Keep Her Safe Chapter Nine
Lady Prin
Disclaimer applies.
"So, where are you staying, my ladies?" Endymion asked Serena and Mina.
Endymion, Serena, Mina, Andrew, and Sammy were standing outside of the medicine house, in the light of the half moon.
Serena's ankle, and her and Mina's wrists were now bandaged.
Serena didn't know how to answer Endymion's question, so she looked over at Mina.
Endymion followed her eyes and looked at Mina as well.
"I don't know." Mina answered with an un-lady-like shrug. "We came here on a slave ship. We were supposed to be sold, but we escaped. We have no place to stay at the moment."
"We've never been here before." Serena volunteered.
"Well then," Endymion said looking back at Serena. "You'll just have to stay at the palace."
Mina looked at him with wide eyes. Serena didn't even blink an eyelid.
"Okay."
Endymion and Mina exchanged questioning looks.
Serena's attention was on Sammy right now, who was talking with Aquesta.
"Please excuse me for a moment, my lord." Serena said with a slight curtsy to Endymion.
She walked over to Sammy.
"She's a weird one." Andrew said.
"And I'm attracted to that." Endymion told him with a slight smile.
Mina was looking between him and Serena with a sly look forming on her face.
"You know you should stay here, right?" Aquesta was asking Sammy as Serena came near.
"Yeah, I know. But I'd rather not. I'm a free spirit!" Sammy said, jabbing himself in the chest with a thumb.
Aquesta smiled.
"Excuse me." Serena interrupted.
They looked at her.
"Can I talk to you Sammy?" She asked.
"Sure!" Sammy said with a shrug.
As Aquesta began to go back inside, Serena stopped her.
"Thank you for everything!" She told her.
"You're welcome!" Aquesta replied.
And without knowing why, she leaned over to Aquesta's ear and whispered.
"Your true name is Ami."
And left her wide eyed, standing there.
She and Sammy walked a few feet away.
"I wanted to thank you!" Serena told him.
"You're welcome. I try to be a good citizen." Sammy said nodding his head.
Serena smiled.
"In case I don't see you again, I want to give you something to remember me by." Serena said running her figures through her hair. "I must've dropped it inside. Just a minute and I'll get it."
Sammy nodded and Serena ran back inside.
She retraced her steps and found the butterfly hair clip on the floor in the room that she had found Mina in.
As she was about to leave, she passed by a door that was open. Inside was an old women, with silver hair, lying asleep in a bed.
She didn't know why, but something made her go into that room.
She knelt at the edge of the bed, and touched the women's hand with her own right hand.
She could tell the women was dying. She had to be about ninety-two.
And the words just came to her.
'I call upon my forbidden birthright,' She thought. 'Help me to save this women. It is not her time.'
No light flared from her forehead, no crescent moon appeared there.
Just her hand glowed softly yellow, as her long dormant magic, flared up just enough to eradicate the disease that was ravaging her body.
In moments it was done, and the light died down.
Serena stared at the womens face for a moment.
The womens eyelids fluttered, then opened.
She looked at Serena with wide open eyes. She had dark blue, that reminded Serena of someone, though she couldn't name them.
Serena could tell the women knew what had happened.
Serena smiled, and raised a figure to her lips in a ssshhh-ing motion.
The women stared, then smiled, and nodded slightly.
Serena got up, and walked calmly out of the room, and back out into the night.
Sammy was still there, talking with Endymion, Andrew, and Mina.
"There you are. . . Rena." Mina said. She was still having trouble calling Serena, Rena.
Serena smiled at her, and went over to Sammy.
"Here you go!" She said happily presenting Sammy with the butterfly hair clip.
He gently took it and stared at it.
He opened his mouth to say something, but closed it with a ruish smile.
"Thanks!" He said.
Then a horse drawn carriage slowly rambled down the road.
"It's time to go, ladies." Andrew said, opening the door.
Serena and Mina looked at Endymion, waiting for him to get in first.
"First rule of edicit. Ladies first." Endymion said with a slight bow.
With a smile, and a goodbye to Sammy, they climbed on in.
As the carriage quickly made progress down the road, the girls fell asleep.
They woke up only when the carriage had stopped at the palace. Endymion and Andrew helped them to their rooms. The two girls didn't take in much of their surroundings.
They didn't bother about their clothes, they just fell into bed and went back to sleep.
When they woke up again, there was fresh clothes laid out on the foot of their beds, which they now realized, were huge canopy beds. Their linens were in soft colors of red, blue, and gold. The mid-morning light from a couple of windows set in the wall about waist high, shinned gently upon their beds, and fell upon their new clothes.
They hurried to put them on, talking to each other in dismay about how late they had slept.
Their new clothes were not dress, but kimonos, with pants instead of a skirt. Mina told Serena that it was kind of like a sign. A kimono with skirt, meant that the women was married. A kimono with pants meant that the women was single.
Their kimonos mirrored each other in color and design. They had pale blue, lavender, yellow, and pink swirls of color on them, and around the edges were embroidered pink flowers that Mina identified as Sakura Blossoms, or known in England as Cherry Blossoms.
They slipped their feet into soft slippers that also were embroidered with Sakura Blossoms.
They felt totally free without their long skirts to weigh them down.
They decided to take a look around.
They opened the door that led from their rooms into the corridor, but nobody was around.
"I wonder if this palace is just like the one back home?" Serena whispered to Mina as Mina closed the door behind them.
"All the palaces made in other countries mirror this one. Although they might be missing a few secret passageways, but other than that, they should be the same." Mina told her as they walked quietly down the corridor, looking at all the paintings of great landscapes.
"I wonder if they have that mural of the Moon Kingdom that we have in the study!" Serena wondered out loud.
"No, they don't." Mina informed her. "They don't even know about that mural, so don't tell them. Your parents didn't tell them when they made it, so they were breaking the rules. The Royal's commanded that any changes to any of the palaces has to be agreed to by them."
"Oh. Drat." Serena sighed.
'Besides,' Mina continued in thought. 'That mural was made for you. And to remind Ikoku and Kenji of who you really were, and of the heritage you would one day inherit.'
They had come to a staircase now. A big one, with a railing thick enough for them to slide down on, if Mina and Serena had not been Princesses.
But of course, they were pretending not to be. Therefore, with a mischievous glance between them, they hopped on and basically flew down the banister. Since they weren't wearing skirts, their ride went faster than it had ever gone before when they had done it at home.
Serena was behind Mina, so without making a sound Serena let go of the railing with her hands, and flung them out to the sides, like as if she had wings, for she felt like she had.
"Uh, oh." Mina cried.
Serena opened her eyes, and looked down below. They were to land in the big room just inside the door to the palace. But that wasn't what Mina worried about.
Endymion, Andrew and an old man servant had just come through, and were now staring up at them as they slid down.
Serena and Mina blushed terribly. But they decided that if they were to be punished, they might as well make their landing their best one yet.
With great skill accumulated from long years of practice, Mina and Serena stood up on their slippered feet, holding their arms out for balance. Back home, they used to do this bare foot. Their feet eventually got hot and sore, but they were only going to do this once... not thirty like last time.
As they flew off the end of the railing, they jumped, brought their knees to their chest for a moment, and then put their feet upon the smooth marble floor, heel first. They leaned back and let the force of their ride slide them across the room. To land neatly in a pair right in front of Endymion, Andrew and the servant.
Acting like they weren't doing anything out of the ordinary, they curtsied.
"Thank you for the new clothes. They feel much better than the old ones!" Serena exclaimed.
"Yes, very much." Mina said.
They stood their watching the three mens expressions as their faces were still in shock.
The man servant recovered first.
"Well, sir." He said in a gravelly sort of voice as he turned to the Prince. "I do believe your record for the greatest banister slider has just been broken. By two young girls." He added with a devilish smile. Then he scuttled away faster than an eighty-seven year old man should scuttle.
Andrew hid his face behind his gloved hand, trying not to laugh. Endymion looked from where the man servant had disappeared, over to Andrew, then back to the girls.
Then he broke out laughing.
"I guess it has. Nobody'd ever thought that was possible." Then coughing slightly to stop his laughter, he said, "Maybe in celebration of this unexpected event, you'll dine with us in the great hall? I know it's mid-morning, but we just arrived and haven't had time to eat breakfast."
"We slept in and haven't had breakfast either." Mina replied.
"So that's a yes!" Chirped Serena.
Still laughing, Endymion and Andrew lead the way to the dinning hall, with Serena and Mina on their arms.
Over a dinner of bacon, eggs, toast, and some kind of juice drink that nobody seemed to remember the name of, but which tasted quite good, Endymion asked where they had learned to slide like that.
But before they could answer, (which was a good thing, cause they didn't have an answer) a soldier in a green uniform entered the hall.
With a deep bow to the Prince, he informed him, that he had good news, and bad.
"By all means tell." The Prince said with a smile. "Good news first. I want my good mood to last as long as possible."
"Your great grandmother has sent word." The soldier began.
"How is she?" Endymion asked, his brow creased in concern.
"She told me to tell you this, in the exact same way as she told it to me." The soldier said, shifting uncomfortably.
"Well!" The Prince demanded. 'Good news?' He thought. 'How can there be any good news? My great grandmother is dying in--'
His thoughts were quickly cut short, as the soldier walked a few feet away from the table, then turned around. He was turning red, form the collar of his tunic all the way up to his brown, slightly graying hair.
He took a breath, steading himself. . .
The others watched him, holding their breaths. . .
"I FEEL SIXTY AGAIN! WOOHOO!" The soldier shouted, jumping up and down. Then he did a couple of cartwheels down the hall, then came back doing back flips.
Then he became still again, his face becoming stony.
"Grandmother did that?" Endymion whispered. "She can't-- I didn't know she could--" He stuttered.
"I didn't know he could." Andrew stated pointing at the stone still soldier.
"I had to practice a full day, before I could deliver that message." The soldier informed them.
"But she was--?" Endymion started to say.
"Dying?" The soldier asked him. "I don't know what happened, maybe it was the Moon Goddess Serenity, I don't know, she wouldn't tell me. All I know is what I saw! And I nearly fainted." He muttered softly.
"How old is your grandmother?" Serena asked.
"Ninety-eight." Endymion explained, looking at her with wide dark blue eyes. Serena could see the happiness starting to build there. Then she remembered that she had seen those same blue eyes in the old women she had helped back at the medicine house. Her suspicions were confirmed a moment later. "She was dying of a disease nobody could name, and nobody could treat. The medicine women told me to expect her to live only two more days. I was visiting her last night when Andrew brought in Mani." Endymion finished.
Then he turned back to the soldier.
"Erin, what was the medicine womens reaction?" He asked.
"She did faint." Erin stated. "And that girl Aquesta couldn't revive her for hours. Nobody knows what happened and your great grandmother will not tell."
Endymion sat there, a huge smile growing on his face.
"Alright! Nothing can stop my good mood now!" He shouted. Everyone at the table was smiling. "Now, the bad news!"
Erin's face was grim.
"We just got a messenger an hour ago from England." Serena and Mina looked at him with intense interest. "Kenji and Ikoku Tuskino, caretakers of England for your Highnesses, has declared war upon Japan." Everybody lost their smile. "They claim that they know we have stolen their daughter, the Princess Serena, and will stop at nothing to get her back." Erin finished.
"What were you saying, about nothing spoiling your good mood?" Andrew asked Endymion.
"Maybe I was wrong." Endymion corrected.