My first Sleeping Beauty fic; I don't own the story, Disney does. Disney also owns the movie Maleficent which is slightly mentioned in this one-shot.
Please let me know what you think.
Just …Getting out.
It was disappointing, she had half expected the guards in the castle to be prepared for anything tonight despite her knowledge to the contrary; she had that expectation that they would somehow realise she was going to escape, and given how effortlessly Maleficient had put the kingdom to sleep they should be more alert, but since she had been planning and watching the guards carefully for the last fortnight it had been easy to pick up the habits of some of the guards.
Four of them liked to chat in the courtyard, two of them either slept out of sheer boredom or suffering from partial hangovers by the gates. It wasn't hard for the ex-Princess to figure out a way to escape and to be honest she would be overjoyed to just leave the kingdom behind.
It had been a year since Maleficient had been defeated on her 16th birthday.
A year since she had learnt the truth about who she really was. A year when she discovered the threat the fairy Maleficent posed to her life, simply because her idiot parents hadn't invited the woman to the castle, but what she would have done if she had she could not tell nor did she care.
A year when her life went upside down. A year since she had discovered she had been lied to, from the moment she had learnt how to walk, to talk, and how to act like a girl. A year since she discovered she was not the person she had thought she was.
And she hated it.
At the age of 17, she had discovered more lies and half-truths about herself to wonder if there was anything about herself she could think was a truth. But she doubted it.
Why had the fairies moved her just to the forest? Why hadn't they just moved much further away, especially since they had the power? If they had done that, there was a chance they would not have seen the point in calling her a different name, thereby softening the lies that followed. In the past year, the soon to be ex princess of the kingdom had started to have enough of it all. She hated how her life was just one great big lie after another. She hated how the relationship that she had with the animals of the forest only came about because of the fairies' spells, which were gifted to her when she was a baby and made her wonder if she even had a gift she'd inherited from her parents, but if she did then she didn't know what they were, but if she were honest she was long since past caring.
The discovery that the fairies had given her such gifts had offended her, especially since she had come to resent her new life where the peaceful routine where she would freely visit the forest and be with her friends, the animals like the birds and the rabbits and hedgehogs were replaced by the duties of a princess.
She hated the way the fairies had lied to her for so many years, it might have been for her protection but she doubted the evil fairy who was after she was prepared to harm her after casting that curse on her in the Great Hall in the castle, but did they really expect her to stop thinking of herself as 'Briar Rose' all of a sudden and be happy about it?
But she just wanted to get away from the castle for good. She wanted to get away and make a new life for herself, especially after seeing how much of a self-centred, arrogant pig Prince Philip was, and how she didn't even know her own parents. Oh, they'd both mutually tried, but they did not know each other. But what she hated the most was how everyone called her "Your Highness," "Princess Aurora," "Aurora," and they expected her to just adapt so quickly. She remembered when the fairies confronted her shortly after she met Philip (she still couldn't believe she had been interested in him and thought it to be love, and she wasn't sure what it was which brought her out of her enchanted sleep, but she was convinced it was infatuation not love) and they expected her to just accept everything without a warning.
Aurora.
Briar Rose.
Oh, how she hated both of those names; she might prefer the latter to the former, seeing as she'd grown up with the name, but it was just another lie in her mind.
All of her life, she had thought she was nothing more than a simple peasant girl, living in the woods with her three kind but weird aunts, only to discover she was the Princess Aurora, the daughter and heiress of King Stefan. Even in the woods, despite the fairies efforts in case she got it in her head she might be the long-lost princess, she had known the girl was threatened at a young age and vanished without a trace.
The discovery she was Princess Aurora was a blow, especially since the fairies told her she was betrothed to a Prince, and she would have to throw away the infatuation she felt for Philip away. The way they'd said it was so cold-hearted, so cruel, she had cried at the thought not only was her life a lie, her name was, and her heart's choice would be overridden by a duty she had never experienced. When she discovered Philip was the Prince, she had been happy and she'd felt overjoyed they would be living together as husband and wife.
But it went wrong. When she got to know Philip over the course of the year while she was forced to learn royal duties, she realised the man she loved was not the wonderful person she had assumed him to be. He was a pig. His father was even worse. She also could not stand how her father treated her like an unruly child whenever she wanted to try to live her life, but that was nothing compared to the knowledge she knew how much of a charlatan he was, and her mother was a weak-willed woman who refused to get involved.
Suddenly she had seen the future if she remained in the kingdom.
One day Philip would be King, and she would be the Queen, but she would never be allowed to be the person she wanted. She would be a trophy, expected to pop out babies at her husband's discretion and everyone expected her to like and take it. Every day if she stayed, she would be forced to keep quiet, to look beautiful, to bear children for a man she had come to despise. She did not want to live like that. Ever.
Only one person had never lied to her.
Maleficent.
Ironic, wasn't it?
During the trance which led her to the spinning wheel, she had been unable to speak while the fairies bickered outside and failed to notice anything was wrong until it was too late - thanks for that, next time someone asks for protection don't offer it - but she could speak in her mind and she had panicked, cried out.
Maleficent had answered her calls; the Dark Fairy had been strangely apologetic about what was going on, but satisfied at the same time; she was sorry about causing undue pain despite the atrocities she had committed in the past, but she had a professional attitude the soon to be ex princess could appreciate. Maleficent had told her why she was trying to kill her. It was just business. She had learnt King Stefan had betrayed the Dark Fairy, stealing her wings and causing her trauma; the Fairy was killing her to make him pay for what he had done.
Despite being forced to hide because of Maleficent, the Princess felt more respect for her than anyone else. The Dark Fairy had never lied to her and she had known it.
She was almost out of the castle now; in another few minutes, if she was lucky and if she was silent enough thanks to her flat heels and slow and carefully measured stride, the guards wouldn't be alerted to her presence. They might be drunk by now, asleep, but she knew one noise would wake them up. As she approached, she grinned when she saw they were pretty much asleep, but she took her time as she walked by them. When she was sure they hadn't noticed her, the Princess didn't bother increasing her pace. She knew if she ran, someone was bound to hear her. When she arrived in the town she found a stable. Walking inside she saddled one of the horses calmly, and she led it gently out of the stables where she took a look around but there was no one in sight. Getting the horse to remain still, the Princess clambered up onto the animal's back and they trotted out of the town, past the walls. Once she was a good distance away, the former Princess urged the horse to go faster, increasing speed with every moment.
She had no idea where she was going, but as far as she was concerned as long as she never saw this Kingdom again she would be happy. Princess Aurora and Briar Rose didn't exist, she didn't want to know Philip, Stefan or her mother, and most of all she did not want to be within 200 miles of anyone who did.
Author's Note - If you would like to contribute to funding my writing, please visit the Stargate Time Traveller on Pa-treon.