Title: +1, The Fairy Prince
Universe: Yumeiro Patisserie, manga focused
Theme/Topic: 4 + 1
Rating: PG
Character/Pairing/s: Ichigo/Prince Julian
Spoilers/Warnings: Post Chapter 28, character death
Word Count: 431
Summary: There once was a sweet Queen with a court of knights. Of course she would be courted by a Prince.
A/N: I'm an amateur baker when not being a harried student. My other indulgence is fluffy shoujo manga. Good lord, what have I done?
Disclaimer: No harm or infringement intended.
Once there was a prince as fragile as moonbeams and beloved by those who saw him. He was fed all the sweets of the world from gold plates with a silver spoon. He played in an ever lit garden with ever-fruiting trees and he did not so much cook as create magic in a kitchen with nearly every flavor at his fingertips.
Once there was a prince who was stifled in crystal palace. Once there was a prince who thought he knew all that could be known about sweets until he recklessly pulled the cover from a cake that he had known he had not baked (and did not care it was another's). Then he stood aback at cerulean blue sugar pillars, fruit flower cakes, and a gleaming rainbow glass road to milk-pale butterfly wings. Then the prince knew that it was time to leave his cocoon.
Once there was a prince who met a seemingly ordinary girl who dreamed extraordinary sweets. Not a princess in her own mind but perhaps she could be one in a story with parents who doted on a younger sibling, who had knights clamoring at her side, who had a sweet and simple nature to move on the tragedy and remain oblivious of her blessings. A princess who could unknowingly court a prince with blueberry gelee and spun sugar in a bright paper box and then capture wistful affection in lemon crème and vanilla sponge. A princess who stormed a castle and challenged the highest minister for a beloved friend. A princess who then infused loyalty and dignity and self-sacrifice and love into chocolate strawberry roses, tea mousse and amaretto cream. In such a story, of course, no perfectly set custard, no beautifully piped icing, no choux pastry like a flaking bubble, could ever match such an effort.
Once there was a butterfly prince who loved a short-lived princess who loved him back because one could not but love back a prince. They wed in great pomp in the Sweets Kingdom, where she was crowned with a sugar and crystal crown with rubies as red as strawberries. Then she left the butterfly prince for her world, only to come back when during the Lemon Moon. And they were happy together, for he was wise and she was kind and they saw to the prosperity of the kingdom with their love and their joy.
There was a butterfly prince who became a king and married a consort within the Sweets Kingdom and wore his first wife's rubies around his neck for the rest of his life.