Chapter Two

True Love's Kiss

Over the following weeks, Prince Alfred learnt a lot about the mysterious, wish-granting princess. Not all of it made sense, a lot of it was fairly contradictory, and none of it came from a source that was particularly reliable. "A friend of a friend said…", "Farmer Giles' cousin heard…", "Well, my aunt's neighbour's milkmaid told him…"

The main problem wasn't where the princess could be found – all reports of the tower where she lived were fairly similar, so Alfred had a firm direction in mind for his quest.

The problem wasn't even the fact that nobody could tell him the princess' name.

The real issue was that he heard such different accounts about how to get his wish from her.

Some people said it was as simple as the old rescue routine (although, nobody could quite agree on what she had to be rescued from). The princess would be so grateful she'd grant your wish then and there. Other accounts said you had to rescue and marry the princess, because she would only offer a wish to her husband.

But most worrying of all – for Alfred, at least – was the story he heard telling that the princess would only grant a wish to her true love. Which meant a rescue, and then…true love's kiss.

Now, Alfred had nothing against falling in love at first sight. In fact, in this case, it seemed the least he could do in return for a wish being granted. Besides that, it was something he'd read about in the fairy tales that had inspired him, and something he'd wanted for a long time – whether it came from rescuing a damsel on a quest or at a ball back at the American palace. But, well, circumstances being what they were, Alfred was going to find that particular task a little bit difficult on this adventure. What with the curse and all.

Luckily, Alfred was a 'living-in-the-moment' sort of person, so although the true love's kiss might cause some trouble for him down the road, he was happy to journey as much as he could, and deal with it when the time came.

So over the following weeks, Alfred kept travelling, learning more about the magic princess and enjoying his quest outside the kingdom more and more each day.

And over the following weeks Prince Alfred met Prince Arthur again.

Often.

Alfred had taken to keeping his own crown safe inside Hero's saddlebags, just in case Prince Arthur showed up to return the favour of sending him on a muddy side quest. So the next time the two princes ran into each other, Alfred felt confident that Arthur wouldn't have any opportunity to hold him back.

Unfortunately, Alfred had picked on the wrong prince; Arthur knew how to hold a grudge, and pay it back tenfold.

"Oh, Prince Alfred!" a singsong voice called through the quiet, green woods.

Alfred turned in the saddle and saw Prince Arthur riding up behind him. He tensed, gripped Hero's reins tighter and prepared to gallop off at any second.

"Good morning to you, Your Highness," smiled Arthur.

"Uh…morning?" Alfred greeted, completely bewildered and uneasy. He didn't trust that smile at all. And he knew that Arthur knew he didn't trust that smile (nobody would be foolish enough to expect the English prince to have forgiven and forgotten a prank like that), so he might as well just be blunt. "What's up with the smile?"

"I'm just so happy I caught up with you. Now I get to give you this."

He reached into the pockets of his fancy white coat and Alfred automatically flinched. Arthur noticed out of the corner of his eye, and smirked, before pulling out a…was that a chocolate-covered carrot?

"Um…" Alfred watched as Arthur brushed some dirt off the carrot, and inspected it closely – all for effect, of course, and to screw with Alfred's mind. "Whatcha got there, Artie?"

The nickname (a spur of the moment idea) paid off. The Englishman's hefty eyebrow twitched in anger, but he recovered quickly. This was his payback moment, and he would not let Alfred get to him again.

"Oh, dear," Arthur sniggered. "The American kingdom's education system is worse than I thought."

"I know it's a carrot," Alfred snapped. "I meant, what are you going to do with it? Giving me vegetables is supposed to pay me back for – "

"Who ever said it was for you, Your Royal Highness?"

Alfred frowned in confusion, and it took a good few moments of Arthur waving the carrot back and forth in front of his face before he realised Hero was practically shaking beneath him. Suddenly, his eyes widened in realisation and h glanced from the carrot to Hero.

Hero, his faithful steed, was staring hungrily at the carrot, head swaying back and forth in time with the carrot as Arthur waved it in the air. His tail was wagging, his legs jittering, and tongue hanging out of his mouth as he drooled.

"I heard from the American people that your horse is a strange one. He acts almost like a dog sometimes, and he just loves to play fetch. Almost as much as he loves chocolate covered carrots."

By the time Alfred realised what was going to happen, it was too late. Arthur had thrown the carrot high into the air, over the trees of the forest and tumbling through the leafy canopy somewhere unseen in the distance. For such a petite looking guy, Arthur had a ridiculously good arm.

That asshole, was all Alfred had time to think. And then Hero was hurtling into the forest, crashing through the underbrush with Alfred barely managing to hang on and dodge the low hanging branches and trees that rushed past.

He wasn't sure, but he thought he caught a glimpse of Arthur smiling and waving as he rocketed past. For Arthur's sake, he'd better not have seen that, or the English prince was really going to pay…

Several hours later found Hero bouncing around the base of a tree, watching Alfred clamber up to retrieve the carrot from the branches above. The stallion had refused to continue the quest until he'd eaten that carrot.

And Alfred decided it didn't actually matter if Arthur had cruelly waved or not.

It was on.