title: A twisted fairytale

author: ^little_faery^

A/N: This is a very bad story. It tells about a prince, a princess and a dragon, as said in the summary. Although I think it's total rubbish, please read and review.

Once upon a time, in a kingdom far from here, lived an old king. He was about to come to his end, 'cause he was very old, and he had a long white beard. This king, called Ferdinand, had only one son, but this boy was, to the grief of the old man, captured by a dragon. The sort of dragon that usually imprisoned princesses, and got slaughtered by princes, who would get the hand of the saved princess and half of the kingdom. In this case, however, the dragon had made a mistake, and he had captured a prince.

King Ferdinand asked the brave knights of his kingdom to save his son, but all of them returned empty-handed, or didn't return at all. When he'd run out of brave men in his own country, he send letters to all kings he knew, to send their princes and knights to fight the dragon to rescue the prince. A few of the befriended heads of states answered the letter, and send out their knights, but they didn't manage to free the poor guy. Most of the royal ones the letters were sent to, didn't even bother to tell Ferdinand they were not sending anyone. There were so many requests for brave men to destroy a dragon or another evil creature; they couldn't help everyone. Time passed on, and after two years the prince had not returned to his father's castle. The king died, and got replaced by the evil uncle.

In a kingdom nearby lived another king happily with his wife and their daughter. She was their only child, so they were very protective over her. Not that they spend much attention to her, they just made sure she had everything she wished. Once she walked in the hall with all the portraits with pictures of the befriended royal families. She asked one of her servants: 'Who is that handsome young man, on that picture with the white bearded fellow?'

'That's the son of King Ferdinand, the old king of our neighbour kingdom. But it is said the young heir has been captured by a dragon two years ago, and no one has heard anything from him ever since. Many have tried, but no men could free him. And as you know, there is a new king now, he stands on the portrait over there.'

The princess didn't even hear the servant's last words, and she said to herself: 'I see. No men, right . . . .'

And she left for her bedroom. She had felt bored for the most time of her life. Nothing happened, because she was so well protected from everything by her parents. Now there was a chance to do something adventurous. If that prince could not be rescued by another prince, a princess had to be able to do it. If fairytales always mentioned the princesses being rescued by princes, it should, of course, work the other way around too.

The same night she left. She took one of the swords, which hung on her wall as decoration, and she wore a wider skirt than usual, with a shirt she stole from the clothesline were the clothes from the servants hung to dry. The horse she took, was her own, a calm mare. Although she always said she preferred the black stallion of her dad, she was very happy with her own horse; aggressive, big, warhorses always scared her a little.

The first day of her journey went fine. She rode on and on, till she came near the mountains, and just when she thought: how can I ever pass those big rocky . . . things, she saw a big green, ugly dragon flying above her head. He flew into the direction of the forest she had just gone through. This disappointed her a little, now she had to go back. . . But then she thought: now I at least know were I have to search for his hiding place.

So she went back into the forest. After a little hour she was back at the crossing she had passed earlier. She decided to turn left this time. After another hour of riding (including a 'little' stop for lunch), she saw a tower rising up in front of her. There were no windows in it at all. She was glad with that, 'cause if there were, she might have had to wait till the prince's hair had grown long enough for her too use it to climb to the highest chamber.

There was one little door. She opened it, and was knocked backwards by the stench of the half rotten steaks. Steaks? she thought, but when she looked better she saw it were the roasted leftovers of the brave knights who hadn't made it.

(note of the dragon: he really liked the canned meat)

Silently, she went up the spiral staircase, no sign of the dragon yet. She held her sword with two hands in front of her, so she could slay the dragon when it would come into her sight. She turned and turned, following the spiral staircase. There were torches on the wand, and in the back of her mind she wondered who always lit those torches.

She almost felt like she was a French toast with cinnamon. . .

(A/N: have to explain this. In Dutch a spiral staircase is called a 'wenteltrap', and a French toast is called a 'wentelteefje'. In a book of Paulus the Forestgnome, the raven Salomo walks down a spiral staircase and says the same as the princess in my story. It's a really lame Dutch joke, don't pay attention to it.)

. . . but finally she reached another door again, which she opened; she hadn't walked all those steps (598 to be precisely) to turn around and to go downstairs again.

She had reached the roof of the tower. It looked like a big round platform with battlements to prevent you from falling down. The dragon sat there, on a big nest, with her back turned to the door and the princess. It was a very big dragon, about the size of four elephants. It was very green too. But most of all, it looked very scary from behind. The princess almost did what she had not planned to do: walk all those steps down again immediately. But then she pulled herself together, and she pricked the dragon in the ass with her sword.

The dragon jumped into the air of shock, a very high jump. When it soared back to the tower, it turned around, so the dragon and the girl were now facing each other. Now she also saw the prince. He was sleeping in the nest the dragon had been sitting on. It was a miracle he wasn't squashed. But hey, she thought, eggs never squash under the weight of a bird, so I suppose princes don't squash under the weight of a dragon.

Suddenly the dragon attacked her, but she hit the mean creature with her sword. The dragon took one step backwards, but that couldn't help it anymore. It had lost its balance, and like in slow-motion, the dragon fell backwards, over the battlements. In a spit second she heard a loud 'bang'; the dragon had fallen on the ground. The loud sound woke the prince. Together the looked over the verge, and the saw a large green and red spot at the ground. 'Dead', they said at exact the same time. They looked at each other and laughed.

'You saved me?' the prince said, but not with disbelieve as she expected.

'Yes, I did.'

'You don't expect to marry me, I hope. You can get half of the kingdom, but I won't ask for your hand,'

'Why not?' she asked, really disappointed, almost crying. She had expected him to marry her. That was how it always went in fairytales.

'Well, to be quite honest, I'm 'on the wrong side'. . .'

'Huh?'

'I'm gay, I like men. God, why didn't one of those handsome princes rescue me? You can return to your home, I suppose your parents are worried. Please don't tell anyone the dragon is slain, so one day a prince will come to save me, and we'll marry, and become Kings of our own realm.'

'. . . sure', the princess said, disillusioned. And she did as the prince had told her. She went home (her parents hadn't even missed the few days she had been gone), she married an old king far away from home, to 'tighten the band between the two countries', and she lived unhappily ever after.

And for the prince? He waited and waited, and after several years, indeed a prince came to rescue him. The parents of the saving prince didn't appreciate the thought of a son in law, instead of a daughter, so they returned to the tower, decorated it o it looked nice and cosy, and they lived, you could've guessed, happily ever after.

*~* The End *~*

A/N: So, what do you think? Is it as stupid as I think of it myself (although I really had to laugh myself when I wrote about Paulus the Forestgnome), or do you think it's real jewel? Please give me your opinion, all kinds of reviews are welcome, even flames, it's freezing cold in here, it might warm me ;-)