T  A L E  O F 

L U C K Y  P R I N C E S S

or the past three months, the girl had been pouring over her great book of history and nothing - there she was on the eve of Choosing Day with absolutely no idea what she wanted to be. Even now, while the royal tailor fretted over last minute adjustments to her golden dress and her royal mother was giving the servants hell to see that the castle sparkled, young Agatha was frantically going over the huge leather-bound tome, checking notes and scribbling names on a piece of paper. She'd been through all the classics again, you know Cinderella, Belle, Snow White and was now frantically reading through the lesser known chapters, like the tale of the Japanese Kaguya who came from the moon.

You might think being a princess is such a wonderful thing - you get nice dresses, live in a great palace and wait for a prince to marry you. But it is not that simple, because few ever get to be famous and the others are left following in their footsteps. Just like a normal girl having to chose between being a doctor like her Mom or a veterinarian like Dad, the little princesses in Fairyworld have to decide on a career path at the age of 15. Few are bold enough to break the mould and do something completely different, like Princess Leia who got to fly all over the Universe and meet all those exciting people. Not to mention marrying Han Solo!

Yet, Agatha's parents would not hear of any of this modern stuff. They did not consider themselves old-fashioned, they upheld traditions, which is why their daughter was now studying the pros and cons of all the classic princess tales.

now White was definitely out of fashion and Agatha had no intention of playing house-mother to seven pathetic dwarfs no matter what sort of prince would rescue her at the end of her ordeal. Becoming the prisoner of the mysterious Beast now that seemed quite exciting, but her mother was not exactly OK with that and kept pointing out that Belle was not even a princess, but rather a pretty girl who was smart enough to get her hands on an unfortunate rich prince.

Cinderella seemed quite outdated, you know. We're not in the Dark Ages anymore and even her conservative parents had agreed to have a dish-washer in the royal kitchen and even a microwave, as the old king was partial to a nice hot midnight snack and it was less of a bother to pop something in the oven. So it was hard to be credible in the part of the poor girl that works from dawn to dusk. Oh, and Agatha also had really big feet and it would be embarrassing to have her try on glass slippers.

There was of course Aurora, the Sleeping Beauty, not too much of a bother you'd say, but fact is, these days no one was able to play it right. These were after all modern fast-paced times, who'd have the patience to sleep for a 100 years and miss out on so many things - memes, cats videos, status updates, because even princesses nowadays have social media, on a private server where mere mortal girls don't have access, of course. The last girl who chose Aurora failed miserably, as she barely managed to sleep for 44 years and woke up to discover her prince wasn't even born. Such a disgrace!
At long last, when it was almost midnight the exhausted Agatha decided upon Ariel, even though she was not a mermaid. That's just a technicality, her mother assured her. 'And at least you swim like a fish!'
The ceremony next day went without a hitch and the beautiful Agatha in her gorgeous dress announced to all the royals assembled for the feast she was to be the new Ariel, declaration welcomed with rapturous applause. Her teary mother led her to the door, as Agatha set out to find the witch who would help her get to her prince. The one with the boat, you know.
The witch was an old hag with shifty eyes who liked to haggle. She immediately pointed out it was not right, as the silly girl was not a mermaid and the whole trade would make a mockery of the old tradition, but all her concerns were swept away by a bag of gold Agatha's father had had the wisdom to provide. The deal was done, Agatha gave up her voice and, in turn, the witch used her magic to fly the girl right in front of the prince's castle, who was conveniently out for a walk.
I know what you must be thinking, giving up your voice is a pretty big sacrifice, but, you see, in Agatha's case it was quite a blessing. Lovely as she was, princess Agatha had a most annoying high-pitched voice and her laughter was so irritating it had been known to kill a bird in mid-flight twenty miles away. They lived happily ever after and the prince who became a king in due time went to his grave regretting he never heard Agatha's sweet voice.
The End.

Story written for Hive account@mariannewest's freewrite challenge, today's prompt was: forty-four! Check out her blog and join our freewrite community.

Thanks for reading!

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