XI

"How about a hint," I said, as Rapunzel led me blindfolded—she was getting a little carried away with her reveals—down the hall towards my eleventh gift.

"What kind of hint?" she asked, as she determinedly pulled me forward, her little hand gripping mine.

"Can you tell me if it's animal, vegetable, or mineral?"

"Animal."

"Man or beast?"

"Man."

"Man as in men? Eleven men?"

"Yep!" she said, giving my hand a tug.

Oh, no. I knew she'd been ridiculously impressed by the lords, but what did she have them doing now? I didn't know how many more times I cared to be showed up in front of my girl. She'd pestered me half the evening about stretching and whether I wanted her help. The problem was, yes, I did. Very much.

"What are these men doing, Blondie?" I asked warily, trying to slow our forward motion by leaning back over my heels.

"I can't tell you that, Eugene," she said, groaning at the effort of continuing to drag me forward. "That would ruin the surprise."

"Are they performing?" I asked, basing my guess on the past two gifts.

"Y-es," she replied, sounding a little reluctant to divulge any more information.

"More dancing?" She laughed, as if that was a ridiculous idea. "Singing?" I tried, but her laughter continued. "I don't know then. I give up," I announced, throwing my free arm up in the air in dramatized defeat.

"No, don't give up so easily. You'll get it if you try," she said, and I knew I'd hooked her.

Rapunzel loved a game, and I'd just made this into a guessing game, which she wasn't eager to have end. She even stopped trying to haul me forward, allowing me to slow our pace to a downright leisurely stroll.

"All right. A few more hints," I said, feigning reluctance. "Are these men doing something with their hands or their feet?"

"Hands."

"Are they holding something?"

"Yes."

"What are the things shaped like that they're holding?"

"Um…they're kind of like cylinders, I guess. More irregular though."

That could be anything. She could have gotten me eleven French guys eating baguettes for all I knew, which only drove home that I wasn't actually very good at this game I'd created, since I was no closer to a correct guess than I was five questions ago. But then, I frequently lost at games when playing Rapunzel. It must have been all that practice she had beating her frog.

Baguettes were worth a shot though. "Irregular cylinders, huh? Can you eat them?"

"Oh, goodness! No! You wouldn't want to do that," she said with another laugh.

"Okay, okay, no eating…" I said, as I stumbled over a threshold and just managed to windmill my free arm to stop myself from taking what would have been an embarrassing spill. Straightening up with a tug on my vest, I continued, "What are they doing with these cylindrical things they're holding?"

"They're blowing…"

A blare of trumpets accompanied my frenzied move to free my hand from hers and rip off my blindfold.

My chest collapsed as I exhaled sharply, the pink blindfold fluttering to the ground. Yep. Eleven guys in green livery blowing away on their shiny horns. Nothing untoward about that. Not at all. Just a bunch of cheerful looking trumpeters.

I had to get some sleep. With the chorus of my fine feathered friends keeping my eyes glued to the ceiling of my bedchamber, I'd had plenty of time the previous night to dream up scenarios where a little flexibility might come in handy, but I couldn't afford to follow that line of thought.

Rapunzel hopped up and down alongside me, hands clenched beneath her chin. "Pipers, Eugene! I got you pipers!"

I nodded, smiling back at her like an idiot. "Pipers!" I repeated, my voice too high to be believably sincere to anyone but Rapunzel, who always wanted to believe the best about people.

I needed to think about rainbows and cupcakes and puppies—whatever it was Rapunzel thought about that kept her so sweet and innocent—otherwise I was never going to survive living here in the palace, doors away from the Princess.

I wanted to do the Right Thing. Not just for her sake, but for the King and Queen's sake too. I groaned to myself. I didn't want to let them down. Any of them. It was really difficult loving people and trying to meet their expectations.

"Something wrong?" Rapunzel asked, having either seen my distress written on my face or heard it over the blast of the horns, which were distractingly playing a tune that was strangely familiar, like a learning tool to teach you how to count or something else I'd been schooled in at the orphanage.

"You know what, Blondie?" I said, my hand slipping into the small of her back. "What I really need is a…" Maybe the Queen had the right idea. "Glass of cold milk."