27. Prologue

Stories hold incredible power. Legends, fables, even idle gossip—bending ears, expanding worlds.

Except the scraps gleaned don't always match memories.

Riots. Theft. Street rats. Trapped by circumstance, tempered by ignorance. A near-perfect cage. Not unlike palace walls.

With the Queen's death, grief was its own prison; fear, another—and freedom a luxury not even a princess could afford.

Then came the suitors—a smaller, foreign cage...

That fear overrides all else, heralding truths no one dares voice:

The best cages are self-made. Time begets courage. And stories are only as powerful as their teller.

My story begins now.


A/N: This is it, guys. Twenty-seven chapters, twenty-seven years from the original animated film to the live-action reboot. I always imagined this as the final chapter to the collection because it circles back to the original question posed in the summary: venturing outside the palace walls was probably the first time Jasmine truly seized control of her fate. I'm sure there's many other memorable moments spanning Jasmine's life, but for now her story rests here. Thanks for reading!