Hello again, folks! I'm back with round two of this sordid affair. Or at least I wish it was a sordid affair. I'll keep doing this only if you people are nice to me and give me reviews. Authors don't run off air, y'know. We run off candy, romance novels, and reviews. Shhh! You're not actually supposed to know that.

I'm also holding Mendanbar hostage until I see some nice fluff in this category. Particularly Cimorene and Mendanbar fluff. PLEASE?

Chapter 2: Messengers, Beds, and Trash Cans, -or- Rude Awakenings

Mendanbar awoke with a groan. He had an enormous headache, and his heartbeat sounded like a sledgehammer in his head. Quite probably the cider had fermented, and he was suffering from a hangover, he mused. He considered just calling in sick, and push off getting out of bed. He didn't even know if he could call in sick. He'd ask Cimorene when she woke up. Right now he didn't want to deal with a cranky Queen, or anything at that matter.
It was then that he found that the pounding wasn't his head, but the door. Grumbling about shoving a certain elf down the laundry chute, Mendanbar untangled himself from the sheets and his wife to see why someone was bothering to wake him up far too early in the morning.
Willian indeed stood on the other side of the door, trying not to back up in fright at the sight of the King of the Enchanted Forest wearing a robe and large scowl. "Your Majesty, I hate to wake you at such an early hour, but there is a messenger here who won't give his message to anyone but you."
Mendanbar's scowl didn't lessen in the least. "You did inform him that it's barely dawn, and most sensible people are asleep at this point of the day, correct?"
Willian nodded. "He, ah, told me off, to put it bluntly, Your Majesty." Willian was obviously still in shock from such rude behavior. "He said he was contracted to get it here as fast as possible, not to wait courteously while...ah..." The elf looked torn over whether to state the exact truth, or stay on good side of the King's temperament.
"Spit it out Willian. He said it, not you." Mendanbar lifted his head as Cimorene shuffled out of bed to stand next to him.
"Tell him shove the stupid message where the sun don't shine." She muttered and put her head on her husband's shoulder.
"Well...he, ah, I think his exact words were, 'I'm not paid to stand around while some ninny bonks his wife, shorty'...Sir I tried to tell-"
Mendanbar cut him off with a slice of his hand. "I'm going to give this idiot a piece of my mind." With that he stomped down the hallway toward the main hall. "And then I'm coming back and do just what he thinks I was doing."
Willian blinked, and Cimorene blushed as a smile spread across her face.

The messenger stood in the main hallway, his face contorted into a sneer and dressed in the most absurd clothing Mendanbar had ever seen. Whatever little reservations Mendanbar had on hating the man were tossed out the window. Mendanbar wondered if he'd start an international incident if he stuffed the messenger into the trash can in the kitchen.
He realized that he had forgotten a crown, and quickly pulled at the magic of the Enchanted forest to transport one from his study. He stuck it on his head, and pulled the robe tighter around him. He forgot how chilly the castle could get in the morning. Although there was never any sort of fall in the Enchanted Forest, the Frost Giants always brought cold weather and sometimes snow, making an odd winter for the country.
He snapped back into focus. He still had to deal with the god-awful man who had gotten out of his warm bed in the first place. "Can I help you?" He semi-snarled as he walked into the hallway.
"Yeah, you can wake your damned...king...uh-oh..." The messenger's bravado slipped when he noticed the crown situated on Mendanbar's head. He bowed very low, and extended a package out to the King. "I bring you a message from King of Eldanberg. He requested that you were the person I was to give it to, and no one else."
Mendanbar looked at the package. He could tell that it indeed an enchanted object, but there were no signs of malevolent magic. It wasn't a curse or a cursed object, and it certainly seemed important. Just in case, he threw up a shield and took the package delicately. He opened it very slowly, and found inside a bright silver mirror.
With a big flash of light, the mirror's surface swirled. A pompous looking young man in equally pompous looking clothing appeared. Small writing at the bottom declared this to be a prerecorded message. "Dear King of the Enchanted Forest, I wish to congratulate you on your recent marriage to the beautiful princess Cimorene. Unfortunately, I must be the bearer of bad news so soon after such a joyous event.
I'm afraid I must declare war on you, King Mendanbar of the Enchanted Forest."

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*Start playing ominous music...the Princess Mononoke soundtrack does nicely*