- Roused
- Chapter 050
~ I'm Here For You; I'll Live For You -
The princes finally get to the castle and they would have a love song together, if I knew how to write songs worth anything.
The kings meet the princes in the courtyard, where men in conical helmets and pikes are beginning to assemble, and a few Coronaian guards, are getting ready with them.
"Good work coming so quickly, there is a new problem. The princesses were attacked by goons in the forest." Said King Stefan.
"What?" they said together.
"We swept the forest just yesterday, where did they come from?" said Prince Phillip.
"Well, wherever they came from, you need to find out what happened. The princesses made it back, but the guards and the maid are still missing."
Eugene's face hardened.
"A few reinforcements have arrived and are being organized. It will take a little while. We'll take care of that." King Stefan said.
Stefan's face softened, "Go up to your princesses, they are in the tower room where you woke Aurora, give them courage and hope. They are in bad shape. Help them live."
The father's had carried their little girls up to the one room they were desperately hoping would be comforting to Aurora to be in. They had stayed for a little while as their little girls lay unconscious, but there was that stupid war with the goons to deal with. Stefan was already thinking of how to split and delegate tasks so Leonard and himself could spend as much time as possible with their daughters but they had to get people and processes in place first.
This annoying war was getting in the way of him being with his daughter. It wasn't supposed to be like this.
Prince Phillip and Eugene share a look and race for the tower.
"Aurora, are you alright?" asked Prince Phillip, breathing hard, as he crashed to his knees next to his beloved's bed, his muddy plate armor scraping the floor. His face unshaven and hair tousled; his steel gauntlets clattering as they hit the floor.
He desperately wanted to hug her to him, to hold her tight, but the terrible vulnerableness he saw in her, and his armor, restrained him, since he did not want to hurt any further his already terribly hurt true love. Taking her soft, limp hand in his strong, callused one, while moving a stray curl of blonde hair from her forehead.
"Rapunzel, you're my new dream," said Prince Eugene, their alternative to I love you, as he sat next to his new dream. His boots still muddy, his face stubbled with whiskers, his breathe coming in pants, his breastplate scratched and dirty. He thought it was obvious what condition they were in. While gently running his hand through her brown hair, kissing her forehead and taking her hand in his.
King Stefan had told them to go to their princesses. They needed their true loves so that they may have the will to live. The princes had run up the stairs to be by their beloved's sides, caring not a whit for the climb.
Aurora and Rapunzel lay grey and exhausted on their beds. Aurora's long sunshine gold hair spilling beautifully, but sweat-soaked, over her purple embroidered white pillow. Rapunzel's short brown hair was spiky from sweat; Pascal, in a anxious mauve, on the pillow by her shoulder.
They had finished eating not long before, some more of the vegetable soup. Their mothers had mashed it so it was easier to eat. The maids were cleaning up and the Queens were sitting quietly in the corner, chaperoning this meeting.
The girls had been so hungry, but it had taken so much effort to eat, they were shaking with exhaustion. They looked so vulnerable, their faces pale, their hair matted from sweat, their limp bodies starkly outlined by the sheets, looking so small, but their feet look huge from the poultices and bandages.
The princes could only look into the eyes of their princesses, holding their hands, loving them. They were there for their true loves, they knew they would have to leave again, but for now, right now, there was nothing else in the universe, but the ones they loved most.
They were here for them.
The smiles the princesses gave their princes, and the slight pressure from their hands, was all the answer they could and needed to give. All the depths of their souls were revealed in their eyes to their princes. For their true loves they were able to smile through the throbbing of their joints and the burning of their feet. They were alive and with their true loves, what more could they ask for? For their true loves they would live, for their princes they would stay in this world of tears. And with their princes beside them, the pain was bearable.
They would live for them.
They spent the minutes, or was it hours? Looking, just looking, into each other's eyes, speaking in a language other then words. The silence quickly passed uncomfortable and then embarrassing; it soon reached awe-inspiring and finally stopped in humbling.
The sheer amount of love they emitted was staggering. Queen Leah had tears streaming down her face and Queen Rebecca was holding her hand tightly, her tears soaking her kerchief.
The blonde maid had long ago fled, weeping. She was curled up in a tearful ball in the corner of the improvised kitchen being comforted by the rest of the staff, rocking back and forth chanting in French 'It's so beautiful,' staggered by the love she had felt, wishing with all her heart she could have it too someday.
The shadows moved across the floor and all too soon the brunette maid came up the stairs with the message they had received and paused, she could feel what was happening in the room, she now knew what her sister had meant, and it was stunning, "Um, your Highnesses, the men are ready for you now."
The princes leaned down and gave a kiss to their princesses, rose, bowed to the queens and followed the maid to meet with the kings and take command of these men to find out what had happened to their princesses.
And when their princes had left, the princesses slept, with smiles on their faces.
- End of Chapter 050
Author's Note: This is supposed to be a beautiful and tender scene. At least it is in my head. It really needs a love song to go with it.
Am I asking for the impossible here? There is a love song to go with this scene, and it's a love quartet? Are there any love quartets? But it wants to be the most powerful love song ever. It should be the kind of song patients dying in hospitals would use to stay alive until their family can come from anywhere on the planet. Teenaged-girls will be wishing to be in a terrible accident so their boyfriends can come comfort them like this.
