands from view. Of course the flurry of activity was only more suspicious drawing her fellow maids, Doria and Lazania, to her side.

"Looking for you of course," Lazania explained. "You don't expect us to clean the kitchen alone do you? Dorcas came in to help clean the flue and now it is a sooty mess. And if that wasn't bad enough, Lord von Bielefeld used the dough for tonight's rolls as ammunition against his Majesty."

"The soot is all covered in flour now," Doria chimed in bleakly.

"Oh, a lover's quarrel?" Sangria asked, a little starry-eyed at the prospect.

"Well, he did call his Majesty a cheater again," Lazania admitted as she made her way next to their wayward companion. Doria followed her lead, flanking the other girl in case she tried to run.

But Sangria wasn't paying any attention. "Do you think Lord von Bielefeld was jealous of his Majesty's friend, the great sage?"

"I think Sir Weller is more likely," said Doria.

"I think it was Lady Gisela," Lazania said matter-of-factly, garnering curious looks from the other two. "I think they are cute together," she defended.

"Well, I hope it was the great sage. The three of them make such a handsome pair," Sangria said in a sing-song voice.

"Three people is one too many for a pair," Lazania argued.

Sangria clutched her papers to her chest and proclaimed, "Love doesn't understand math! They are my one true threesome!"

Doria and Lazania gasped in unison and then shared a look before their sneaky hands grabbed for the suspicious papers. Sangria was so startled that she released them easily, sending the other two women tumbling back, each holding a few pages with a few others scattered around the floor.

Lazania quickly looked at the page she was holding and read a passage aloud.

"Prince Firelight's trembling hand outstretched to touch King Sunlight's ebony tresses, causing the young sovereign to purr with unbridled pleasure even as he shifted to touch his advisor, Moonlight's heaving chest."

"Give those back," shouted the normally timid Sangria.

"Oh, it's a naughty story!" Doria cried out in a mixture of embarrassment and delight. "Who is it about?"

Lazania and Sangria stopped struggling over the papers to slowly turn toward the other girl. "You can't tell?"

"I don't know anyone with names like those. Are they from the human lands?" Doria asked innocently.

Sangria released the papers again and sank back. "No, Doria. I made the names up in case the story fell into the wrong hands."

"It's about Lord von Bielefeld, his Majesty, and his Excellency," Lazania explained. "And it is a good thing it fell into the right hands. We need to read this right away, so that if anything happens we'll be prepared." She nodded resolutely at her decision.

Lazania, the ring-leader, shuffled the papers she was holding until she found what looked like the beginning.

"His Excellency, Moonlight, always claimed to be just an average schoolboy. But he was anything but average. There was no one more cunning, clever, or devilishly handsome in those extremely sexy glasses that everyone in the kingdom loved. "

Lazania paused and lifted a single eyebrow at the author. Sangria didn't make eye contact. She just pushed her own frames further back on her nose and cleared her throat.

"Prince Firelight had the ability to raise people from the dead with his sizzling good looks. He could also burn someone with a single glance if you got on the wrong side of his hot-headed temperament or make you melt if he warmed to you."

The puns were almost too much, but as soon as Lazania looked as if she were about to put the document down, Doria, scooted closer with an eager expression. "Go on, go on!"

Lazania relented, lifting the page to continue.

"But it was King Sunlight who was the most beloved and sought after bachelor in all the land. His generous spirit and boyish charms garnered the attentions of countless suitors. But he had chosen his own true love for himself. He had known that Prince Firelight was his from the moment they met, so he had struck the traditional engagement.

"They might have been very happy at that, but the story couldn't end there. The King's heart was too big and his bed was too wide. He needed to fill them both and one devastatingly beautiful blond was not enough."

Doria pouted. "Why do you keep stopping?"

"I just think it is a little over-the-top. They would never act this way," Lazania explained.

Sangria quickly came to her own defense. "What does reality have to do with anything? I'm putting it right. This is what should happen! Keep going, you'll see!"

Lazania didn't look convinced, but realistic or not, it was entertaining, so she continued.

"It was not long before his Excellency, Moonlight, joined the royal duo in matters of state and those a little closer to home.

"'Hold still, Sunlight, I want to please you the way you have pleased your people with peace and goodness and always cleaning up after yourself so the maids have less needless work to do except I want to please you with my tongue,' said the impetuous Firelight as his fiancé wiggled beneath him.

"'And while he makes you burn with desire, I will read you a poem I wrote about your beauty.'"

"A poem?" Lazania asked incredulously.

Sangria folded her hands together and tilted her head to rest on them. "He's so romantic," she swooned. "I wish he were here right now."

Almost as if on cue, the three maids heard approaching footsteps.

"I'm telling you, Murata, I heard voices."

"It's usually a bad sign when you start hearing voices, Shibuya."

"Stop fooling around, you two and stay back. They could be dangerous for a wimpy king."

When the three boys entered the room they found three maids all busily dusting the unused attic. One was using her own apron and another was using a bundle of papers and the third was just blowing on the dust and coughing each time.

The three boys exchanged looks and then turned around to leave. "Girls are strange," Wolfram said when they weren't quite out of earshot of the girls in question.

Sangria, who had been white as a sheet only a moment ago, was now jublient. "You see! You see!? It's true love."

Lazania just shook her head. "I don't know how you can believe in that kind of thing."

"Does that mean you don't want to read anymore of the story," Doria asked with disappointment clearly sounding in her voice.

"I didn't say that. Let's just skip to the good stuff. The kitchen can wait a little longer."