The Flame Queen blinked. "You shall marry my son and become princess of the Flame Kingdom. And he shall appropriately, by marriage law, become the prince of your kingdom, wherever it is."
Fionna's hands dropped to her sides as she slumped forward. "But...married? How do I even...why me?"
She was met with an agitated sigh. "I offered my son's hand to any worthy champion. You challenged me by entering the kingdom. I put you in mortal peril. You came out victorious. Now, you will marry Flame Prince!"
The prince dipped into a bow that ended on bent knee. He raised his head to look up at Fionna with a warm smile.
Fionna's mouth opened and shut a few times. She turned to Cake, who just shrugged. "I...I can't get married..." she managed.
"Why not?" The Queen demanded. "Are you already spoken for? Have you a secret lover you've betrayed simply to satiate your lust for dangerous super action?"
"No, no, no, no!" Her hands waved frantically. "Dude...look. No. Stop. I can't just...I don't even know this guy yet! I'm not just gonna marry somebody I don't even know! Who does that? That's not even okay! I'm not marrying him!"
There was a pause as Fionna caught her breath, all the blank, slow-burning eyes of the nobles staring at her. Tiny crackling noises from their fiery hairpieces were the only sound to be heard as the words settled. Flame Prince was the first to break the silence with "...why won't you marry me? Am I...unfit for you?"
Fionna looked down at him. His expression was one of confusion and concern, as though he couldn't understand whether he should feel sad or contemptuous. "No, I don't mean like...I'm not saying that to be mean or anything, dude. It's just...I don't, uh...I don't hardly even know you yet. I can't be all marrying dudes I haven't even hung out with!"
"Oh..." the prince mused. He looked to floor for a moment, fingers twitching slightly as he ran some mental calculations. After a moment, his face popped up again like an egg timer, saying "Then perhaps we should take a stroll around the kingdom. I'll show you what this kingdom is all about! Perhaps you might change your mind after I've shown you the land?"
"Uhmm...that's not quite what I...I mean..." the words faded into a babble as her inner voice took over. Wait a minute now. Think. What if you just play along, act like he's your husband? Make him happy, until he agrees to do something for you. You could say you're going on a vacation, then take him out to the Ice Kingdom...yeah! That could work!
"Is that not what adventurers do, Fionna?"
"What?"
Flame Prince trailed his hand through the air as he spoke. "Travel across kingdoms unexplored, unite with new friends, then re-explore old kingdoms under a new light?"
"Well...yeah, that about sums it up, I mean..." she could see she was getting pushed into this no matter what excuse she tried making. Best to just go with the flow, she decided. "Alright. Take your champion on a tour of the kingdom."
Flame Prince rose to full height and smiled. "Wonderful. But...there are two champions, are there not?"
"Mhmm," Cake said, stepping forward.
"Oh. Right," Fionna said turning to face her. "Almost forgot you were even there, Cake."
"Oh, sure. Ignore the other champion, cause it's just all about you, isn't it?"
"What? No! Not like that, girl. Don't give me that lip!"
Cake chuckled and pinched Fionna's elbow. "HA! I'm just messin' with ya, girl. Anyhoopla, I'd love to join you kids, but without a Flame Shield, my paws are gettin' a little too well-done from walkin' on all these lava rocks. I tell you what, Fi, you and Flame Prince go have yourselves a wonderful honeymoon-"
"-Cake what-"
"-while I run back home and get phase two set up and rollin'!"
Fionna's cheeks burned red, though the intense heat of the atmosphere masked it well. "Cake, what kind of crackersnap nonsense are you jivin'?! I'm not going to...with Flame Prince...just NO!"
A toasty paw tapped against her nose. "Simmer down, ya baby, it's not like that. I just got other plans. Brilliant plans. You'll see."
"Cake," Fionna whispered, pulling her close, "Are you sure you don't wanna stick around? You always wanna stick around to make sure I don't get hurt."
"Fionna, we talked about this. I know you can handle yourself, you're a big girl. I'm givin' you a little breathin' room so you can take care of this little adventure in your own way. Isn't that what you want?"
She responded with a smile and a quick hug. "Thanks, Cake. I'll make you proud, don't worry!"
Cake brushed her off. "Yeah, yeah, I love you too, too much mushy stuff! Just remember, though. If things start hopping a train to southern butts-town, you just holler and you can bet yours I will be there." The last four words were spoken with the grinding force of a chisel on a tombstone. Fionna swallowed and nodded.
With that, Cake held up two fingers, addressing the room with a quick "Peaces, y'all!" before sauntering her way back out through the corridor on elongated legs.
And the moment Fionna turned around, there was the Flame Prince, burning hot hand closing slowly around her wrist. Ow. Ow. OW. "Shall we depart, my Champion?" he asked, eyes alive and flickering.
Ow. Ow. Ow. "Yep, lead the way!"
She squirmed loose from his grasp and gestured to the corridor. He bowed lightly and swooped right out the door. Fionna tagged along at a close distance, rubbing her wrist gingerly. This was going to be harder than she had thought. She needed a quick solution...something to at least guard her wrists in case he did that again. Something non-restrictive. A wristband, or a gauntlet.
Thinking quickly, she tore thick strips from both of her stockings and bound them around either wrist. That wasn't going to hold long, but at least it would offer a smidgen of protection, right?
Just outside the palace gates, the guards stood to stiff attention in the presence of the prince. "Yes, my people," he said with regal flair. "Stand to attention and take note of my bride and Champion Adventurer, Fionna!"
He motioned to Fionna, who was just stepping back into the muggy, putrid air of the Fire Kingdom. She knew she couldn't have looked further from a bride at this point. Craters of burn marks decorated her shirt and skirt. Ash fluttered out of her tangled hair any time she ran her scorched fingers through it. She smelled like burnt weenies, but that was probably considered very appealing and attractive around these parts. She coughed out a tiny cloud of smoke and put on the most willing smile she could muster.
The guards side-eyed her for a brief moment before returning to attention. Flame Prince frowned. "What's wrong, guards? Don't you like her?"
The left guard shrugged. "Maybe if she were a little more on fire and had more of a barbecue musk, she'd be the boss's sauce...uh, I mean, she's fine! She's fine!"
A fiery eyebrow raised on the prince's face. "I had hoped you'd say that."
"Y-yerse," the guard stammered.
Stepping closer, the prince held the guard under his gaze for a few moments, scrutinizing and judging silently. Fionna shifted her weight uncomfortably, then gulped and grabbed him by the wrist. Ow. "Come along, my prince! This world of yours isn't gonna show itself!"
The burn dissipated from his eyes as Flame Prince turned to face her. "Of course, yes! Onward, shall we?"
He in turn took hold of her wrist, burning quickly through the stocking bracelet, and leapt out onto a stalagmite jutting up out of the sea of magma. His shoe sank right into the stalagmite, became a part of it as he lighted, then separated again as he leapt to the next one.
Thoughts kept shifting through Fionna's mind as they hopped from rock to rock. She had no idea what Flame Prince was planning to do with a simple tour of the kingdom, but whatever it was, it couldn't take too long. After all, there was an ulterior mission to be adhered to, and the sooner it got underway, the better.
"So, my Champion," the prince said as they ascended the spires of rock up the side of the cliff-faced borders of the kingdom, "Tell me about your kingdom. Tell me about the whole of the outside world."
"The whole world?"
"Certainly! Now that you've proven outsiders are able to enter the kingdom and survive, it must mean the rest of the world has made some impressive advances in the last hundred years!"
"Wha...did you say hundred years? How old are you, again?"
The prince paused and turned to her, releasing her wrist. "Fionna, you seem confused. How much do you actually know about the Fire Kingdom?"
Fionna looked down at her shoes. "Uhmmm...".
Flame Prince sighed. "Perhaps I should familiarize you with my people first, so that you understand why it's so important to me." He sat down, legs crossed. "I'll tell you all that I know from reading the Heritage Books. Sit."
"I'd, uh...rather stand," Fionna said, brushing her hands over the back of her skirt. "These rocks are really hot, and I don't wanna toast my buns if ya know what I mean."
His expression went blank for a moment, then he shrugged. "Now, then...".
"It has been an easy hundred years since the last recorded time a Fire Citizen set flaming foot outside our borders. We've stayed tucked up in these lava-locked mountains, all to ourselves, quietly burning our contained bonfires until the day we could once again walk freely among the otherworlders."
Fionna crossed her arms and rocked on her feet in an effort to keep them from melting to the rock. "So...you guys were banished here, or what? Why can't you ever come out?"
"In the oldest times, we used to live and walk wherever we pleased. The Inmost Ancestors wanted to scatter us across the entire land, so that lost, lampless flames left to wander might never be too far from their own kindred kind. If only it had been as simple as that...".
A lava bubble popped loudly beneath them, an ungodly stench of acid and ashes filling the air. Flame Prince wasn't fased.
"We are an inherently dangerous people, Fionna. We are creatures of consumption who need fuel to continue the slow burn of our lives. And as you probably know, fire spreads quickly on a world made to burn."
"The further our people spread out, the more fire we brought to distant lands. Every new civilization met us with a new resistance. They denied us the right to settle in their lands. Oh, not because they hated who we were, but because we could do nothing but raze the earth and turn their lives to ashes."
Fionna swallowed, listening closely now.
"Eventually, driven away to a corner of the land, we rediscovered this place of volcanoes and fiery rivers. A warm place where we would not be turned away. A land without homes to burn or bones to melt. Our first home and eternal utopia! We have been living here for perhaps a century now, through a full Royal Age. We have been waiting for the day the world will again be ready for us. The day we can walk across the land without fear of scorching its earth. We have been waiting for the world out there to come and find us in here, to tell us they are at last ready for our flaming footsteps. A world altogether immune to dangerous flames, in which we all can walk and talk without fear of causing harm. A day we can call the entire land home."
A pause hovered between the two of them. Fionna rubbed her arm, feeling like she should say something. "That's...that's really intense, man."
Flame Prince nodded and stared off into the distant thundering smoke clouds across the lava bed. "That is why my mother held the invisible contest. To see if outsiders could enter, stand up to fire, and take a husband back into the outside world. I am thrilled by the chance to finally leave this kingdom, Fionna...you could never know!"
"Yeah, well..." she started, fishing for the right words. "That's...there's for defs sure a lot of really neat stuff I can show you in the outside world...but uh...let's keep it strictly adventure, okay? No romancey stuff?"
"No romance?" The prince asked, slightly disappointed. "But...is not romance a vital part of marriage? You will at least let me hold your hand, won't you?"
Fionna's hand immediately clutched her burnt wrist. "But...that still hurts."
Flame Prince rose to his feet, head slightly tilted. "You never said so before. I thought you had a defense against fire. I thought that was why you came."
"Well, I...I had a Flame Shield spell from these cool-dude glasses, but it's kind of worn-"
"Isn't that sufficient, then?" The prince asked, hopefully. "You can use a Flame Shield to protect yourself when you are weakest, right? Can a little pain not be endured for the sake of our marriage?"
"Hey," Fionna said, taking a step back. "Listen, dude. I like you and all, you seem pretty spice. I want us to be friends, but marriage is like...come on. It's way too soon. You gotta understand that about me. I don't just marry people whatever-whenever. If you really wanna be my husband, you gotta learn better about me, okay?"
The prince again looked down, deep in thought. His lips moved as he ran through a cycle of thoughts. After a moment he emerged with "...am I getting too close? Too soon?"
"Too close? You mean like, in my personal bubble close?"
"What I mean is...".
He stepped into her personal bubble and gently took her wrist, burning a little brighter than before. His hand quickly burnt through the makeshift armband. Ow. Ow. Ow.
"Listen carefully to this, fair Fionna," he said gravely. "I am as unto a candle. My body is hot wax, my touch is living fire. Too close to me and your hairs will singe, your skin will char. But too far away, and your heart may freeze."
He stepped back, releasing her. She pulled her hand close, rubbing the burnt skin and hissing through clenched teeth. She wanted to lash out, but restrained herself. Her gut instinct told her that the Prince wasn't trying to hurt her, but the crispy smell of cooked flesh was telling her otherwise. She wondered if he was being genuine, or if he had some ulterior motive behind that innocent-looking face.
No, stop thinking like that. This isn't Ice Queen you're dealing with. She'd definitely have a motive, but this is different. Gotta be open and friendly with this guy. Gotta trust him a little bit. Don't let my heart freeze, like he said. Keep it warm and melty.
She looked up at him and managed to smile, hand not leaving her wrist, even though it hurt to touch. "...alright, then. I'll remember what you just said. For right now, don't get too close, and I'll make sure I don't get too far. Okay?"
Flame Prince returned the smile, then looked skyward. "And now it appears night has fallen."
Fionna looked up at the billowing towers of smoke blotting out any semblance of sky. "...how can you tell?"
"We should both probably get some sleep..." he continued, ignoring that. "...but before we do...there's one thing I want to do."
He took a step closer. Fionna instinctively activated her defense mode.
"Fionna, will you step outside the border with me?"
"...wha?"
"Just for a moment. I want to see the world beyond the volcanoes and acid rain. Just a peek. I want to see if I am as dangerous as the Heritage Books said of the ancestors."
"Oh." She let it hang for a moment before shrugging and pulling her hat into place. "Yeah, sure, why not?"
"Excellent!" the prince said happily, leaping his way up the staggered cliffside. Fionna scrambled after him, not wanting him to get too far out of sight. Minutes later they were both standing on the edge, looking out over the grassy hills below. The thick smoke layer overhead blocked out most of the moonlight, but the glow from the lava behind them managed to light up several patches and pockets of grass.
"Well..." Fionna started, doing her best to present the rather dull scene, "...it's kind of hard to see right now, but yeah. Them's the plains."
The prince's eyes were wide with wonder. "Vegetation? It was literally this close to the kingdom this entire time?"
He floated down in a gentle fireball to the ground to get a closer look, followed closely by Fionna. She found it more difficult to descend than to ascend; the burn around her wrist was getting very sensitive, and climbing hurt. She switched to one-handed climbing the rest of the way down.
The prince was kneeling in a small pool of scorched, black grass when she reached him. He seemed to be examining the immediate flora, trying to touch it with his hand. A nearby daisy blew up in flames, and he frowned, disappointed.
"This vegetation is unlike anything I've seen..." he said. "But it burns before I can truly see it. How do you do hold it without destroying it?"
Fionna reached out and plucked one herself. "You just hold it like a newborn kitten. See?"
Flame Prince brought his face closer to her outstretched palm, gazing intently. The proximity of his face stung against her still-tender wrist as it radiated the familiar glowing warmth of a midnight bonfire. She did her best to ignore it and pushed her hand microns closer to his face. He recoiled quickly when the daisy spontaneously combusted.
"I don't understand," he said after a moment. "This isn't right. Why are you able to enter my kingdom unharmed while I remain unable to enter yours harmless?"
He held out a hand, the grass beneath almost visibly bending away from the intense heat. "Are you certain this world is ready for me?"
"Well, I'M certainly not ready for you," said a familiar voice.
Fionna's head snapped up. "Ugh, not you!"
A cackling white-rimmed silhouette stepped forward from behind a twisted tree and into the low firelight of the scene. Ice Queen tossed her hair behind her and looked Flame Prince up and down. "So...is this the hot boyfriend I've been hearing about?"
There was a pause as Fionna pulled her hat back, picked her ear and trained forward. "Hearing about? Who...how? I only just met him to-BOYFRIEND?"
"Yes, I got an anonymous tip earlier today," she replied, one hand on her hip. "Word among the herd, so to speak."
Fionna raised a brow. "Herd?"
Before Ice Queen could make a remark about Fionna's dull responses, Flame Prince stepped forward. "A pleasure to meet you, milady. I am the Flame Prince."
"Yes, charmed," the Queen said in a disinterested tone as she began rolling up the sleeves on her dress. "I wish we were meeting under better conditions, though. The heat out here is just destroying my skin."
"What are you talking about, Queenie?" Fionna asked, noting that this was the first time she'd ever seen the Queen's bare arms before. They were thinner than the sleeves made them appear. "It's pretty normal out here tonight...".
"Says the girl who just stepped out of nature's biggest oven," the queen muttered as she flapped the neckline. "Ugh, this just will not do for me."
Fionna leaned in closer to the circle. "Are you...are you sweating out here?"
Ice Queen snorted and pushed stray strands of hair into place. "Silly tomboy. Ice Queens don't sweat...they melt."
"Why are you melting though? We're not even inside the Fire Kingdom!"
"It's not...the kingdom," Ice Queen said, slightly hunched forward and panting now. "It's...this hottie over here!"
"...me?" Flame Prince asked, drawing back a step.
Even under stress, the queen found it in her to grin suggestively, adding "Yes, my darling. You're making me so unbearably hot tonight...you're melting me. All this moisture is going to ruin my fancy undergarments. Fionna, tell your boyfriend to stop getting me all wet."
"Ew," Fionna said, miming sickness. "And he's not my boyfriend."
"That's correct," noted Flame Prince. "We're married!"
"Shut up!" Fionna said, elbowing him. Ow.
"What?" Ice Queen asked, faux-dramatically. "And you didn't invite ME to the wedding? Fionna, how could you?"
"It's not...that isn't what we're...rrgh," Fionna stammered, tugging on the ears of her hat. "What are you even doing here, Freezerburn?"
Ice Queen sighed loudly, face dropping into a frown. "I wanted to meet this mysterious boyfriend of yours, so I could judge and hassle him."
Fionna's fist clenched.
"And from my first impression...all this heat he's putting out...all this potential energy...he's dangerous...really hot...really dangerous...ugh, I can't even breathe now...". She dropped to one knee and stared up at Fionna, blowing errant hair out of her face.
Fionna returned the stare as a sly smile slowly took shape across her face. The queen's chest was visibly heaving, and small beads of sweat or melted ice or whatever they were dribbled their way down her face, falling from her chin. Her staggered breath came out in sighing puffs of steam. The plan was working like a charm.
She wasn't backing down, though. "You're entering into...a bad relationship here...Fionna...he's much too hot...for you to handle...".
"What, you think I can't handle him?" Fionna said with a smirk. "I know how to play with fire. I'm a big girl!"
To prove her point, she put her bad arm around Flame Prince. Ow. Ow. OW. OW.
"Fionna, STOP THAT!" The queen commanded, struggling to her feet. "You're hurting yourself!"
"And what do you care if I hurt myself?!" she yelled, stomping as she moved closer. "If Flame Prince wasn't here, YOU'D just be the one hurting me!"
"That's different, Fionna! I know how to control myself! HE doesn't! You could get yourself killed staying with him!"
"You're such a liar! You've tried to kill me hundreds of times, Ice Queen!"
"I WOULDN'T KILL A PERSON I LOVED, WOULD I?!"
Silence hung for a moment. The prince shrank further back, watching in equal parts fascination and terror.
The stillness broke when Fionna spun around on her heel and kicked the queen hard in the stomach. She doubled over and collapsed to the ground, coughing and wheezing to regain her already limited breath.
"I told you to knock off that goopy love junk, you hag," she growled through her teeth. "You better just back the fridge up before I crush your skull."
After another short bout of coughing, Ice Queen raised her head, face twisted into an enraged snarl. "Why? Am I just...not good enough...for you? What is this...this Flame Prince...going to give you...that I can't?"
Fionna drew her sword and pointed it menacingly at her face.
"...AS A FRIEND," the queen added sourly.
Fionna took a moment before answering, enunciating slowly and very clearly, "I came out here to make a new friend. I met this boy who'd never been outside his own kingdom. He wanted to taste freedom so badly it probably hurt. He's the kind of friend I wanted to make. Someone I could make life better for. And frankly, Ice Queen, I don't want his first impression of the outside world to be a nasty, creepy witch like you."
In response, Flame Prince idly kicked at the charred ground, waiting patiently for the scene to end.
"So...that's it, then?" the queen rasped. "No room for interpretation, no second thoughts? Fine. Have it your way, you spoiled little child. Go and get your fingers burned."
She pushed herself up to her feet and straightened her hair. "But I hope for your sake you understand what it is you're doing here. With Flame Prince at large, things are going to be rough. And I'm not just talking about the inevitable troubles you'll find in your marriage. It's a bigger thing than you may realize."
Fionna brandished her sword overhead, standing silent and proud in spite of her flesh burns screaming in pain.
Ice Queen maintained her stare for a few more seconds, then shifted her eyes away. "I'm out of here. Another five minutes and my popsicles will be melted to the sticks." She turned to leave, calling over her shoulder, "I'll see you again soon enough, Fionna. This marriage isn't going to last long, you'll see...".
She coughed a few times, turning it into a breathy cackle as she flew off on a cool evening breeze. The heat must be draining her powers, Fionna mused.
Ow. She returned the sword to her backpack and gingerly ran her better hand along the burn marks. Ow. Ow. Maybe I should stop touching it? Ow. She turned to Flame Prince, who was looking back at her absently.
"I'm sorry you had to meet her, dude," she said remorsefully. "Not everybody out here is bat-spit cray-cray like that."
"Oh, I hope not," Flame Prince replied. "It would be terrible if everyone in the outside world shared the same personality."
"What? Oh...yeah, I guess."
He stepped in closer. "Fionna, thank you for sharing in my first taste of the outside world. You may never know how important this was to me."
She shrugged, still trying to soothe the burns. "It's no big deal, dude. You deserve to see the world, and I think I make a kick-butt guide."
"I think so too," he said, smiling. "Speaking of which, I think we should turn in for the night. If you care to spend the night here with your new husband, there is a spare lava pool in the castle...".
"Oh...that's, um...that's nice and all, but I don't really wanna die, so...I'll pass."
The prince brushed it off with a hand motion. "It's entirely up to you. Just promise you'll meet me here again in the early morning, alright?"
"Right here? Yeah, I can do that."
"Most radical. Good night to you then, Fionna. We shall begin our marvelous world tour at dawn." He leapt back up to the topmost rim of the Fire Kingdom border. "Sweetest dreams."
Fionna waved back, then clutched her arm. Even something as simple as waving hurt now. This wasn't going to be an easy fix...but the results were worth it.
She readjusted her backpack and struck out for home, but she hadn't gone more than five minutes before a bush rustled beside her. The sword was out in a glinting flash, pointed inches from the nose of...a small, stumpy cat named Cake.
"...what are you doing here, Cake?"
Cake pushed the sword aside and stretched an arm up around Fionna's shoulder. "Waitin' for you, of course! I wanna hear all about what happened tonight!"
"You wanna hear...ALL of it?"
"Yes ma'am! ...ESPECIALLY the part when that stupid Snowblower showed up!" she added with a naughty grin.
"What...you knew she was here?"
"Who do you think told her to come find you?"
Fionna almost fell on her bottom. "Are you serious? What the stump, girl?!"
Cake shrugged it off. "Pretty good way to test the plan, don't ya think?"
Fionna grunted and returned the sword to her backpack.
"Now," Cake said as they walked into the emerging moonlight, away from the smoky skies and pungent acid smells of the Fire Kingdom. "Tell me everything...".