A Most Precious Treasure (1/11)
Whoosh!
“You know,” huffs a masculine voice that sounds very much like Eugene Fitzherbert’s, “I’ve done some pretty strange things in my life.”
“Uh-hmm,” a feminine murmur replies. It sounds unsettlingly similar to Princess Rapunzel’s dulcet tones.
“But, I ask you,” the man continues, panting slightly. The sounds of two pairs of bare feet skidding and slapping across the stone floor echo out into the tapestry-draped hall. “Why must the strangest things I’ve ever done always involve a frying pan?”
Rapunzel (unfortunately it is, indeed, the princess) giggles. “Don’t worry, Eugene. You’re very fast.”
Swish!
“And a good thing, too,” he mutters jerkily as another step-slide-stomp reverberates. “Un-fortunately…”
The sounds that echo are different now. There’s the silence of a decisive advance, a moment of breathless capture, and then a resounding clang as the pan drops, clattering against the stone floor.
“I’m also bigger and stronger,” Eugene Fitzherbert points out, his voice smugness itself.
Rapunzel grunts softly. The sounds of her distress pull on the heart strings of the man who is eavesdropping from the corridor until he peers in through the partially open door. His heart leaps at the sight of his daughter caught in a man’s grasp. Never mind that this man has her complete faith. Never mind that he had saved her from a life of imprisonment. Never mind that their chaperone is in clear view.
The lizard who accompanies his daughter everywhere, gesticulates wildly, clearly encouraging Rapunzel to do her worst!
“Not so tough without your hair, huh?” her captor purrs in a tone that the king does not like at all.
The king cannot see his daughter’s expression, but he senses a change infuse the air in answer to the thief’s challenge. “We’ll see about that!” she crows, shifting perceptibly.
Eugene squeaks.
The lizard hisses out a laugh.
“You were saying, Eugene?” Rapunzel asks sweetly.
The king dares to push the door open just a bit wider and gapes; his daughter - the princess - holds the point of a small but very well-sharpened knife snuggly against a rather delicate junction of a man’s figure.
Wheezing, the former thief forces a grin, “Ah. You remembered that one, eh?”
“You’re a very good teacher,” she replies with candid praise which is so at odds with Fitzherbert’s obvious discomfort that the king has to swallow back a bark of uncharacteristically loud laughter. The lizard, Pascal, is rolling on the stone floor with uninhibited yet nearly silent mirth.
“You’re welcome,” the thief replies, slowly raising his hands in a gesture of openhanded-surrender. When the knife tip retreats marginally in wary acceptance of his forfeiture, he shuffles back a step. Once out of range of the knife, he takes a deep breath. His shoulders slide into a cocky slouch and the easy smile is back. “So you’re handy with a knife after all,” he evaluates. “Be careful with that or people might start to think you can actually cook.”
“I can cook.”
His look is doubtful. She levels the knife at him.
“Put that dubious brow back where it belongs or I will use this.”
He crosses his arms, looking for all the world as if he couldn’t be bothered to even contemplate the thought of injury to his person. He shrugs. “Yeah? Well, you’re welcome to try,Bblondie.”
The king watches from the shadowy embrace of the hall, through the not-quite-closed wooden door as Rapunzel throws the knife. Eugene ducks, startled, and the king blinks, equally stunned. It’s not until a moment later when Rapunzel is holding the reclaimed frying pan in her hand and is virtually sitting on top of the thief (whom she had artfully tripped) that the king realizes what had happened. Rapunzel had thrown the knife to distract Eugene (although, in retrospect, he realizes that she had not thrown it at him), then - while the thief had been flinching - she had scooped up the frying pan, stuck out her ankle, tripped him as he’d turned to locate the off-target projectile, sat on him, and lifted the pan in preparation for a whopper of a blow on the back of the young man’s dazed head.
Now is as good a time as any, the king decides, to interrupt.
He toes open the door, applauding. After a moment of startled, color-shifting-lizard panic, Pascal joins in, nodding sagely with approval.
Rapunzel looks up, her green eyes wide and frying pan still held aloft. “Daddy?”
He chuckles, enjoying the sight of Eugene’s aghast expression. He doesn’t doubt the young man is mortified, but - as usual - he makes the best of it. Adopting a droll expression, Fitzherbert crosses his arms and props his chin up on the palm of his hand, patiently waiting for Rapunzel to remember upon whom she is seated and obligingly remove herself.
The king replies, “Would an imposter dare reveal himself in the face of your frightful skills in warfare, my dearest?”
She squeals with delight and clamors off her inconvenienced instructor. “Did you see me, daddy?” she demands, stampeding toward him still clutching the frying pan. The king marvels at how daily deportment lessons for the past three years have not managed to make any appreciable difference in softening his daughter’s awe-inspiring enthusiasm into royal grace.
“Did you really see me?” She anxiously clutches the frying pan by the rim in both hands and glances down at Pascal. “Did he?”
Before the lizard can shrug, the king replies. “I did, indeed. From swish to seating.”
He laughs as she performs a gleeful twirl. “He saw me, Eugene!” she enthuses as the thief collects the discarded knife with deliberate slowness. The king has noticed this often: whenever Rapunzel is enjoying herself, particularly with him or her mother, Eugene will fade into the background by performing some mundane activity… which usually involves picking up after the princess herself.
She scampers over to him and he presents the knife to her, handle first. “And a good thing, too,” Fitzherbert replies with a charming smile, “because I would rather not do that again today, if you don’t mind.”
“Oh! But, we haven’t shown Momma my progress!”
The king decides to interject. As a man, he can imagine how bruised the fellow’s pride must already be. The king doesn’t doubt Eugene would indulge Rapunzel’s request for a re-enactment. Truly, the young man would do anything for her.
That is precisely what worries him.
A man might forsake his own pride for a love greater than himself… but he might also do anything for power, wealth, and a beautiful woman. Precisely how this supposed once-had-been a thief sees his daughter, the king cannot say. Not even after three years of cohabitation.
“No need to show her, my dearest,” the king says, holding out his hand to her. She tucks the knife into the sheath at her belt and skips over to him, collecting Pascal along the way. “I shall give her a full report, rife with vivid details. She will be most impressed.” Returning to his side, Rapunzel looks up at him and the king smiles as he gives her shoulder a reassuring squeeze. Once again lurking in the background, Eugene steps into his boots and wordlessly collects Rapunzel’s slippers. She hadn’t even thought to put them on.
“Come along now,” the king invites. “We have to finish our preparations.”
Rapunzel wrinkles her nose that the reminder. When Fitzherbert draws near enough, she links her arm through his, still ignoring her slippers in his other hand. “Why can’t Eugene come with us this time? He has for the last two tours.”
Yes, he had. The thief had accompanied Rapunzel and himself during the previous tours of the kingdom. His presence had also managed to prevent several very suitable and eligible bachelors from making Rapunzel’s acquaintance. Perhaps he is a man of tradition, but the king finds it difficult to believe that someone who has been so driven by the promise of wealth, by the possibility of quenching the thirst of his own greed, would be capable of appreciating the treasure that Rapunzel is. The king will not ask Rapunzel to choose one of the lords or princes over her current companion, but he would not be opposed to it if she did.
“Now, Rapunzel,” Eugene says softly, chiding her gently. Again, this is something else that the king has noticed; the young man always uses her given - although not her proper and royal - name while in his presence. “You know I’m allergic to all that pomp and posturing that goes with politics. Besides, the queen asked me to stay and help her prepare the castle for your return. You think I want to turn her down? With me in charge, you know it’s going to be a celebration to remember!”
Rapunzel laughs as she pulls Eugene past the king and into the hall. “Oh, all right. And you will have a lot of fun while I’m gone…”
“Of course I will!” he agrees with perhaps a little too much enthusiasm. “This is only the beginning. Party planning, fabric swatches… this is the start of something big.” Eugene gestures with the hand still holding the princess’ slippers. She still doesn’t seem to even notice them. No, she only has eyes for Eugene Fitzherbert, whoever he really is.
The king watches as his ever-barefoot daughter pokes the thief in his side. The young man deftly avoids her attempt to tickle him, not even breaking stride or pausing in his self-aggrandizing.
He’s very slippery, this thief whom the king had pardoned out of thanks for the return of his daughter. But, in doing so, had he done the right thing? In allowing Rapunzel to keep this man as her friend and confidante, has he done his daughter more harm than good? Three years is more than enough time for a man like this to steal her precious heart. That is why this annual tour is so important. The king wishes to open his daughter’s eyes to other possibilities, other charming gentlemen who can appreciate her. There may be hope yet that she will choose a partner who isn’t a formerly wanted criminal. But, as Rapunzel blushes under the thief’s frank stare, the king allows that perhaps it is already too late. It is likely that her heart has already been taken.
Chapter 1