But I digress

Hi.
I guess you have wondered where I have been?
Well the short answer is I have been a toad for the last 4 months.
Let me tell you that I will never look at flies in quite the same way.
The water was great.
What?
Oh, right- how did this happen? You remember the Witches?
Part of their barrage was as it turned out random curses. One moment. I am racing through a trench, the next I am hopping out of my clothes and armor down into the mud.
Grimm says it took a week to back track and find me.
No, I don't know how he did it. I almost asked but then I remembered the mushroom incident and opted for a sturdy slap on the back and a "good to see you girlie" instead.

Also being a toad is all fine and good but it would have helped if Grimm had brought something more than a saddle blanket. I mean it would have made a better story than having to trudge back to the castle in my birthday suit and a muddy blanket.

All Hail Muddy Princess Charlie.

My father hadn't noticed my absence.

My mother put me in a hot bath and spoon fed me her own special mava bean soup (don't ask but tastes like pizza- well that's what Ralph says...what is pizza anyway?)

LIFE!

Once upon a time the writer discovered that life could- in fact, get in the way of writing.

Meanwhile or the Problem with Witches

Meanwhile:

Here in the present, I am commander of my father's army in times of war.

We are at war.

Kind of.

Look it's complicated. 

Stonehaven is at war with witches.

Not all witches, just one coven of them.

The only problem with that is that we are not sure which coven it is.

Remember my 12th Birthday?

Oh, I hadn't gotten to that one yet.

Hang on a second, got to run through some trenches now.
Damn I hate running through trenches.
"Keep up lassie!"
That's Grimm, he's a dwarf, Rock-Biter.
He's also my Master-at-Arms. Right now I am following him through a series of trenches that have been dug since Dad's war with the witches went from this:

to this: 

Dammit, just fell in the mud. Grimm comes back and hauls me out.

"Damn girl. you are going to be the death of me." says the man who left me alone to dodge fireballs and run in zigzags while maintaining my balance (which I did not)

Ugh, I am afraid to see what I look like right now. I can feel mud in places that I don't want to think about. Why are trenches so muddy?

I am probably telling this all wrong.

What would Rikk say?

God but I hate mud.

Once upon a time, there was this weird king named Dev who wanted a son but got a daughter. When she turned 9, she made him stop referring to her as his son. Of course, it took her punching him in the gut. this is her mother's favorite story.

So, King Dev behaved himself for the next 2 birthdays and while they were not princess fests, they were less about competition and manliness. Many of the other Kings in the 9 kingdoms breathed a sigh of relief. I mean, how many archery contests can you have, anyway?

"Is this going to take long?' Grimm asks.

"Maybe- you got a hot date?"

"Not with you."

"Lucky me" I say before pushing him into some mud.

Just my luck- he looks better the uglier he gets.

Now where was I. 

Oh right, the problem with witches, believe me there are lots of them.

problems.

On her 12th Birthday, the witches came to bless the Prince. This is customary. This particular coven of witches are popularly known as The Blessed Ones (or The Cursed Ones- depending on how the birthday party goes)

There are 8 of them. 4 of them are what men would call beautiful, 3 of them are pretty and the ugly one is their leader. (No, I don't get why the ugliest one is always the leader.)

This picture is similar, just figured you might need a visual

So, the day of the big gala came and folk came from near and wide.

My father met the witches was they came striding in. 

He immediately demanded to know what gifts they would be bestowing on his son.

Yes, he forgot.

The witches took one look at me and cackled.

Again, just a visual aid.

Before I could move, I saw my mom start to run forward as my father backhanded the lead witch.

This was a first. Dad had never hit anyone before - at least as far as I knew.

In fact, he seemed as surprised as the lead witch, Malificnessa.

He looked at his hand as if it was this new sword and as a Malificnessa gaped, spun on his heel and went back by my aghast mother to his throne to sit down and further consider his hand.

Queen Sam hastily approached Malificnessa and started to apologize when the Witch shrieked.

It was very loud and disturbing.

"How dare you strike me, whelp!"

"Please, madame witch." My mother said. "He meant no-"

"Rubbish! You are the Queen of Rubbish!" Malificnessa screeched.

"You" She pointed her gnarly hand at King Dev and gestured

"You will pay most dearly for that insult."

"Do your worst crone." King Dev said all the while posing his hand this way and that as if he was modeling a new ring.

Malificnessa drew herself to her full height and turned to one of the beautiful witches.

"Curse her!"

This witch was:

No, not her- but they do look a lot alike.

This witch was called Grimelda and she was know for having a wicked sense of humor. 

With a satisfied sirk of satisfaction, she whipped out her wand and pointed it as my mother.

At my mother's stomach to be more precise.

"Expectorium Absolutea! (or something like that)" She pronounced.

There was a sudden flash and my mother cried out in pain and crumpled to the floor.

"What have you done!" King Dev shouted jumping up and racing to the queen's side. 

His bodygaurd shuffled in between the King and the witches.

Bravery was in short supply that day.

"I have Cursed you wife with infertility!" Grimelda said and then all the witches cackled.

"Damn you to the seven hells!" King Dev shouted.

"Nine hells." Ralph, the otherwise magnificent said off to my left.

"Nine?" King Dev asked.

"Nine Hells." Ralph the otherwise responded ignoring the witches.

There was laughter.

For a time, everyone stared around witches, guards, courtiers and the king.

Then I heard the laughter and it was coming from my mother.

Mom sat on the floor and laughed until her sides shook.

Things got better after that.

The witches ended up ignoring me. They debated on another curse on my father but couldn't agree on which one would be suitable and decided that if they really wanted to curse him they were going to need a stronger curse than they had ready for that occasion.

So they bit their thumbs and apparated away in puffs of smoke.

Later, after mom had finally calmed down, she told my father that the curse was useless since she had gotten another witch to curse her with infertility over 7 years ago.

My father stormed. 

My mother calmly thanked our guests,

and the guests left as well (there was some thumb biting there too)

When everyone had gone, my father demanded an explanation.

Queen Sam nodded at him then walked over to where I sat on the dias (throne) and sat down next to me.

"You are a stupid, arrogant man." She said. "I love you, the stars only know why."

He opened his mouth to speak and Queen Sam held up one finger.

"You have acted like such an ass where our daughter is concerned that I decided if I were to bear you a son, you would forget you even had a daughter- who loves you as well."

"So this is not a joke then?" Dad said dropping down on a bench.

"No and don't you dare do something else stupid."

"I won't."

He did.

A year later, King Devlin issued a proclamation against all witches and he turned out every witch his men could find.

Ironically there were eight of them.

They were not the same witches, but it didn't matter.

Also ironically, Mom conceived and had my brother nine months after that.

And then 5 years later. 

The 8 Cursed Ones returned and declared war on Stone Haven and cursed my father with warts.

Right now, I don't know if the warts were the actual curse or just an afterthought.

It blows my mind, that it took 8 witches that long to get the spell components to cast a curse.

Witches are not to be trifled with.

Well, I got to run, another barrage is coming.

So What happened next?

"I was coming to that."
"Are you sure you are not Welsh?"
"Shut up and stop trying to kiss me."
"This is way better then the beating I just received."
"Sorry, just wish you would get to the good parts."
"I had been around a pretty long time before you came into the picture. It's not like we are like Rapunzel and Flynn (or whatever his real name was.) Anyway, Zel says she really liked Flynn better than Eugene... well except when she gets to call him Genie."
"Flynn is a good name, almost as good as mine."
"Shush. This isn't about you anyway- not yet."
"MMMRPH."

So where was I?
(you were 29 looking back at 9)
I did not transform into a princess overnight.... actually not at all.
for one thing I have never worn a dress in my life.
Sorry Merida, but I never had to. Unlike your mom and many of the other Queen Mothers in the 9 kingdoms (yes there are more but Dev and his fellow kings liked the sound of nine)


I only met Merida after she was quite a bit older, sometimes it's hard to imagine us all living in the same world, but as Ralph has said the world is a big place that is filled with many people, each with their own stories. One of the reasons, I bring up Merida is that she had her own kind of beauty.
In the end, it was her finding her own beauty that changed her story.
I find it odd, sometimes, that more of this did not occur to me as I grew older.
I wish I could say that I became an inspiration to the young girls of the Kingdom but the truth was that i never really stopped being a boy. It was ingrained into my psyche. I knew I was a girl and when I confronted my mother the morning following my 9th birthday, she just gathered me into her arms and laughed.
I did not realize how strange my mother was until I got to know some of the other queen mothers. Sam was the odd one out. She wasn't a great beauty, by comparison she was rather plain. Her face might have launched only my father's row boat, but like most daughters, I was in awe of her beauty.
It was her easy going personality and slow determination to make our kingdom more civil towards its citizens that won over the hearts of everyone where Sam was concerned. One thing said that would have to change now was that I was to call her Mom from then on.
It's funny, but at nine years old this made perfect sense. I nodded very seriously and said.
"Mom."
That was the closest I ever saw my mother come to crying until many years later.
It would have been a "Hallmark Moment" (something Ralph the Mighty says a lot), but then King Dev walked in.
"Morning Sam, Charles. How is my brand new boy today?"
"I am a girl." I said looking at him.
King Dev frowned at me and then looked at Mom.
"Is this some kind of joke?"
"No dear," Mom said (see I can call her Mom). "Your daughter has discovered that she is, in fact, a girl not a boy after all."
"If this is a joke- it's in very bad taste Sam." King Dev sat down at the breakfast table and took a bit of toast.
"King Dev- the charade is over. You are going to have to face facts." Mom said standing, she walked across the sunlit chamber to the table and took the buttered toast from her husband.
"Don't say it." sputtered Dev as he tried in vain to snatch back the toast. Mom was just to fast for him. "If you say it I-"
"You will what?'
"I- I will exile you to the North Tower." King Dev pronounced and held out his hand triumphantly.
Sam ate the rest of the toast, slowly, to the horror of my father.
It was Mom's first major act of defiance.
Mom finished and then licked her fingers and wiped them on her dress.
King Dev's eyes went wide. Sam had never done such an act of flagrant disregard for her clothing.
"Hmmm, the North Tower is better then this one." Mom said returning to her seat. "Especially since you just had it redone this year."
King Dev opened his mouth a few times and then close it.
I walked over to him. He stood and looked down at me with his most imperious stare.
"Son." he said with grim determination.
I punched him in the gut.
He crumpled over and took several deep gulps before looking at me.
I waited tapping my foot.
"Daughter..?"
I smiled broadly and tiptoed to kiss him on his forehead.

So, there you have it. well some more of it.

"So what happened next?"

"You mean other than growing up and meeting you?"

"That was kind of where I am headed."

"Well- I became this awesome warrior and Knight and then I rescued you from your certain doom."

"Well, that is one way of putting it, I guess."

 "I figure that you are going much further into dangerous territory than that."

"Yes. Yes I am going to have to ask it again."

"Shut up and kiss me."

"I was coming to that."

Looking in the Mirror

Today I am 29 and find myself staring in a looking glass in a castle that is foreign to me wondering what that 9 year old version of myself was thinking the next morning after the birthday party.
Am I what I thought I would be when I grew up?
Did I find myself somewhere beyond all that my father wanted me to be?
Am I glad I finally have a brother?

When I was 9 however, my only thought is am I a girl?
Remember, that this is Charles looking at himself in the mirror and seeing his father's daughter staring back at him.
I knew all the while, I had never been completely comfortable with being a prince. That morning I knew why as I looked in the mirror wondering what it was about my face that made me a girl and not a prince. 
Look, I know now that if any of the boys or Princes had said let's play "I'll show you mine- if you show me yours" - then it would have been over a long time before this. But let me point out no one had ever asked before the night Baldur tried to kiss me.
My father was very careful to avoid any situation that would bring the difference up. He even decreed that no one could go swimming without a shirt.
And since no one in the Kingdom thought it was all that weird, everyone one did without ever questioning what my father was up to.
Also, let me point out that nothing happened to my body for years even after I looked into the mirror that morning that would point to me being a girl.

Unlike Hildy and Izzy, I did not "blossom" until I was in my twenties, and even then it wasn't anywhere near what happened to the girls around me. For a while, I was positive, that my lack of femininity was a result of my father meddling with witches and wizards. When I was 19, my mother finally sat me down and told me that she hadn't grown breasts until she was in her twenties either.
"It just takes more time for us Stonehaven women, Charlie."
It didn't assuage my fears or suspicions and probably drove my father to distraction with all my accusing looks.
I still found myself looking in the mirror wondering if what I was. Boy or Girl. Prince or.....
Yeah, being a Princess never entered my vocabulary even after I finally grew some breasts.

The Problem with Fairy Tales Part 4

The problem with having this many princes is that there is only so much space in the ten kingdoms to have the adventures that their fathers- the kings want them to have. Bragging rights take over as the main tension in this group of men. Territorial skirmishes took on a whole new level. Picture small armies showing up to make sure Hal gets to slay the Beast of Kalikos before George.
Lucky for us, no one gets much more than a lot of insulting and the occasional bruising when things get out of hand. But even as a kid, myself and some of the princes could see that the rivalries were going to continue escalating until it did get violent.
The Beast of Kalikos, by the way, laughed himself sick over that skirmish and moved to Malta later.
Who could blame him/it? The writing was on the wall, so to speak. He/It would be getting little sleep once the two kings settled things.

The Conspiracy.
Once everyone had arrived in Stonehaven, I set about inviting the Princes, I believed to be the most reasonable to my chambers in order to hatch what i was calling operation "Forget about it." In which, it was my purpose to find ways to stump our father's ambitions of dominance through acts of Princely heroism in order to ensure a lasting peace both at home and abroad.
I invited:
1. Prince Baldur, because I liked him and we had a lot of fun playing tag during my sixth birthday while our father's argued over who of us would be allowed to take on Grendel first once we turned 19. His brother, Thorn is very scary and pale like a ghost, so I didn't ask him. (should have known better).
2. Prince Phillip, he's always been a reasonable well behaved boy.
3. Princes Cronk and Dipcus, mostly because I still had no idea that princes could be dumb twits. The lessons I have learned.
4. Prince Louie and Godfrey, their brother is a spoiled brat and they hate him. I figured this had to be a "slam-dunk" (Ralph insists this is the best metaphor of all time).
5. Prince Hal, because everyone likes Hal.
6. Prince Mark, because I could spell Herikles and Ippy just makes me feel embarrassed. Something I didn't understand until I was 16.

My father threw a big feast and everyone came. Prince Baldur kept looking at me and winking and I suddenly felt very uncomfortable with the attention. Then I was just confused because I caught him doing the same thing to Princess Helen and she is very pretty.
So after the Princes and Princesses had retired back to their rooms, I awaited to see who would come to my invitation.
I waited a while before Baldur came in and then tried to kiss me. I punched him in the nose and he burst into tears and called me a horse. He spit up some blood and ran out of the room.
What the hell was that about I wondered.
Anyway none of the Princes came. I sat on my bed and wondered why and then a knock came and when I opened it up I found Hildy. Mark and Izzy looking at me with these weird smiles.

I let them in and we sat around eating some pilfered bunch cake (think fruit cake without the rum) and goat's milk. We tried the ale I had smuggled in but none of us like it much.
I told Hildy about Baldur trying to kiss me.
She looked at me out the side of her eyes and then she glanced at Izzy and Mark and started to laugh.
I sat there perplexed.
"Tell me that you punched him." Hildy said after a moment.
"I popped him in the nose." I declared and then "He got mad and cried and called me a horse."
Izzy fell over in gales of Laughter while Mark looked sick and tried to apologize for Baldur.
I was really confused.
"I don't understand." I said, "I mean we are both Princes. Why would he try to kiss me?"
Izzy stopped laughing and her and Hildy locked eyes and then they looked a bit ill too.
Mark opened and closed his mouth a few times.
Hildy came and sat down in front of me and I got scared.
I mean really scared.
"Charlie, you are not really a prince." Hildy said and then rushed on as I was about to disagree.
"You aren't exactly a princess either, but you are a girl like me and Izzy."
"What?"
"Baldur tried to kiss you because he knows, well we all know that you are a girl."
"But King Dev said I was-" I trailed off as all of what I could remember suddenly came into focus and then I suddenly knew why I hadn't seen Frankfurt in 3 years, I suddenly understood why King Hal and Prince Matrim had not been invited to my birthday party.
"Oh."
I wanted to cry.
I couldn't cause Princes do not cry, ever.
I still wanted to cry because I knew that I was no longer a prince.
I was nothing. I was a girl.
Izzy said that if I wanted to, she would teach me how to be a princess, but we both knew it was pointless. Izzy wasn't a very good princess either and Hildy had sworn off being a princess when she was four. Apparently that was an epic event in Eisengarde. Hildy said her dad (me paw as she puts it) ranted for three whole days and still begged her to wear dresses almost every month since then.
In the end we decided that Prince Mark was the best candidate for becoming a Princess and oddly enough, that made Mark very happy.

When you are nine, the world becomes a different place.
I knew that I was no longer a prince, but I also knew that King Dev would never accept it.
This is the problem with Fairy Tales.

The Problem with Fairy Tales Part 3

As you have probably noticed I often think too much and then feel I need to "touch all the bases." (The court wizard, Ralph the Magnificent, tells me that has something to do with a game where you take a club and hit a ball at people and then run around a square...oh, diamond {which is a square stretched a bit} to prove you hit someone with that ball and then when you get back to the home base you declare victory and there's a group hug from your team before they go hunt down the losing team and- oh right, sorry. Ralph says that he wished I would listen to him better and that I get easily distracted {cause its boring the way he described it}- Baseball should be called Battleball).

Where was I?
Oh right, so my fairy tale came crashing down. Well I should say my father, King Dev's fairy tale came crashing down. I had turned 8 and my father decided to invite the entire 9 kingdom's for my birthday.
So almost everyone came.
As you can probably guess. King Hal declined the invite...rather violently. Well, I hear he tore up the invitation and stomped on it before ordering it burnt.
So here is who came (take note because there will be a quiz later)

1. King Olaf of Eisengarde, who brought his sons Thorn and Baldur. He also brought his daughter Brunhilda but who goes by Hildy.
2. King Mark of the Enchanted Forest (go figure. No I am serious- that's what they named it) who brought his son...wait for it...Forest. (this stuff is too good to be true! but it is).
3. King Herbert of Angsland, who brought his son, Phillip.
4. King Randalf of the Hinderlands, brought his sons Cronk and Dipcus (no I have no idea how one goes about naming your kids that).
5. King Stefan of Castille, who brought his sons Flynn, Quince, and Darin. He also brought his duaghter Izabole (or Izzy- she hates being called Izabole).
6. King Louis of  Royaume des Fluers de Fees. (something like Fairy Kingdom of Flowers) who brought his sons Louis, Louie and Godfrey (Godfrey goes by Frank- who can blame him?).
7. King Romane of Novis Talis, His sons are Henry (otherwise known as Prince Hal) and Richard (otherwise known as Rick).
8. King Jason of Arkady, his sons are Herikles (whom we call Herk) Iphikles (whom we call Ip or Ippy) and Mark (because his mother insisted)
9. King Landon of Helios, his son is George and his daughters Tricia and Helen.

 So there you have it, the Ten Kingdoms from our corner of the world. A small corner as it turned out (but that's for later). The corner was big enough for us and for the most part everyone got on save for one thing. Princes. 

Yep, each of the king's shared this one flaw- their prince had to be the best prince ever. King Dev, my father was no exception. Which made me, his son top candidate for that position.

You can see where this is leading?