[JE] [FAIRY] Silver Cinders on the Road to Matrimony 1/2
Title: Silver Cinders on the Road to Matrimony 1/2
Fandom: KAT-TUN
Pairing: Akame
Rating: PG
Genre: Twisted fairy tale
Word count: Approx. 15,000 in total
Disclaimer: Not mine, damnit.
Summary: lilmatchgirl007 is to blame for this one by suggesting 'Cinderella' as the next fairy tale to get the Akame treatment. Jin dreams of escaping his life of housework, leaving his stepfamily and starting over with only his dog for company. Prince Kame dreams of marrying for love, not politics, and Yamapi...probably dreams of food. When the prince throws a ball to find himself a suitor, a visit from a fairy godmother sets Jin's dreams on the path to becoming reality...
Author's Notes: I play fast and loose with names here, so there's no consistency. First names, surnames, nicknames, you name it. I shamelessly throw in random JE guys, and please be warned that Junno is a dog for most of this fic. A very cute one, with a tail that wags a lot. ^_^
Silver Cinders on the Road to Matrimony 1/2
"Jin! I can't find my headphones! Stop what you're doing and go look for them, all right?"
"Jin! Haven't you finished the laundry yet? I need my best scarf in five minutes or I'm going to be late!"
"Jin!"
"Jin!"
"Where *is* that boy?"
Safely tucked away in the pantry, Jin listened to his stepmother and two stepbrothers above complaining about his failure as a housekeeper. They never thought to look for him there - perhaps because it involved going down to the cellar, and that, they made it perfectly clear, was *his* domain and they weren't going to sully themselves by spending more time understairs than they could help.
At least it meant they couldn't possibly starve him. He munched on a hastily-made sandwich until the voices faded: Koki stormed off in a huff because Nakamaru had borrowed his headphones without asking, Nakamaru remembered he'd actually thrown out his favourite scarf because Koki had accidentally ruined it, and their witch of a mother gave up on her hunt for Jin because it was time to watch Shounen Club.
Their mother. Not *his*.
Jin's real mother had died when he was six. His memories of her, though few and blurry, were all good. She'd been a kind, gentle woman, and when illness had taken her from him, Jin's father had been devastated. He'd done his best to raise Jin alone, to make him into the kind of man he could be proud of.
As far as Jin was concerned, his father had been doing a good job. Evidently, his father hadn't thought so, because he'd come home the weekend of Jin's thirteenth birthday with a wealthy widow in tow, complete with her two sons from her previous marriage.
It hadn't been so bad, when his father had been alive. His new stepmother had ignored him, for the most part, and when she deigned to pay attention to him it was usually to tell him to cut his hair shorter, to stop wearing skirts, and just generally be more manly, like her precious sons. Jin tried to explain that he was only wearing skirts to be like Duke Subaru of Shibutani - the older man had an unusual sense of style - but she told him if he wanted a fashion idol, he'd do better to imitate Prime Minister Nagase.
Even when he took up the guitar, figuring you couldn't get much more macho than cranking the amp up to max and rocking the roof off the house, she told him he should have learned the drums instead, like Count Tadayoshi of Ohkura.
Now, of course, she wouldn't even let him play, claiming he disturbed her delicate nerves with his racket. Since his father's untimely death a year ago at the hands of an inept court assassin - he'd forgotten to put his contacts in, and shot the unfortunate merchant by mistake - Jin had found himself having to hide his guitar, his jewellery, and anything else he treasured, or his stepbrothers would find it.
The only thing his father had left him that he didn't have to hide was the family dog, a cheery black Labrador named Junno. While his stepmother had successfully rid the house of all other traces of husband no. 2, even she had a soft spot for the dog, and her sons positively adored him.
Junno, however, loved Jin the best, and consequently whenever the boy took up hiding in the pantry, the dog went too. Of course, Jin mused, this might have something to do with the fact that he knew he was going to get food...
Junno whined softly and lay down with his head on Jin's lap, hoping to have his ears fondled, and Jin didn't disappoint him. Not that Junno ever showed signs of disappointment. The dog was extraordinarily happy, and Jin had already decided that in one month, when he came of age on his eighteenth birthday and could finally move out, he was going to take his canine companion with him.
"Just you and me, right?" he whispered to Junno, who wagged his tail in response. "We'll go find ourselves somewhere to live in peace, and I'll play guitar and sing for money and you just...uh...be your lovable self."
Unsurprisingly, the dog did not disagree.
But Jin couldn't hide away for too long. His stepmother, free now to run the household as she chose, had dismissed their few servants on the basis that she could save money by simply getting Jin to take over all the chores, and his workload seemed to be never-ending.
A door slammed upstairs, followed almost immediately after by one on the floor above, and Jin gently nudged Junno aside so he could get to his feet, grinning all the while. "That first door must have been Nakamaru going out, and the second one was probably Koki going to listen to music in his room," Jin commented to the dog. He liked to pretend that Junno could understand him, because that way it didn't feel like he was talking to himself - and even that was still more fun than talking to the other three occupants of the house.
Junno whined almost quizzically and cocked his head, as if to ask, "What now?"
"Now," Jin handed the dog the remains of his sandwich, "you and I sneak out of here. I have to go grocery shopping anyway, and if they see me leaving they'll find all sorts of things for me to do before I can go."
Like the time Koki had insisted that Jin help him attach individual sequins to his hooded sweatshirt. *Thousands* of sequins. And then Jin had gotten the blame when some of them accidentally ended up on his stepmother's shoes, resulting in her having hysterics and insisting that he wasn't allowed outside for a month. (Once she'd realised that this meant somebody else had to do the shopping, she'd relented and changed the punishment so that he couldn't go out after dark for a month instead.)
His stepbrothers weren't *mean*, exactly...but they sure were selfish. And lazy. And petty. And quick to mock. To avoid his stepmother's commands to keep his hair short, Jin had adopted the habit of tying it back and wearing a bandana over it - which had the added bonus of keeping the dust out when he cleaned - but his stepbrothers enjoyed nothing better than making fun of his choice of headgear.
Jin put a finger over his lips and nodded to Junno that he must keep silent; Junno wagged his tail again and did a backflip of joy that they were going to go walkies. Jin never grew tired of marvelling at his pet's acrobatics.
They made their way slowly through the cellar to the kitchen, where Jin found his stepbrothers had been adding things to his shopping list again. From the vast quantities of alcohol and snack food added, Jin surmised they were going to be having another one of their parties - or 'strategy meetings' as they liked to refer to them.
Jin had never been invited to one, of course, but he knew what they were about. His stepbrothers invited all their friends over and they all got drunk, ate too much, listened to loud music, and talked about how to snare the prince.
Everyone knew that Prince Kame, only son of King Takki and Queen (it was a non-gendered job title) Tsubasa, preferred men. Given his parents, the skewed male-female birth ratio in the kingdom and the almost total lack of women anywhere in the palace, it wasn't a surprise. So when Kame married, everyone figured it would have to be to a guy.
Result: the topic of how to catch the prince, win his hand in marriage and live in eternal luxury, was the most talked-about at any social gathering involving single men of marriageable age (and some married ones). Even the avowedly straight men frequently had their heads turned by the prince's good looks, after an early ugly duckling phase had, with the help of some hair dye and tweezers, given way to unearthly beauty.
Personally, Jin didn't give a damn what the prince looked like. It wasn't as if they were ever going to meet, after all. His ambitions didn't extend as far as finding himself a prince to marry - right now, he was more concerned with how his stepbrothers kept putting beer on the list for him to buy despite the fact that he was underage...
"Idiots," Jin muttered to himself as he stuffed the list in the back pocket of his torn, stained jeans. "If they want beer so much, they can go buy it themselves."
"But you're going shopping anyway, aren't you?" came a familiar voice from the door.
Koki. Jin winced in anticipation of the hundred-and-one things his stepbrother would no doubt find for him to do. Evidently, it had been the witch who'd locked herself in her room, not the younger of her two sons.
"I'm going shopping for *groceries*," Jin said tersely. "Food we need. If you guys want to get drunk so much, go to a bar."
Koki slung himself round the edge of the doorframe and into the kitchen, crouching down to pet Junno. The dog ducked under his hand and squeezed behind the vegetable rack on the other side of the room, about as far from Koki as he could get without actually leaving.
Jin repressed a smile at Junno's actions and turned his back on Koki, hoping to get out through the kitchen's external door before the other boy could say anything further.
No such luck. His shaven-headed stepbrother gave up on the dog and quickly crossed the kitchen to block Jin's escape route.
"Hey, if you order the beer, we'll let you have some."
It wasn't the first time Koki had dangled this bait in front of him. All the bills were charged to the household account and the shops delivered anyway, but Jin still had to go in person to place and sign the orders. He couldn't order anything he wanted for himself, since his stepmother scrutinised the bills very carefully, and the only money he had of his own had been left to him by his father - and that, he was saving for when he came of age.
"Like you said you would last time?" Jin retorted.
Koki shrugged. "I didn't know Duke Subaru was gonna turn up and drink half a case by himself, did I? You know he doesn't always show."
Grudgingly, Jin conceded that Koki had a point. "Fine, I'll order your stupid beer. But when you guys all throw up 'cause you've had too much, you're cleaning it up yourselves."
"Maybe I will - using your bandana. Couldn't make it any uglier, right?" Koki smirked and headed out, swiping a soda as he went.
Jin breathed a sigh of relief and made a dash for the door, Junno at his heels. He made it outside, got all the way to the gate when he heard a window being thrown open.
"Jin!"
He fixed a smile firmly on his face and turned round to look up at his stepmother, hanging half out of a second-floor window. "Yes, ma'am?"
"The shopping can wait," she called down to him. "This is much more important. Viscount Aiba has generously accepted my dinner invitation and will be here promptly at six. You will serve us dinner at seven, and don't spare the dessert."
Jin groaned. His father, while not nobility himself, had been close to a number of that class and now their sons, mostly of Jin's own generation, were cultivating the friendship of the family he'd left behind.
Most of them. They didn't bother with Jin.
"And if I don't go shopping, there won't be any dessert!" he yelled back.
"You can shop afterwards; there's something else I need you to do first."
"What?"
"Childproof the house!"
Junno howled and hid behind a tree; Jin wished he could do the same. He wouldn't have minded the slave labour so much if was being paid for it, but doing it all for free simply because his father had made a really bad second marriage...there was no honour to be found, there. He couldn't do any sort of paid work until he came of age, not without the witch's consent, but he swore that when he did, it definitely wasn't going to include providing desserts to dumb nobles.
Viscount Aiba was probably going to be around for Koki and Nakamaru's latest 'strategy meeting', too, cooing over the prince's newest shop photos and convincing himself that he had what it took to marry into royalty.
Royalty. Hah. Jin was willing to bet the prince didn't have to spend all afternoon securing the house against the viscount's curious wanderings. He was probably still in bed, recovering from the previous night's misadventures with some handsome young thing, or busy shopping for fabulously expensive accessories in the most exclusive boutiques in the kingdom.
It was all right for some.
-----
Prince Kame, only son of King Takki and Queen (it was a non-gendered job title) Tsubasa, the most eligible bachelor in the entire kingdom, was not, as it happened, still in bed. Nor was he shopping for accessories, expensive or otherwise.
He was, in fact, hiding in the palace's enormous pantry, and like Jin, he was not alone.
Kame's company, however, was human, though just as playful and fluffy. His faithful friend and companion, Yamapi, was standing sentry at the door, keeping a watchful eye out for pursuers while the prince caught his breath.
"Never...hah...seeing...that idiot...again," Kame panted, one hand on his chest.
Yamapi looked appropriately sympathetic. "I told you taking Viscount Kusano to Baron Ryo's birthday party was a mistake. He gets really possessive when he starts drinking."
Kame reflected on their mad dash through the palace gardens, mere steps ahead of his erstwhile suitor, and rolled his eyes. "You don't have to tell me twice. He thinks we're engaged because I asked him to one lousy party!" He pulled a marshmallow out of the bag on a nearby shelf and bit down savagely on the sweet.
He hadn't taken Kusano seriously - never took anybody seriously, so long as they appeared to be more in love with the idea of marrying into the royal family than they were with him - but the boy had seemed...well...eager. And he could dance, too.
Unfortunately, Kusano's crush on Kame had gotten out of hand, to the extent that the prince had spent the better part of his day avoiding him. It wasn't the first time one of his liaisons had blown up in his face, leaving him alone again.
"Why are all the good ones either straight or married?" Kame pondered aloud through a mouthful of marshmallow. "I go to all the right parties, accept all the right dinner invitations, move in all the right circles...what am I doing wrong?"
"You know I hate to suggest this, but," Yamapi's voice was unusually serious, "you could try girls. It would make the business of providing your heir a lot simpler too. Not like all that business your parents went through with the sorcerer and male pregnancy and everything..."
As usually happened when he started talking about Takki and Tsubasa, Yamapi began to drift off into a kind of dreamy, dazed state, which Kame would have found quite charming if they hadn't been *his* parents. Sure, they still looked like a pair of twenty-somethings, but they were both almost forty and Kame found his friend's blind adoration for them both to be a little...creepy.
Kame shook his head and swallowed the remains of his sweet. "I don't think girls are the answer, Pi."
"You just don't want to marry anyone who might be prettier than you. I can understand that."
The prince looked thoughtfully down at his beautifully painted nails. Were there any girls out there prettier than he was? It was a moot point, since he wasn't attracted to them, and with his parents setting a precedent no one was going to complain if he married a man.
Actually, as long as he got married soon, no one was going to complain if he married his *car*. The insufferable ministers who surrounded his parents kept hinting that a royal marriage would be good for the people, good for their relationships with neighbouring kingdoms, good for the crops, even.
Whether or not it would be good for the prince, they never said, and privately, Kame wasn't sure they cared. His parents, who definitely did care, were saying more or less the same things, only with the emphasis that oh, wouldn't it be nice if he settled down soon and gave them some grandchildren while they were still young enough to play baseball with them, and wouldn't Kame be happy if he had someone to share his life with the way they had? (This conversation inevitably ended with his parents giving each other sappy looks and retreating to the Royal Bedroom, at which point Kame made his escape.)
"I don't care about the looks," he said finally. "When I marry, I want it to be someone who can make me happy - and someone whose happiness I can actually care about. I haven't found anyone like that yet."
Yamapi pouted and pretended to be hurt. "Aww, Kame doesn't care about my happiness?"
Grinning, Kame swatted his friend lightly on the shoulder. "I can't marry you, can I? All your lovers would be lining up to challenge me to a duel!"
"I guess I can't be responsible for getting the heir killed."
"Are you implying that I'd lose?"
Both boys looked at each other and burst out laughing, attracting the attention of one of the underchefs. He didn't have the authority to tell them to leave, but did drop hints that if Viscount Kusano were to appear in the kitchens, he might be forced to reveal their hiding place unless they moved on.
"Does *everyone* know how disastrous my love life is?" Kame complained as the two of them sneaked out of the pantry and took off full-pelt for the hedge maze, not stopping until they were happily ensconced in the centre where Kusano would never find them.
"Your love life is the hottest gossip in the palace," Yamapi remarked. "You hadn't noticed?"
Kame was aghast. "Of course not!"
"Everyone's desperate to find out who you'll marry so they know who to start sucking up to."
"Oh."
The young prince sprawled out on the grass, resting his head on his hands, and watched Yamapi make a daisy chain. He'd been quite right to say that he couldn't marry his friend, for all that he loved him dearly. Kame wanted to meet someone new, someone different. Someone who didn't spend all his time on the endless round of parties, charitable events and hunts that seemed to take up the bulk of the leisure time of young nobles.
Wouldn't it give the ministers a fit if he suddenly announced he wanted to wed a commoner? Kame was sure of it. But how to meet one?
"We need a ball," he declared without warning, causing Yamapi to drop his daisy chain.
"Any type in particular? Football? Baseball? Tennis?"
"Not that kind of ball," Kame said impatiently. "A party!"
Yamapi propped himself up one elbow. "Sounds good."
"And we'll throw it open to all single, non-criminal men between the ages of sixteen and thirty, regardless of rank."
"Not so good. You want to invite commoners?"
"I need a *change*, Pi! I need to meet new people."
"That's fine," Yamapi said dubiously, "but what will everyone think?"
"I'm the prince," Kame said sweetly. "They'll think whatever I tell them to."
-----
The household of the Widow Akanishi was in a frenzy. That morning, an invitation had arrived in the mail to invite all single males in the house between the ages of sixteen and thirty to a royal ball, thrown by Prince Kame himself. The gossip all round town was that the prince was having such bad luck with nobles, he was willing to look to other classes to find himself a consort, and Koki and Nakamaru were already picturing themselves living a life of luxury in the palace.
Jin wasn't.
"The invitation doesn't include you," his stepmother said nastily, snatching it out of his hand when he attempted to read it. "The prince would never be interested in someone like you, who spends all his time up to his filthy elbows in housework and doesn't even own a single piece of clothing without a rent or tear."
"And whose fault is it that I'm doing all the housework?" Jin muttered. He didn't care about meeting the prince, but he did want to go to the ball. He needed to get out, even if it was only for one night, and remind himself that there was a better life out there somewhere, one that didn't involve sweeping and doing dishes.
Nakamaru swanned through and seized the invitation for himself, clutching it to his chest with a sigh. "When I marry the prince, we'll all go live in the palace," he said happily. "Then you'll have lots of help with the housework."
Yes, all those other servants... "Hey!"
Junno, sensing his master was offended, immediately nipped at Nakamaru's ankles in protest.
Koki laughed. "I'll be the one marrying the prince." He hooked his thumbs in his thick gold chain and held it out from his chest, bragging, "Who could resist some of this?"
"Now, now, boys," their mother said hurriedly. "We mustn't fight over this. Of course one of you will marry the prince, but right now we need to ensure that you don't just beat out the competition, you absolutely slaughter them. And we know what that means, don't we?"
Jin knew only too well, and trudged off to fetch his sewing kit. It was time to make his stepbrothers look fit for a king - or at least a prince.
Three days, many yards of material and not a great deal of sleep later, and Jin thought he'd done pretty well, considering the constant interruptions from his stepmother, and Koki and Nakamaru insisting on practising their rapping and beatboxing respectively while he was fitting them, the better to catch the prince's attention. Jin considered sending an anonymous note to the palace to warn the prince that if he valued his peace and quiet at all, he should stay well away from both of them.
In truth, he didn't begrudge his stepbrothers their chance at happiness - but he didn't think either of them were concerned with the prince at all, only with marrying into royalty. That wasn't a recipe for a happy marriage.
Besides, they were going off for a night of fun, all dressed up, while Jin was going to be stuck at home, doing the chores, wearing his old, ripped jeans, and a faded shirt. He'd outgrown all his decent clothing, had to resort to making more from the remains, but the outfits were still plain and practical - nothing he could wear for a ball. Besides, if he'd possessed anything obviously fancy, his stepbrothers would long since have "borrowed" it and forgotten to give it back.
"I'll be over at the spectator's gallery with the other proud parents," the witch promised her sons. "I want to see their faces turn green with envy when the prince picks one of *my* boys."
"Then they'll match Koki's outfit," Nakamaru sniped.
Koki sneered. "At least I don't look like a disco ball!"
He'd opted to go down the casual route, wearing classic jeans and a green 'JOKER' shirt, beautifully trimmed and decorated, designed to leave the prince in no doubt that here was a truly macho man.
Nakamaru, on the other hand, was resplendent in a shiny purple suit, complete with tie and hat, intending to dazzle the prince with his elegance.
Notwithstanding the sour expressions on both their faces, Jin thought they both looked pretty good. He only got a brief moment to admire his handiwork, unfortunately - his stepmother ushered them both out the door. As a parting shot, she uttered, "But I'm not so cruel as to make you miss your brothers' moment of glory. If you can iron every scrap of material in the house and have it all crisp and smooth before my return, you may go to the ball. Not that you have anything to wear, of course, and they may not let you in, dressed like that..."
She turned on her heel, swept her black, flowing cape about her and practically danced out the front door.
Left to his own devices, Jin pulled out the ironing board, thought about the sheer amount of linen in the house, and gave up before he even got started. It was an impossible task. His stepmother was a complete clothes horse and his stepbrothers were worse, and that wasn't even including all the bedding.
Not only was the likelihood of him completing all the ironing a slim one, but his stepmother was right - he didn't have a thing to wear. Moreover, they'd taken the car - not that he'd been allowed to get his license, anyway - so he'd have had to go by public transport. Going to a royal ball by bus seemed wrong, somehow.
Damn it, it wasn't fair! Jin had just as much right to go to the ball as his stepbrothers - more so, even, because the invitation had been addressed to the Akanishi Family and he was the only real Akanishi left.
He sank down in a pile of sheets, creasing them further, and tickled Junno's tummy when the dog curled up with him.
"At least one of us is happy," he murmured.
"You can both be happy," said a voice from behind him.
Jin rolled over on the sheets - the dog did the same, thinking they were playing - and turned to look at the intruder. He was slender, of average height, with longish black hair and slightly-too-pale-to-be-healthy skin. His clothing matched his hair - black trousers topped by a loose black shirt with some kind of knitted vest thrown over it, and finished off with silver-buckled black boots.
All that black could only mean one thing, and Jin ducked under the sheets in terror. "The Grim Reaper!"
"What?" The intruder clomped over to Jin, pulled the sheets off his head, and gave him an exasperated look as he hauled him to his feet. "People are always saying that. I think I'm going to have to dye my hair, or wear flannel shirts, or something. I'm not the Grim Reaper, so stop cowering!"
"You're not?"
"I'm not." The intruder was most firm on this point. "My name is Ueda, and I'm a fairy godmother."
"Don't you mean, 'godfather'? You are a guy, aren't you?"
"It's a non-gendered job title," Ueda said testily. "Do you want my help or not?"
"Uh..." Jin wasn't sure what to make of it all. Fairy godmothers generally worked magic, or so he'd heard, and he'd never had any experience with that. He opted to err on the side of caution. "Help with what, exactly?"
"To go to the ball, of course!" Despite his gloomy appearance, Ueda was smiling brightly. "I know you want to go. You have every right to go."
"But I can't go!" Jin wailed. "I don't have a thing to wear and I don't have time to make anything because I've got all this ironing to do!"
The fairy snorted. "Mortals. So hung up on housework. Give me a minute."
Small tornados of fairy dust whirled from room to room, neatly folding and flattening any fabric they found, with the unexpected benefit of cleaning it at the same time. Jin watched, astounded, while Junno darted playfully between the spirals, occasionally running round in circles so he could join in with the fun.
"A-Amazing!" Jin stammered. "I'd have taken all night to do that!"
"You have better things to do with your night," Ueda assured him. "Take off the bandana and untie your hair."
Jin obeyed, letting his tousled brown curls spill down to his shoulders; nobody, not even his stepfamily, had seen him like that, and it changed his whole appearance.
The fairy appraised him critically, one hand on his black-clad hip. "Hmm," he said. "That's not a bad start. Now I need to find you something to wear. How do you feel about silk?"
Before Jin could answer that yes, he loved silk but hadn't worn any since he was twelve, Ueda snapped his fingers and Jin's tatty, disheveled clothing disappeared. In its place, as Jin discovered when he caught sight of himself in a mirror, were smart black trousers, a white silk shirt that hung loosely to mid-thigh, and an elegant black coat that fitted snugly over the rest and made Jin seem taller than he really was.
"I like that," Ueda declared. "The simple, clean, black and white look - it's a classic. You'll really stand out amongst all those overdressed, brightly-coloured peacocks. The prince won't be able to help noticing you."
Jin shivered, though out of excitement or anxiety he couldn't have said. The idea of meeting an actual prince was an overwhelming one; just being in the palace was more than he'd ever dreamed of.
"And if we just tidy your hair a bit..." Ueda snapped his fingers again and another fairy dust tornado formed, this time around Jin, leaving him cleaned, brushed and faintly lemony-fresh. "That's better. Don't know how the prince feels about calluses, though, so you're going to wear gloves."
In the time it took Jin to blink, black, fingerless gloves of softest leather appeared on his hands. He flexed experimentally, loving the way the material gleamed in the light. It had been a long time since he'd been able to preen on his own account.
"You clean up quite well," Ueda remarked. "Maybe I should take you home with me." At Jin's confused look, he added, "Just kidding. We're almost done here; you've a pierced ear, haven't you?"
Jin's father had let him get his ear pierced for his eighth birthday, but Jin hadn't worn an earring in it since the old man's death. There was one in particular that he didn't want his stepbrothers to realise that he still owned.
It was as good a time as any to remove it from its hiding place.
"I have," he replied, "and I know what I want to wear. Wait here a minute."
Five minutes later, Jin returned with a silver lady dangling from one ear, and necklace to match lying against his chest where the shirt gaped open. The set was a present from his father, a custom-made fifteenth birthday gift, and the design was unique. It was the most precious thing he owned; and, he thought, the most beautiful.
"Bravo!" his fairy godmother applauded. "Matches perfectly. Now for a hat," another snap of the fingers, "to make you a real man of mystery. I hear the prince is looking for someone different, and you want to make him work for it, don't you?"
"I'm not going there to snare the prince. I've never even met him!" Jin pointed out, but his protests fell on deaf ears.
"We'll soon fix that," Ueda said tartly. "But first you have to get there."
"Can't you just snap your fingers again and magic me there?" Jin was hoping to avoid the bus, and there was no way he was going to be able to get a taxi on the biggest night of the social calendar.
"Magic doesn't work like that. There is something I *can* do, though." Ueda pursed his lips thoughtfully, then went outside, Junno trotting along at his heels. After some initial apprehension, the dog had taken to Ueda easily enough, recognising him as the person responsible for making those fun whirlwind toys.
Standing on the driveway, Ueda fished a toy car from his pocket and set it down on the gravel. One finger-click later and Jin had his ride: a brand-new, shiny black Ferrari, top down and ready for action.
Only one problem: Jin had never learned to drive. The witch wouldn't let him.
Ueda sighed. "I don't like transfiguring living creatures, but I don't have a choice this time. Come here, boy."
Jin immediately stepped forward, then realised Ueda had been talking to Junno, not him. The fairy bent down and let the dog nuzzle his cheek, then set a hand on his back.
Under Ueda's touch, the dog began to grow, stretching until he lay a full six feet tall on the ground. That in itself was astonishing, but the encore was far more spectacular.
Junno, the cheerful black Labrador, became Junno, the even more cheerful, black leather-clad human.
"Jin, meet your driver. He may not have a license but he's fully trained," Ueda informed him.
Jin took a step back from the grinning former-dog, not so stunned by power of the magic as he was by the brightness of the man's smile.
Junno was practically jumping up and down with excitement, and if he'd still had a tail, it would've been wagging. "Hi! I'll be your driver tonight!"
"How does a dog learn to drive?" Jin spluttered.
"Crash course," Ueda said, and smirked as Jin winced at the joke. "I can implant the knowledge in his head because his little doggy brain isn't taken up with all sorts of useless things, like ironing. Just don't expect much in the way of conversation."
"Can I have a treat?" Junno asked, scratching at the door to get back in the house. "I've been a good boy - everyone tells me so!"
Jin sighed and patted his driver on the head, which seemed to mollify him. "If you can get me to the ball and back in one piece, you can have all the treats you want," he promised.
Ueda looked thrilled. "Off you go, and don't you dare stand in the corner all night after all my hard work! Get out there and dance!"
"I intend to." Jin was deadly earnest about this, having been denied a chance to give his hips a real workout for years.
Junno sprang nimbly into the driver's seat, caught the keys Ueda threw at him, and started the engine. Jin tried to ignore the fact that he was about to be driven by a dog, and climbed in after him.
"One last thing," Ueda interrupted their joyful goodbyes. "When the clock strikes midnight, the magic begins to wear off, so you'd better be home by then."
"Midnight?" Jin sounded vaguely disgusted. "Can't you at least make it three a.m.? Who leaves a party at midnight?"
"Leave *before* midnight," Ueda advised, "and that's just the way the magic works. Ignore my warning and it'll be a long walk home for you and your pet."
Trudging home from the palace in the middle of the night, his dog at his side, did not hold much appeal for Jin. Midnight it was.
-----
The ball started at eight o'clock. By five minutes past eight, Kame was regretting his decision to invite...well, anybody except his closest friends, really. The whole occasion was turning into an unmitigated disaster of the highest order, beginning with the gate guards accidentally forgetting that Viscount Kusano was barred from the palace.
Luckily, Kame had still been meeting and greeting when his stalker turned up, and had managed to avoid dancing with him on the grounds that he couldn't possibly be introduced to every guest if he was whirling round the ballroom with Kusano, could he?
By ten o'clock, he was considering feigning an injured ankle. It wouldn't have been difficult - most of his dance partners thus far had been clumsy at best, downright dangerous at worst. The nobles were better at it, since they had more practice, but even they seemed to have two left feet once they got near Kame.
"This isn't working," he complained to Yamapi, who'd finally stopped dancing long enough to rehydrate himself.
Yamapi managed to look both delirious and clueless at the same time. "What isn't working?"
"This!" Kame waved his hand to indicate the ballroom in full swing. "This mess! I must have danced with half the men in here already, and they've either been arrogant jerks who insist on telling me how lucky I'd be to have them, or they've been timid little mice who are too shy to do more than stammer out a few flatteries."
His friend gave him a lazy grin. "You're obviously dancing with all the wrong people."
"All the right people are only dancing with each other," Kame moped.
Sure enough, many couples had formed on the dancefloor, refusing to let anyone else cut in. Why, the young Baron Shige, his father lately killed by the same horrible disease that had left the parents of many of his peers deceased, appeared to be getting over his grief rather well with the help of his neighbour, Count Koyama. Duke Subaru had even gone so far as to link up with seven others, forming a tight circle of eight, and interlopers intruded at their peril.
"But isn't that good? You don't want to hook up with anyone who's already in a relationship, do you?" Yamapi glanced sidelong at the prince. "Or has Kame decided he wants to be a homewrecker?"
For the first time that evening, Kame cracked a smile. "I'm not *that* desperate!"
"Then stop looking like you are. Get back out there and dance like you don't have a care in the world, because good-looking guys like us shouldn't have any worries."
"Tell that to the ministers who keep hassling me," Kame suggested, but he knew Yamapi was right. He had to look like he was having fun, or he was never going to have any, and it would be a shame to waste the outfit.
He was, according to his magic mirror, the fairest of them all, but since his parents had bought him the mirror the day he started experimenting with nail polish he wasn't entirely sure he could trust its objectivity. When even the ordinary mirrors started telling him how handsome he looked, he knew he was dressed to kill.
Kame had gone for simple, classic, black and white elegance, hoping (yet failing) to set the tone for the inhabitants of the ballroom. The black silk shirt suggested a sensualist, while the crisp, white suit and tie hinted at the prince's suave, serious side. A matching hat lent a jaunty air to the whole outfit, and overall, Kame thought he was probably the best-dressed person in the ballroom.
(Yamapi had vied for the position but lost on account of the excess of fur - *so* last season - and half the guests were decked out like tropical birds, requiring Kame to don his designer sunglasses before he could approach them.)
"Sure, if I can get any of them on the dancefloor," Yamapi agreed and spun off into the night, beer in hand and all the come-hither he could muster glinting in his eyes.
Kame sighed and ducked behind the banners, found his parents canoodling there and beat a hasty retreat in the direction of the doors, under the pretext of requiring some fresh air. He didn't get very far. The great doors were flung open, silencing the entire room, and a newcomer, unannounced, was ushered in.
The herald was plainly flustered, searching his lists for the guest's name to no avail, and from where Kame was watching, the young man declined to give a name.
He didn't need one, Kame decided. The stranger was of the right gender, seemed to fit the age requirements, and was dressed far too nicely to be a common criminal. Whether or not he was single...Kame intended to find that out for himself.
"Let him in!" he called, and the herald gratefully stepped aside to let the newcomer pass.
The ballroom was immediately filled with a low buzz of gossip, the like not heard since last week, and the noise level increased as the stranger walked slowly towards Kame. Dancers and wallflowers alike shuffled towards the outskirts of the room, forming a rough gauntlet through which the young man had to pass, and none lost a chance to gawk.
The prince, reluctant though he was to admit to it, was gawking too, only much less obviously and in a more refined way. He was in good company. All heads turned to stare at the black-clad stranger, who glided effortlessly across the room, projecting an aura of casual indifference to the attention he was receiving.
Kame was used to leaving others speechless - it was one of the perks of being a) royalty and b) impossibly gorgeous. He wasn't used to experiencing it from the other side. Wild brown curls spilled out from under the young man's hat but his face was almost entirely in shadow, and the prince had no clue as to his identity.
Based on the rumours he could hear flying behind him, neither did anyone else.
"He's obviously a foreign prince," one voice whispered, and another burst in with, "I think he must be one of Lord Jun's models!" A cry of "King Takki's secret lovechild!" was hastily suppressed by the queen's supporters, and the offending party tossed in the Royal Swimming Pool as punishment.
The stranger declined to enlighten them, and continued his approach till he stood a reasonable distance from the prince, ever step he took corresponding to an increase in Kame's heartrate. "Thank you, Your Highness," he said, and half the guests sighed in satisfaction at his voice, which was respectful but not awed, musical but not theatrical.
Kame didn't answer, merely held out his hand, palm down, for the stranger to kiss.
Part 2
Fandom: KAT-TUN
Pairing: Akame
Rating: PG
Genre: Twisted fairy tale
Word count: Approx. 15,000 in total
Disclaimer: Not mine, damnit.
Summary: lilmatchgirl007 is to blame for this one by suggesting 'Cinderella' as the next fairy tale to get the Akame treatment. Jin dreams of escaping his life of housework, leaving his stepfamily and starting over with only his dog for company. Prince Kame dreams of marrying for love, not politics, and Yamapi...probably dreams of food. When the prince throws a ball to find himself a suitor, a visit from a fairy godmother sets Jin's dreams on the path to becoming reality...
Author's Notes: I play fast and loose with names here, so there's no consistency. First names, surnames, nicknames, you name it. I shamelessly throw in random JE guys, and please be warned that Junno is a dog for most of this fic. A very cute one, with a tail that wags a lot. ^_^
Silver Cinders on the Road to Matrimony 1/2
"Jin! I can't find my headphones! Stop what you're doing and go look for them, all right?"
"Jin! Haven't you finished the laundry yet? I need my best scarf in five minutes or I'm going to be late!"
"Jin!"
"Jin!"
"Where *is* that boy?"
Safely tucked away in the pantry, Jin listened to his stepmother and two stepbrothers above complaining about his failure as a housekeeper. They never thought to look for him there - perhaps because it involved going down to the cellar, and that, they made it perfectly clear, was *his* domain and they weren't going to sully themselves by spending more time understairs than they could help.
At least it meant they couldn't possibly starve him. He munched on a hastily-made sandwich until the voices faded: Koki stormed off in a huff because Nakamaru had borrowed his headphones without asking, Nakamaru remembered he'd actually thrown out his favourite scarf because Koki had accidentally ruined it, and their witch of a mother gave up on her hunt for Jin because it was time to watch Shounen Club.
Their mother. Not *his*.
Jin's real mother had died when he was six. His memories of her, though few and blurry, were all good. She'd been a kind, gentle woman, and when illness had taken her from him, Jin's father had been devastated. He'd done his best to raise Jin alone, to make him into the kind of man he could be proud of.
As far as Jin was concerned, his father had been doing a good job. Evidently, his father hadn't thought so, because he'd come home the weekend of Jin's thirteenth birthday with a wealthy widow in tow, complete with her two sons from her previous marriage.
It hadn't been so bad, when his father had been alive. His new stepmother had ignored him, for the most part, and when she deigned to pay attention to him it was usually to tell him to cut his hair shorter, to stop wearing skirts, and just generally be more manly, like her precious sons. Jin tried to explain that he was only wearing skirts to be like Duke Subaru of Shibutani - the older man had an unusual sense of style - but she told him if he wanted a fashion idol, he'd do better to imitate Prime Minister Nagase.
Even when he took up the guitar, figuring you couldn't get much more macho than cranking the amp up to max and rocking the roof off the house, she told him he should have learned the drums instead, like Count Tadayoshi of Ohkura.
Now, of course, she wouldn't even let him play, claiming he disturbed her delicate nerves with his racket. Since his father's untimely death a year ago at the hands of an inept court assassin - he'd forgotten to put his contacts in, and shot the unfortunate merchant by mistake - Jin had found himself having to hide his guitar, his jewellery, and anything else he treasured, or his stepbrothers would find it.
The only thing his father had left him that he didn't have to hide was the family dog, a cheery black Labrador named Junno. While his stepmother had successfully rid the house of all other traces of husband no. 2, even she had a soft spot for the dog, and her sons positively adored him.
Junno, however, loved Jin the best, and consequently whenever the boy took up hiding in the pantry, the dog went too. Of course, Jin mused, this might have something to do with the fact that he knew he was going to get food...
Junno whined softly and lay down with his head on Jin's lap, hoping to have his ears fondled, and Jin didn't disappoint him. Not that Junno ever showed signs of disappointment. The dog was extraordinarily happy, and Jin had already decided that in one month, when he came of age on his eighteenth birthday and could finally move out, he was going to take his canine companion with him.
"Just you and me, right?" he whispered to Junno, who wagged his tail in response. "We'll go find ourselves somewhere to live in peace, and I'll play guitar and sing for money and you just...uh...be your lovable self."
Unsurprisingly, the dog did not disagree.
But Jin couldn't hide away for too long. His stepmother, free now to run the household as she chose, had dismissed their few servants on the basis that she could save money by simply getting Jin to take over all the chores, and his workload seemed to be never-ending.
A door slammed upstairs, followed almost immediately after by one on the floor above, and Jin gently nudged Junno aside so he could get to his feet, grinning all the while. "That first door must have been Nakamaru going out, and the second one was probably Koki going to listen to music in his room," Jin commented to the dog. He liked to pretend that Junno could understand him, because that way it didn't feel like he was talking to himself - and even that was still more fun than talking to the other three occupants of the house.
Junno whined almost quizzically and cocked his head, as if to ask, "What now?"
"Now," Jin handed the dog the remains of his sandwich, "you and I sneak out of here. I have to go grocery shopping anyway, and if they see me leaving they'll find all sorts of things for me to do before I can go."
Like the time Koki had insisted that Jin help him attach individual sequins to his hooded sweatshirt. *Thousands* of sequins. And then Jin had gotten the blame when some of them accidentally ended up on his stepmother's shoes, resulting in her having hysterics and insisting that he wasn't allowed outside for a month. (Once she'd realised that this meant somebody else had to do the shopping, she'd relented and changed the punishment so that he couldn't go out after dark for a month instead.)
His stepbrothers weren't *mean*, exactly...but they sure were selfish. And lazy. And petty. And quick to mock. To avoid his stepmother's commands to keep his hair short, Jin had adopted the habit of tying it back and wearing a bandana over it - which had the added bonus of keeping the dust out when he cleaned - but his stepbrothers enjoyed nothing better than making fun of his choice of headgear.
Jin put a finger over his lips and nodded to Junno that he must keep silent; Junno wagged his tail again and did a backflip of joy that they were going to go walkies. Jin never grew tired of marvelling at his pet's acrobatics.
They made their way slowly through the cellar to the kitchen, where Jin found his stepbrothers had been adding things to his shopping list again. From the vast quantities of alcohol and snack food added, Jin surmised they were going to be having another one of their parties - or 'strategy meetings' as they liked to refer to them.
Jin had never been invited to one, of course, but he knew what they were about. His stepbrothers invited all their friends over and they all got drunk, ate too much, listened to loud music, and talked about how to snare the prince.
Everyone knew that Prince Kame, only son of King Takki and Queen (it was a non-gendered job title) Tsubasa, preferred men. Given his parents, the skewed male-female birth ratio in the kingdom and the almost total lack of women anywhere in the palace, it wasn't a surprise. So when Kame married, everyone figured it would have to be to a guy.
Result: the topic of how to catch the prince, win his hand in marriage and live in eternal luxury, was the most talked-about at any social gathering involving single men of marriageable age (and some married ones). Even the avowedly straight men frequently had their heads turned by the prince's good looks, after an early ugly duckling phase had, with the help of some hair dye and tweezers, given way to unearthly beauty.
Personally, Jin didn't give a damn what the prince looked like. It wasn't as if they were ever going to meet, after all. His ambitions didn't extend as far as finding himself a prince to marry - right now, he was more concerned with how his stepbrothers kept putting beer on the list for him to buy despite the fact that he was underage...
"Idiots," Jin muttered to himself as he stuffed the list in the back pocket of his torn, stained jeans. "If they want beer so much, they can go buy it themselves."
"But you're going shopping anyway, aren't you?" came a familiar voice from the door.
Koki. Jin winced in anticipation of the hundred-and-one things his stepbrother would no doubt find for him to do. Evidently, it had been the witch who'd locked herself in her room, not the younger of her two sons.
"I'm going shopping for *groceries*," Jin said tersely. "Food we need. If you guys want to get drunk so much, go to a bar."
Koki slung himself round the edge of the doorframe and into the kitchen, crouching down to pet Junno. The dog ducked under his hand and squeezed behind the vegetable rack on the other side of the room, about as far from Koki as he could get without actually leaving.
Jin repressed a smile at Junno's actions and turned his back on Koki, hoping to get out through the kitchen's external door before the other boy could say anything further.
No such luck. His shaven-headed stepbrother gave up on the dog and quickly crossed the kitchen to block Jin's escape route.
"Hey, if you order the beer, we'll let you have some."
It wasn't the first time Koki had dangled this bait in front of him. All the bills were charged to the household account and the shops delivered anyway, but Jin still had to go in person to place and sign the orders. He couldn't order anything he wanted for himself, since his stepmother scrutinised the bills very carefully, and the only money he had of his own had been left to him by his father - and that, he was saving for when he came of age.
"Like you said you would last time?" Jin retorted.
Koki shrugged. "I didn't know Duke Subaru was gonna turn up and drink half a case by himself, did I? You know he doesn't always show."
Grudgingly, Jin conceded that Koki had a point. "Fine, I'll order your stupid beer. But when you guys all throw up 'cause you've had too much, you're cleaning it up yourselves."
"Maybe I will - using your bandana. Couldn't make it any uglier, right?" Koki smirked and headed out, swiping a soda as he went.
Jin breathed a sigh of relief and made a dash for the door, Junno at his heels. He made it outside, got all the way to the gate when he heard a window being thrown open.
"Jin!"
He fixed a smile firmly on his face and turned round to look up at his stepmother, hanging half out of a second-floor window. "Yes, ma'am?"
"The shopping can wait," she called down to him. "This is much more important. Viscount Aiba has generously accepted my dinner invitation and will be here promptly at six. You will serve us dinner at seven, and don't spare the dessert."
Jin groaned. His father, while not nobility himself, had been close to a number of that class and now their sons, mostly of Jin's own generation, were cultivating the friendship of the family he'd left behind.
Most of them. They didn't bother with Jin.
"And if I don't go shopping, there won't be any dessert!" he yelled back.
"You can shop afterwards; there's something else I need you to do first."
"What?"
"Childproof the house!"
Junno howled and hid behind a tree; Jin wished he could do the same. He wouldn't have minded the slave labour so much if was being paid for it, but doing it all for free simply because his father had made a really bad second marriage...there was no honour to be found, there. He couldn't do any sort of paid work until he came of age, not without the witch's consent, but he swore that when he did, it definitely wasn't going to include providing desserts to dumb nobles.
Viscount Aiba was probably going to be around for Koki and Nakamaru's latest 'strategy meeting', too, cooing over the prince's newest shop photos and convincing himself that he had what it took to marry into royalty.
Royalty. Hah. Jin was willing to bet the prince didn't have to spend all afternoon securing the house against the viscount's curious wanderings. He was probably still in bed, recovering from the previous night's misadventures with some handsome young thing, or busy shopping for fabulously expensive accessories in the most exclusive boutiques in the kingdom.
It was all right for some.
-----
Prince Kame, only son of King Takki and Queen (it was a non-gendered job title) Tsubasa, the most eligible bachelor in the entire kingdom, was not, as it happened, still in bed. Nor was he shopping for accessories, expensive or otherwise.
He was, in fact, hiding in the palace's enormous pantry, and like Jin, he was not alone.
Kame's company, however, was human, though just as playful and fluffy. His faithful friend and companion, Yamapi, was standing sentry at the door, keeping a watchful eye out for pursuers while the prince caught his breath.
"Never...hah...seeing...that idiot...again," Kame panted, one hand on his chest.
Yamapi looked appropriately sympathetic. "I told you taking Viscount Kusano to Baron Ryo's birthday party was a mistake. He gets really possessive when he starts drinking."
Kame reflected on their mad dash through the palace gardens, mere steps ahead of his erstwhile suitor, and rolled his eyes. "You don't have to tell me twice. He thinks we're engaged because I asked him to one lousy party!" He pulled a marshmallow out of the bag on a nearby shelf and bit down savagely on the sweet.
He hadn't taken Kusano seriously - never took anybody seriously, so long as they appeared to be more in love with the idea of marrying into the royal family than they were with him - but the boy had seemed...well...eager. And he could dance, too.
Unfortunately, Kusano's crush on Kame had gotten out of hand, to the extent that the prince had spent the better part of his day avoiding him. It wasn't the first time one of his liaisons had blown up in his face, leaving him alone again.
"Why are all the good ones either straight or married?" Kame pondered aloud through a mouthful of marshmallow. "I go to all the right parties, accept all the right dinner invitations, move in all the right circles...what am I doing wrong?"
"You know I hate to suggest this, but," Yamapi's voice was unusually serious, "you could try girls. It would make the business of providing your heir a lot simpler too. Not like all that business your parents went through with the sorcerer and male pregnancy and everything..."
As usually happened when he started talking about Takki and Tsubasa, Yamapi began to drift off into a kind of dreamy, dazed state, which Kame would have found quite charming if they hadn't been *his* parents. Sure, they still looked like a pair of twenty-somethings, but they were both almost forty and Kame found his friend's blind adoration for them both to be a little...creepy.
Kame shook his head and swallowed the remains of his sweet. "I don't think girls are the answer, Pi."
"You just don't want to marry anyone who might be prettier than you. I can understand that."
The prince looked thoughtfully down at his beautifully painted nails. Were there any girls out there prettier than he was? It was a moot point, since he wasn't attracted to them, and with his parents setting a precedent no one was going to complain if he married a man.
Actually, as long as he got married soon, no one was going to complain if he married his *car*. The insufferable ministers who surrounded his parents kept hinting that a royal marriage would be good for the people, good for their relationships with neighbouring kingdoms, good for the crops, even.
Whether or not it would be good for the prince, they never said, and privately, Kame wasn't sure they cared. His parents, who definitely did care, were saying more or less the same things, only with the emphasis that oh, wouldn't it be nice if he settled down soon and gave them some grandchildren while they were still young enough to play baseball with them, and wouldn't Kame be happy if he had someone to share his life with the way they had? (This conversation inevitably ended with his parents giving each other sappy looks and retreating to the Royal Bedroom, at which point Kame made his escape.)
"I don't care about the looks," he said finally. "When I marry, I want it to be someone who can make me happy - and someone whose happiness I can actually care about. I haven't found anyone like that yet."
Yamapi pouted and pretended to be hurt. "Aww, Kame doesn't care about my happiness?"
Grinning, Kame swatted his friend lightly on the shoulder. "I can't marry you, can I? All your lovers would be lining up to challenge me to a duel!"
"I guess I can't be responsible for getting the heir killed."
"Are you implying that I'd lose?"
Both boys looked at each other and burst out laughing, attracting the attention of one of the underchefs. He didn't have the authority to tell them to leave, but did drop hints that if Viscount Kusano were to appear in the kitchens, he might be forced to reveal their hiding place unless they moved on.
"Does *everyone* know how disastrous my love life is?" Kame complained as the two of them sneaked out of the pantry and took off full-pelt for the hedge maze, not stopping until they were happily ensconced in the centre where Kusano would never find them.
"Your love life is the hottest gossip in the palace," Yamapi remarked. "You hadn't noticed?"
Kame was aghast. "Of course not!"
"Everyone's desperate to find out who you'll marry so they know who to start sucking up to."
"Oh."
The young prince sprawled out on the grass, resting his head on his hands, and watched Yamapi make a daisy chain. He'd been quite right to say that he couldn't marry his friend, for all that he loved him dearly. Kame wanted to meet someone new, someone different. Someone who didn't spend all his time on the endless round of parties, charitable events and hunts that seemed to take up the bulk of the leisure time of young nobles.
Wouldn't it give the ministers a fit if he suddenly announced he wanted to wed a commoner? Kame was sure of it. But how to meet one?
"We need a ball," he declared without warning, causing Yamapi to drop his daisy chain.
"Any type in particular? Football? Baseball? Tennis?"
"Not that kind of ball," Kame said impatiently. "A party!"
Yamapi propped himself up one elbow. "Sounds good."
"And we'll throw it open to all single, non-criminal men between the ages of sixteen and thirty, regardless of rank."
"Not so good. You want to invite commoners?"
"I need a *change*, Pi! I need to meet new people."
"That's fine," Yamapi said dubiously, "but what will everyone think?"
"I'm the prince," Kame said sweetly. "They'll think whatever I tell them to."
-----
The household of the Widow Akanishi was in a frenzy. That morning, an invitation had arrived in the mail to invite all single males in the house between the ages of sixteen and thirty to a royal ball, thrown by Prince Kame himself. The gossip all round town was that the prince was having such bad luck with nobles, he was willing to look to other classes to find himself a consort, and Koki and Nakamaru were already picturing themselves living a life of luxury in the palace.
Jin wasn't.
"The invitation doesn't include you," his stepmother said nastily, snatching it out of his hand when he attempted to read it. "The prince would never be interested in someone like you, who spends all his time up to his filthy elbows in housework and doesn't even own a single piece of clothing without a rent or tear."
"And whose fault is it that I'm doing all the housework?" Jin muttered. He didn't care about meeting the prince, but he did want to go to the ball. He needed to get out, even if it was only for one night, and remind himself that there was a better life out there somewhere, one that didn't involve sweeping and doing dishes.
Nakamaru swanned through and seized the invitation for himself, clutching it to his chest with a sigh. "When I marry the prince, we'll all go live in the palace," he said happily. "Then you'll have lots of help with the housework."
Yes, all those other servants... "Hey!"
Junno, sensing his master was offended, immediately nipped at Nakamaru's ankles in protest.
Koki laughed. "I'll be the one marrying the prince." He hooked his thumbs in his thick gold chain and held it out from his chest, bragging, "Who could resist some of this?"
"Now, now, boys," their mother said hurriedly. "We mustn't fight over this. Of course one of you will marry the prince, but right now we need to ensure that you don't just beat out the competition, you absolutely slaughter them. And we know what that means, don't we?"
Jin knew only too well, and trudged off to fetch his sewing kit. It was time to make his stepbrothers look fit for a king - or at least a prince.
Three days, many yards of material and not a great deal of sleep later, and Jin thought he'd done pretty well, considering the constant interruptions from his stepmother, and Koki and Nakamaru insisting on practising their rapping and beatboxing respectively while he was fitting them, the better to catch the prince's attention. Jin considered sending an anonymous note to the palace to warn the prince that if he valued his peace and quiet at all, he should stay well away from both of them.
In truth, he didn't begrudge his stepbrothers their chance at happiness - but he didn't think either of them were concerned with the prince at all, only with marrying into royalty. That wasn't a recipe for a happy marriage.
Besides, they were going off for a night of fun, all dressed up, while Jin was going to be stuck at home, doing the chores, wearing his old, ripped jeans, and a faded shirt. He'd outgrown all his decent clothing, had to resort to making more from the remains, but the outfits were still plain and practical - nothing he could wear for a ball. Besides, if he'd possessed anything obviously fancy, his stepbrothers would long since have "borrowed" it and forgotten to give it back.
"I'll be over at the spectator's gallery with the other proud parents," the witch promised her sons. "I want to see their faces turn green with envy when the prince picks one of *my* boys."
"Then they'll match Koki's outfit," Nakamaru sniped.
Koki sneered. "At least I don't look like a disco ball!"
He'd opted to go down the casual route, wearing classic jeans and a green 'JOKER' shirt, beautifully trimmed and decorated, designed to leave the prince in no doubt that here was a truly macho man.
Nakamaru, on the other hand, was resplendent in a shiny purple suit, complete with tie and hat, intending to dazzle the prince with his elegance.
Notwithstanding the sour expressions on both their faces, Jin thought they both looked pretty good. He only got a brief moment to admire his handiwork, unfortunately - his stepmother ushered them both out the door. As a parting shot, she uttered, "But I'm not so cruel as to make you miss your brothers' moment of glory. If you can iron every scrap of material in the house and have it all crisp and smooth before my return, you may go to the ball. Not that you have anything to wear, of course, and they may not let you in, dressed like that..."
She turned on her heel, swept her black, flowing cape about her and practically danced out the front door.
Left to his own devices, Jin pulled out the ironing board, thought about the sheer amount of linen in the house, and gave up before he even got started. It was an impossible task. His stepmother was a complete clothes horse and his stepbrothers were worse, and that wasn't even including all the bedding.
Not only was the likelihood of him completing all the ironing a slim one, but his stepmother was right - he didn't have a thing to wear. Moreover, they'd taken the car - not that he'd been allowed to get his license, anyway - so he'd have had to go by public transport. Going to a royal ball by bus seemed wrong, somehow.
Damn it, it wasn't fair! Jin had just as much right to go to the ball as his stepbrothers - more so, even, because the invitation had been addressed to the Akanishi Family and he was the only real Akanishi left.
He sank down in a pile of sheets, creasing them further, and tickled Junno's tummy when the dog curled up with him.
"At least one of us is happy," he murmured.
"You can both be happy," said a voice from behind him.
Jin rolled over on the sheets - the dog did the same, thinking they were playing - and turned to look at the intruder. He was slender, of average height, with longish black hair and slightly-too-pale-to-be-healthy skin. His clothing matched his hair - black trousers topped by a loose black shirt with some kind of knitted vest thrown over it, and finished off with silver-buckled black boots.
All that black could only mean one thing, and Jin ducked under the sheets in terror. "The Grim Reaper!"
"What?" The intruder clomped over to Jin, pulled the sheets off his head, and gave him an exasperated look as he hauled him to his feet. "People are always saying that. I think I'm going to have to dye my hair, or wear flannel shirts, or something. I'm not the Grim Reaper, so stop cowering!"
"You're not?"
"I'm not." The intruder was most firm on this point. "My name is Ueda, and I'm a fairy godmother."
"Don't you mean, 'godfather'? You are a guy, aren't you?"
"It's a non-gendered job title," Ueda said testily. "Do you want my help or not?"
"Uh..." Jin wasn't sure what to make of it all. Fairy godmothers generally worked magic, or so he'd heard, and he'd never had any experience with that. He opted to err on the side of caution. "Help with what, exactly?"
"To go to the ball, of course!" Despite his gloomy appearance, Ueda was smiling brightly. "I know you want to go. You have every right to go."
"But I can't go!" Jin wailed. "I don't have a thing to wear and I don't have time to make anything because I've got all this ironing to do!"
The fairy snorted. "Mortals. So hung up on housework. Give me a minute."
Small tornados of fairy dust whirled from room to room, neatly folding and flattening any fabric they found, with the unexpected benefit of cleaning it at the same time. Jin watched, astounded, while Junno darted playfully between the spirals, occasionally running round in circles so he could join in with the fun.
"A-Amazing!" Jin stammered. "I'd have taken all night to do that!"
"You have better things to do with your night," Ueda assured him. "Take off the bandana and untie your hair."
Jin obeyed, letting his tousled brown curls spill down to his shoulders; nobody, not even his stepfamily, had seen him like that, and it changed his whole appearance.
The fairy appraised him critically, one hand on his black-clad hip. "Hmm," he said. "That's not a bad start. Now I need to find you something to wear. How do you feel about silk?"
Before Jin could answer that yes, he loved silk but hadn't worn any since he was twelve, Ueda snapped his fingers and Jin's tatty, disheveled clothing disappeared. In its place, as Jin discovered when he caught sight of himself in a mirror, were smart black trousers, a white silk shirt that hung loosely to mid-thigh, and an elegant black coat that fitted snugly over the rest and made Jin seem taller than he really was.
"I like that," Ueda declared. "The simple, clean, black and white look - it's a classic. You'll really stand out amongst all those overdressed, brightly-coloured peacocks. The prince won't be able to help noticing you."
Jin shivered, though out of excitement or anxiety he couldn't have said. The idea of meeting an actual prince was an overwhelming one; just being in the palace was more than he'd ever dreamed of.
"And if we just tidy your hair a bit..." Ueda snapped his fingers again and another fairy dust tornado formed, this time around Jin, leaving him cleaned, brushed and faintly lemony-fresh. "That's better. Don't know how the prince feels about calluses, though, so you're going to wear gloves."
In the time it took Jin to blink, black, fingerless gloves of softest leather appeared on his hands. He flexed experimentally, loving the way the material gleamed in the light. It had been a long time since he'd been able to preen on his own account.
"You clean up quite well," Ueda remarked. "Maybe I should take you home with me." At Jin's confused look, he added, "Just kidding. We're almost done here; you've a pierced ear, haven't you?"
Jin's father had let him get his ear pierced for his eighth birthday, but Jin hadn't worn an earring in it since the old man's death. There was one in particular that he didn't want his stepbrothers to realise that he still owned.
It was as good a time as any to remove it from its hiding place.
"I have," he replied, "and I know what I want to wear. Wait here a minute."
Five minutes later, Jin returned with a silver lady dangling from one ear, and necklace to match lying against his chest where the shirt gaped open. The set was a present from his father, a custom-made fifteenth birthday gift, and the design was unique. It was the most precious thing he owned; and, he thought, the most beautiful.
"Bravo!" his fairy godmother applauded. "Matches perfectly. Now for a hat," another snap of the fingers, "to make you a real man of mystery. I hear the prince is looking for someone different, and you want to make him work for it, don't you?"
"I'm not going there to snare the prince. I've never even met him!" Jin pointed out, but his protests fell on deaf ears.
"We'll soon fix that," Ueda said tartly. "But first you have to get there."
"Can't you just snap your fingers again and magic me there?" Jin was hoping to avoid the bus, and there was no way he was going to be able to get a taxi on the biggest night of the social calendar.
"Magic doesn't work like that. There is something I *can* do, though." Ueda pursed his lips thoughtfully, then went outside, Junno trotting along at his heels. After some initial apprehension, the dog had taken to Ueda easily enough, recognising him as the person responsible for making those fun whirlwind toys.
Standing on the driveway, Ueda fished a toy car from his pocket and set it down on the gravel. One finger-click later and Jin had his ride: a brand-new, shiny black Ferrari, top down and ready for action.
Only one problem: Jin had never learned to drive. The witch wouldn't let him.
Ueda sighed. "I don't like transfiguring living creatures, but I don't have a choice this time. Come here, boy."
Jin immediately stepped forward, then realised Ueda had been talking to Junno, not him. The fairy bent down and let the dog nuzzle his cheek, then set a hand on his back.
Under Ueda's touch, the dog began to grow, stretching until he lay a full six feet tall on the ground. That in itself was astonishing, but the encore was far more spectacular.
Junno, the cheerful black Labrador, became Junno, the even more cheerful, black leather-clad human.
"Jin, meet your driver. He may not have a license but he's fully trained," Ueda informed him.
Jin took a step back from the grinning former-dog, not so stunned by power of the magic as he was by the brightness of the man's smile.
Junno was practically jumping up and down with excitement, and if he'd still had a tail, it would've been wagging. "Hi! I'll be your driver tonight!"
"How does a dog learn to drive?" Jin spluttered.
"Crash course," Ueda said, and smirked as Jin winced at the joke. "I can implant the knowledge in his head because his little doggy brain isn't taken up with all sorts of useless things, like ironing. Just don't expect much in the way of conversation."
"Can I have a treat?" Junno asked, scratching at the door to get back in the house. "I've been a good boy - everyone tells me so!"
Jin sighed and patted his driver on the head, which seemed to mollify him. "If you can get me to the ball and back in one piece, you can have all the treats you want," he promised.
Ueda looked thrilled. "Off you go, and don't you dare stand in the corner all night after all my hard work! Get out there and dance!"
"I intend to." Jin was deadly earnest about this, having been denied a chance to give his hips a real workout for years.
Junno sprang nimbly into the driver's seat, caught the keys Ueda threw at him, and started the engine. Jin tried to ignore the fact that he was about to be driven by a dog, and climbed in after him.
"One last thing," Ueda interrupted their joyful goodbyes. "When the clock strikes midnight, the magic begins to wear off, so you'd better be home by then."
"Midnight?" Jin sounded vaguely disgusted. "Can't you at least make it three a.m.? Who leaves a party at midnight?"
"Leave *before* midnight," Ueda advised, "and that's just the way the magic works. Ignore my warning and it'll be a long walk home for you and your pet."
Trudging home from the palace in the middle of the night, his dog at his side, did not hold much appeal for Jin. Midnight it was.
-----
The ball started at eight o'clock. By five minutes past eight, Kame was regretting his decision to invite...well, anybody except his closest friends, really. The whole occasion was turning into an unmitigated disaster of the highest order, beginning with the gate guards accidentally forgetting that Viscount Kusano was barred from the palace.
Luckily, Kame had still been meeting and greeting when his stalker turned up, and had managed to avoid dancing with him on the grounds that he couldn't possibly be introduced to every guest if he was whirling round the ballroom with Kusano, could he?
By ten o'clock, he was considering feigning an injured ankle. It wouldn't have been difficult - most of his dance partners thus far had been clumsy at best, downright dangerous at worst. The nobles were better at it, since they had more practice, but even they seemed to have two left feet once they got near Kame.
"This isn't working," he complained to Yamapi, who'd finally stopped dancing long enough to rehydrate himself.
Yamapi managed to look both delirious and clueless at the same time. "What isn't working?"
"This!" Kame waved his hand to indicate the ballroom in full swing. "This mess! I must have danced with half the men in here already, and they've either been arrogant jerks who insist on telling me how lucky I'd be to have them, or they've been timid little mice who are too shy to do more than stammer out a few flatteries."
His friend gave him a lazy grin. "You're obviously dancing with all the wrong people."
"All the right people are only dancing with each other," Kame moped.
Sure enough, many couples had formed on the dancefloor, refusing to let anyone else cut in. Why, the young Baron Shige, his father lately killed by the same horrible disease that had left the parents of many of his peers deceased, appeared to be getting over his grief rather well with the help of his neighbour, Count Koyama. Duke Subaru had even gone so far as to link up with seven others, forming a tight circle of eight, and interlopers intruded at their peril.
"But isn't that good? You don't want to hook up with anyone who's already in a relationship, do you?" Yamapi glanced sidelong at the prince. "Or has Kame decided he wants to be a homewrecker?"
For the first time that evening, Kame cracked a smile. "I'm not *that* desperate!"
"Then stop looking like you are. Get back out there and dance like you don't have a care in the world, because good-looking guys like us shouldn't have any worries."
"Tell that to the ministers who keep hassling me," Kame suggested, but he knew Yamapi was right. He had to look like he was having fun, or he was never going to have any, and it would be a shame to waste the outfit.
He was, according to his magic mirror, the fairest of them all, but since his parents had bought him the mirror the day he started experimenting with nail polish he wasn't entirely sure he could trust its objectivity. When even the ordinary mirrors started telling him how handsome he looked, he knew he was dressed to kill.
Kame had gone for simple, classic, black and white elegance, hoping (yet failing) to set the tone for the inhabitants of the ballroom. The black silk shirt suggested a sensualist, while the crisp, white suit and tie hinted at the prince's suave, serious side. A matching hat lent a jaunty air to the whole outfit, and overall, Kame thought he was probably the best-dressed person in the ballroom.
(Yamapi had vied for the position but lost on account of the excess of fur - *so* last season - and half the guests were decked out like tropical birds, requiring Kame to don his designer sunglasses before he could approach them.)
"Sure, if I can get any of them on the dancefloor," Yamapi agreed and spun off into the night, beer in hand and all the come-hither he could muster glinting in his eyes.
Kame sighed and ducked behind the banners, found his parents canoodling there and beat a hasty retreat in the direction of the doors, under the pretext of requiring some fresh air. He didn't get very far. The great doors were flung open, silencing the entire room, and a newcomer, unannounced, was ushered in.
The herald was plainly flustered, searching his lists for the guest's name to no avail, and from where Kame was watching, the young man declined to give a name.
He didn't need one, Kame decided. The stranger was of the right gender, seemed to fit the age requirements, and was dressed far too nicely to be a common criminal. Whether or not he was single...Kame intended to find that out for himself.
"Let him in!" he called, and the herald gratefully stepped aside to let the newcomer pass.
The ballroom was immediately filled with a low buzz of gossip, the like not heard since last week, and the noise level increased as the stranger walked slowly towards Kame. Dancers and wallflowers alike shuffled towards the outskirts of the room, forming a rough gauntlet through which the young man had to pass, and none lost a chance to gawk.
The prince, reluctant though he was to admit to it, was gawking too, only much less obviously and in a more refined way. He was in good company. All heads turned to stare at the black-clad stranger, who glided effortlessly across the room, projecting an aura of casual indifference to the attention he was receiving.
Kame was used to leaving others speechless - it was one of the perks of being a) royalty and b) impossibly gorgeous. He wasn't used to experiencing it from the other side. Wild brown curls spilled out from under the young man's hat but his face was almost entirely in shadow, and the prince had no clue as to his identity.
Based on the rumours he could hear flying behind him, neither did anyone else.
"He's obviously a foreign prince," one voice whispered, and another burst in with, "I think he must be one of Lord Jun's models!" A cry of "King Takki's secret lovechild!" was hastily suppressed by the queen's supporters, and the offending party tossed in the Royal Swimming Pool as punishment.
The stranger declined to enlighten them, and continued his approach till he stood a reasonable distance from the prince, ever step he took corresponding to an increase in Kame's heartrate. "Thank you, Your Highness," he said, and half the guests sighed in satisfaction at his voice, which was respectful but not awed, musical but not theatrical.
Kame didn't answer, merely held out his hand, palm down, for the stranger to kiss.
Part 2