It was early afternoon when Daventry came into sight. Gwydion could not be happier, with the prince having decided to cry and scream and carry on all night, until he wanted to scream in return. It didn't help that Gwydion had run out of bread, and the baby didn't want the ham he had left.

They anchored off Port Karlavaegen, and after paying the other half of the gold, were rowed into shore, with a number of creates and barrels. Once on the beach, Gwydion had planned on skipping past the town, unsure if any of the bandits were around, but as they climbed out of the small row boat Gwydion was shocked to hear a happy cry carry on the wind from up the beach.

"Alexander!"

Gwydion hugged the boy tighter as he twisted in Gwydion's arms, crying out, "Mummy!"

Gwydion turned to see a stately tall woman, dark brown hair pulled up large bun complex on the top of her head, encircled by a golden crown. Her high aristocratic features where filled with joy as she picked up her long green dress and ran down the beach, ignoring the way her slippers became sandy and wet. "My baby! My beautiful Alexander!"

Gwydion was reluctant to hand over the child, to someone he didn't know, but the figures following the women at a only slightly slower pace changed his mind. At the head was a black haired man, with streaks of white at each temple. He was wearing a thick doublet in heavy red linen, with gold rampant lions embroidered on the front over deep red leather trousers, and high black boots. On his head was a crown of gold, with large rubies and sapphires shining in the sun. Behind him, at his heels, were four guard dogs, a german shepherd, a doberman and two rottweilers, each wearing the uniform he had seen what felt like weeks ago in the castle of Daventry, the tunics with the five pronged golden crown on blue shield, over chainmail shirts and thick leather trousers and boots. One guard dog carried a small girl the same size as the prince and the same sky blue eyes, but with hair as light as the prince's was dark.

By this stage the woman, who Gwydion thought just may be the Queen, had reached Gwydion, and the little baby prince was straining forwards, making grabby hands at her. Gwydion handed over the child. The Queen peppered kisses on the child's face, crying and laughing at the same time.

Gwydion wasn't sure what to say. Thankfully, the King had reached them, and started, "King Gwydion, we know you set out and managed to save out son, and came to meet you on your return."

"Oh, um. That's good?" What was one meant to say to that?

King Graham laughed, and hugged his wife and child, before taking the girl from the guard. He then ushered everyone up the beach, including the two Berner sisters, who had looked about ready to interrupt, giving everyone, especially Gwydion, long looks.

"King Gwydion?" Sarge asked.

"I sorry I didn't tell you. I just wasn't sure if it was safe."

"Oh, no, that's about the only think about this that makes sense." The Captain said.

"Where exactly are you king of?" Sarge looked slightly bemused.

"Oh, Llewdor. But Medusa is mostly in charge."

"Medusa? And what of Manannan?"

"Medusa is my friend. She agreed to become my regent until I'm old enough." Gwydion blushed, "I turned Manannan into a cat."

Both sisters laughed loudly at hearing Manannan's fate. "Medusa is an odd name. I once heard of a great witch by that name, who was one of the Old Ones."

"Medusa is one of the Old Ones. Manannan cursed her but I managed to break the curse, mostly by accident."

At this, the King and Queen seemed to have calmed down, and the little prince, now Gwydion knew was called Alexander, had fallen quiet clutching at his mothers high collar.

King Graham, still smiling, proclaimed, "King Gwydion, you will of course return with us to the Castle, and we shall feast in celebration that you saved Alexander from a horrible fate. Ladies, you can also come, but I think you have business yet in Port."

"Yes, sire." Captain inclined her head.

"Then you may join us later if you so wish."

Gwydion called back "Come visit me in Port Bruce some time!" to the sisters as he found himself climbing into a carriage with the Queen, Prince and little girl who turned out was the Princess, while the King mounted a strong looking black horse.

The trip to the castle was bumpy. Gwydion found himself awkwardly watching as the Queen sung quietly to the now sleeping prince.

"So how did you know I would be coming back? In fact, how did you know I saved the prince in the first place?"

"The magic mirror of course!"

"Huh?" The queen did not look impressed by his vocabulary.

"The Magic Mirror is one of the Three Great Treasures of Daventry, it once belonged to the magician Merlin and shows the truth, whether of past, present or future. When we found my dear son gone, at first it could provide no answers, but showed a horrible future were my son was a slave, forced to toil for an evil far away, lost to us forever. But then the mirror changed and we saw you being crowned King of Llewdor before being trapped in the pirate hold, and escaping to save Alexander. When we saw you buy passage back, we knew that you would return, and rode out to meet you."

"Wow," Gwydion said. A magic mirror! "But if the mirror is so powerful, why didn't you see what was going to happen beforehand?"

"The mirror is powerful, but it is not infallible," seeing Gwydion's puzzled face qualified, "it is sometimes wrong, or clouded, and it requires someone to watch it with the right question in mind. We were happy, and thought that nothing could touch us. We had heard that some believed we would sacrifice a virgin to the dragon, but did not give it much thought, after all we would never do such a thing. That the maid believed it was her may have just had to do with the amount of gold Manannan had paid her, or perhaps Manannan found it easy to bribe her because of her delusions."

"So you were never going to feed her to the dragon?"

"Absolutely not."

"Oh." There was a long, awkward pause, while Gwydion avoided looking at the women he had thought could give a dragon a young women to eat.

"You know, traditionally, saving a member of a royal court would be a proposal of marriage. Why Graham saving me was the start of our long married life! Perhaps then we should also celebrate your betrothal to Prince Alexander."

Gwydion's eyes widen in panic, his face drained of colour, "I didn't mean that… I just wanted to stop something terrible from happening, and I don't want to get married! And the Prince is a boy! And I mean, he's a baby! What if he falls in love with someone else?"

The Queens face is intense, "And you wish for no such reward? Daventry is wealthy, and a marriage would no doubt solve many problems for Llewdor. Do you think the Prince's feelings matter in such affairs?"

"They matter to me!"

Suddenly, the Queen smiled, and Gwydion had a feeling he had passed some sort of test. He vaguely wished people would stop doing that. "I am glad. Some would not be as considerate. Maybe not a marriage, but something else is in order. But we will discuss such things with Graham."

Before Gwydion could protest any reward, the carriage rolled to a stop and the door opened. They were in a small courtyard, he assumed within the castle. King Graham offered a hand out of the carriage to his wife, whose arms were still full of the sleeping prince, and then picked up the princess. She had remained so quiet Gwydion had forgotten she was even there. She giggled happily in her fathers arms, while Gwydion climbed out.

Before he entered the castle, the King stopped briefly and said, "King Gwydion?"

"You don't have to keep calling me that. Gwydion is fine."

Graham smiled, "Then called me Graham." The smile then fell from his face, "Do you still have the maid's body? Give it to the Sergeant, and he will see it is buried properly. Even if she was the one to kidnap the prince, she did so in desperation thinking to avoid the dragon."

"I sorry."

"It isn't you fault, and you should not feel bad about it. If anyone is at fault, it is I, for not dealing with the dragon before now."

Gwydion disagreed, but didn't say anything. Instead he took the blanket wrapped body out, which as soon as it left the bag dropped to the ground in a loud unsettling thump when Gwydions arm couldn't support it. The waiting guard dog, one with the head of a mastiff, nodded stiffly and picked up the body, throwing it over his shoulder and moving away.

After that he was ushered into a room in the castle, given a fine set of clothes to change into, while servants filled a large ornate bathtub with steaming water. When they moved to undress him as well, Gwydion protested loudly, and eventually managed to convince them to leave. He bathed, thankfully to wash the salt layer from his skin, and scrubbed maybe a little to hard, as if to rid himself of thoughts he didn't want. His clothes, quiet worn before his adventure, where now closer to rags then anything else. He put the new clothes, even if he felt a bit weird for doing so. The woollen leggings and velvet tunic were a deep blue, with silver trim and made him look much too pale. It was also much too tight across his shoulders, clearly for a child who hadn't worked hard everyday in his life.

"Sire, the feast will begin shortly. Can I escort you to the dinning hall?" The voice was muffled through the door, but still understandable. Still slightly suspicious after everything that happened, Gwydion decided to take his belt and rucksack with him.

The servant turned out to be young boy of maybe only ten or eleven years old. He had an unfortunate shade of bright red hair, and soft honey coloured eyes. Eyes which looked at the rucksack over Gwydions shoulders, "Sire, you do not need to bring your things."

"I think I'll just keep them on me. Just in case."

The page looked like he wanted to argue, but simply nodded and started down the corridor. It was a short walk to the dinning hall.

The King was already present, as well as various human-looking guests.

"Gwydion! The one who saved my son, and Daventry, from the dragon!"

The guests, all lords and ladies, looked the boy up and down, many with the carefully blank faces of high ranked peers, some with open disdain, some with open happiness.

"Gwydion, in the spirit of times past, I offer a great alliance between our kingdoms. May both Llewdor and Daventry be forever allies and friends."

The was a long pause, clearly Gwydion was meant to say something. "Thank you. I hope we can be friends for a long time too."

King Graham beamed, "Now come, and let us feast!"

Gwydion was shown to a seat next to Graham, with the Queen on the other side. The little Prince and Princess where somewhere else. Gwydion looked over the mounds of food piled high on the table. "Um thank you for this meal, but I need to leave at sunset."

"You still have time. And I wished to speak to you. You are clearly a good King, but still young. I had already arranged some of the finest tutors for my own children, and one more in the lessons would not be such a trial."

"What do you mean?

"Let me pay the debt I owe you for saving us, join us here and learn."

"Um, again, thank you, but I want to go home."

"But you have a way to travel easily between Llewdor and Daventry, do you not? Perhaps you can come and visit us every few days, learn during the day and return home at night."

"I need to think about it." And ask Medusa Gwydion thought.

"Very well. But know you are always welcome here."

Gwydion nodded and ate some of the food, making small talk with the king. Just before sunset, he nodded to the King and Queen, who after another round of cheers, allowed him to slip away from the feast.

In the courtyard he held the amber stone up, and wished, as he had for the last few days, to finally be home. A moment later he was.

~~~~~Llewdor, the Keep~~~~~

"Gwydion!" Medusa was standing in the doorway, looking tired and worn, Letholdus beside her coils, both clearly waiting for the moment of dusk. In a scene very much like what he had seen only hours earlier on the beach, Medusa swept forward and hugged the boy tightly. "You silly boy! Where have you been? Three days you have been gone!"

"I sorry Medusa! I was too late! And then I got caught by pirates… and then I had to save the Prince, and then I had to get him back…and then I had to wait until sunset. Please don't be angry."

"Pirates! No don't tell me yet. Come inside, let me brew some tea. I have a feeling I will need it to calm my nerves."

And she did. Medusa, Letholdus and Manannan, who sneaked downstairs as soon as he had heard Medusa call Gwydion's name, sat in the dinning hall and listened to Gwydion recount everything that had happened. At some points Medusa hands were white in tension as she clutched the cup. Gwydion, noticing, was somewhat surprised it didn't break apart, and tried to down play the danger he had been in. None of the audience believed him.

Finally coming to the end, Medusa stood, and silently hugged the exhausted boy.

"Rest Gwydion, tomorrow is early enough to discuss all of this," and with that she carried the now limp King upstairs and stripped the boy and tucked him into bed. It seemed to Medusa she would most certainly have to be on her toes to keep her little King out of trouble, but for now she could be sure he was safe, and that was enough for her to finally, after three days of worry, rest.

And that's the end of this installment! I have posted the prolog for the next story up, so that people can subscribe/follow it, instead of me having to add a chapter note when the I will start posting the next installment, called (drum roll): Harry's Quest 2: The Gamble of Gywdion
I expect the first real chapter to be posted by the end of the month, and then will follow a similar posting rate as To Freak is Divine. I have also made a collection of one-shots set in the same universe you can subscribe/follow to, starting with Cauchy gift fic, called (creatively): Harry's Quest One Shots