CINDERELLA PART 3

The ballroom was a glittering spectacle of pastel gowns and powdered wigs, with enough gold leaf on the walls to fund a small kingdom’s military campaign. Rhea crouched behind an enormous flower arrangement, her pointed hat barely concealed by a particularly aggressive peony, watching Cinderella hover near the refreshment table like a nervous deer.

            ‘Rhea, you were right, the music makes me want to dance,’ Cinderella said. ‘It’s fantastic in here, and so clean.’

            ‘I’m just going to the loo, I’ll be right back,’ Rhea nodded to her. Cinderella looked stunning in her shimmering dress, and Rhea squinted, locating the prince. Hidden behind a majestic vase, she whispered to herself, ‘Right, Operation Get-Cinderella-to-Dance is a go.’

The prince stood across the room, looking bored out of his royal mind as Lady Brunhilde monopolised his attention with what appeared to be an interpretive dance about her father’s sheep farm.

            ‘Time for some strategic magic,’ Rhea muttered, pointing a finger at Lady Brunhilde’s hairpiece. ‘Flora Capillus!’

Poof.

Lady Brunhilde’s wig suddenly sprouted actual daisies. She shrieked and fled, leaving the prince bewildered but free.

            ‘Excellent,’ Rhea grinned, then turned to the next obstacle: a Lady Cordelia, power-walking toward the prince with the determination of someone who’d practised her curtsy 847 times. Rhea flicked her wrist. ‘Bustle-us Maximus!’ Lady Cordelia’s bustle expanded to three times its standard size, causing her to get wedged sideways in a doorway like a fashionable cork.

            ‘Oops,’ Rhea whispered, not sounding sorry in the least.

But Cinderella was still frozen by the punch bowl.

            ‘Oh, for crying out loud.’ Rhea tried a gentle encouragement spell. ‘Anima Fortis!’ Her magic, feeling unreliable, seemed to mishear the request. Instead of confidence, the spell gave Cinderella a spectacular case of the hiccups.

Hic—hic—HIC.

Every hiccup made Cinderella’s golden slippers emit a slight chiming sound. The noise drew confused stares.

            ‘Not what I was going for,’ Rhea grimaced, quickly trying to reverse it. But instead of stopping the hiccups, she accidentally made the chandelier candles flicker in rhythm.

Hic-flicker, hic-flicker, HIC-FLICKER.

The prince, drawn by the peculiar light show, finally approached.

            ‘Are you… Alright, miss?’ he asked, looking genuinely concerned.

‘I’m—hic—perfectly—hic—wonderful, Your Royal—HIC—Highness,’ Cinderella managed.

Rhea tried another spell, but her concentration was shot. Her magic latched onto the orchestra, cranking the tempo. The gentle waltz became a frantic polka, and dancers began spinning like deranged music boxes. In the chaos, the prince grabbed Cinderella’s hand, and they began to dance—less a waltz and more a desperate attempt to avoid getting trampled.

            ‘Finally!’ Rhea celebrated, then immediately tripped as a duchess spun past like a silk tornado.

After two songs, the prince and Cinderella managed to escape the ballroom carnage, slipping onto the moonlit terrace.

            ‘Oh my cauldron, finally,’ Rhea breathed, crawling out from under a table where she’d taken refuge from a conga line that had spontaneously formed. She crept to the terrace doors and peered out from behind a statue. The prince and Cinderella were actually talking. A genuine smile touched Cinderella’s lips.

            ‘Success!’ Rhea whispered.

Then the clock began to chime midnight. The magic in the air seemed to curdle. Cinderella’s smile vanished.

            ‘Oh no,’ she gasped, pulling away. ‘I must leave!’

            ‘But why?’ the prince pleaded.

            ‘I cannot stay!’ Cinderella insisted, backing towards the grand staircase. She paused, her eyes glittering with cunning. ‘But… before I go… promise you will not watch me leave. Close your eyes, and I will kiss you.’

The prince, utterly smitten, immediately shut his eyes tight. Cinderella shot a frantic glance toward Rhea—part apology, part ‘watch this’—then turned and fled down the grand staircase. Rhea, seeing her chance, slipped from behind the statue to follow.

            ‘I am waiting, chosen one,’ the prince’s voice boomed from the terrace.

As Cinderella reached the final landing, she turned and flung her golden slipper. It wasn’t an accident—it was a clean, deliberate throw. The shoe spun through the air, striking a step with a bright, ringing clink, then bounced and clattered its way down the staircase. Without a backward glance, Cinderella swept into the moonlit gardens.

The final chime of midnight faded.

The prince opened his eyes. ‘She’s… gone?’ His eyes scanned the hall and fell upon two things: the single, gleaming slipper, and the pointy-hatted witch who had just reached the bottom of the stairs, staring at it in horror.

Rhea looked up and met the prince’s gaze. Before she could move, he was rushing down the steps, his face alight with a deeply flawed theory.

            ‘You!’ he exclaimed, not with anger, but delirious joy. ‘My lady! You’ve changed your attire! A clever magical disguise!’

            ‘What? No, I’m—’

            ‘But you cannot fool fate!’ the prince declared, swooping down to pick up the slipper. ‘The shoe will prove it! It will prove you are my one true love!’

            ‘Actually, that’s not how magic, shoes, or love works,’ Rhea protested, but he was already kneeling before her.

            ‘Wait, no, that’s not—’

It was too late. With a gallant flourish, he took her foot and slid the golden slipper on. It fit perfectly. A gasp went through the remaining courtiers.

            ‘My beloved!’ he cried, seizing her hands. ‘I knew I’d find you! Your disguise is brilliant, but your feet could not lie!’

Rhea stared at her own foot, now clad in an exquisite golden shoe. She stared at the prince’s beaming, utterly convinced face. ‘Your Highness, I think there’s been a mistake. I have black hair; she was blonde. I’m wearing a pointed witch hat.’

            ‘Love is blind to such superficial details!’ the prince declared, having the observational skills of a dim-witted goldfish.

            ‘But I literally look nothing like her!’

            ‘Your beauty transcends physical appearance!’

            ‘How can you be so blind? I am another person!’

            ‘Fashion is so subjective!’

            ‘Oh no,’ she whispered. By interfering, she’d derailed entirely Cinderella’s story. Cinderella was gone, vanished, while Rhea was being mistaken for a princess.

            ‘This,’ Rhea muttered as the prince continued to profess his undying love to her left elbow, ‘is going to be a magnificent disaster.’

The prince was now trying to waltz with her on the steps, utterly oblivious to the fact that she bore absolutely no resemblance to the woman he’d fallen in love with an hour earlier. ‘I’ve really done it this time,’ Rhea sighed, as her hat got caught on his epaulettes. ‘I’ve accidentally written Cinderella out of her own story.’

The sound of carriage wheels grew fainter. Rhea pushed him away.

            ‘Your Highness, I have to fix this mess!’

            ‘But my darling, we haven’t even discussed the wedding arrangements—’

            ‘No weddings!’ Rhea shouted, sprinting toward the courtyard. ‘I need my broom, I need to catch that carriage, I need to—oh, blast it all, I don’t have my broom! Think, Rhea, think.’ Her eyes fell on a bale of hay by the stables. ‘Oh, you’ve got to be kidding me.’

Desperate times call for desperate measures. She sprinkled levitation powder on the hay. ‘Volatus Rusticus!’ The bale rose, wobbling into the air.

            ‘Right then,’ she said, climbing aboard the floating hay. ‘Off we go.’ The hay bale lurched forward with the grace of a drunk pelican.

            ‘My beloved, wait!’ came a shout from behind. Rhea turned to see the prince mounting his white stallion. ‘I shall follow you to the ends of the art!’

            ‘Oh, for the love of—’ Rhea groaned as the prince spurred his horse forward. She threw the heeled shoe at him. Just then, two familiar voices piped up from her shoulder.

            ‘Well, well, well,’ said Gus, adjusting tiny spectacles. ‘Look what we have here, Tavo.’

            ‘Indeed, my friend,’ replied Tavo, from a miniature announcer’s booth made of breadcrumbs. ‘It appears we have a most unusual chase sequence developing.’

            ‘Ladies and gentlemen,’ Gus announced, ‘welcome to the Midnight Grand Prix! In lane one, Rhea is on what can only be described as agricultural transportation. Speed: questionable.’

            ‘And in lane two,’ Tavo added, ‘the persistent Prince Charming on his magnificent stallion, clearly suffering from a severe case of mistaken identity.’

Rhea’s hay bale bucked. ‘Are you two seriously commenting on my life right now?’

            ‘Coming around the first turn,’ Gus continued, ignoring her, ‘our witch appears to be having some technical difficulties. A new record for in-flight shedding, I believe.’

            ‘What will happen next?’ Tavo exclaimed. ‘The hay bale is losing altitude! And what is this? The prince is gaining ground!’

Indeed, the prince was galloping hard, shouting romantic declarations that were getting increasingly absurd.

            ‘I can see Cinderella’s carriage!’ Rhea called out, but her hay bale was starting to shed straw like a moulting chicken.

            ‘This is it, folks!’ Gus announced. ‘The final stretch! Will our heroine catch the runaway princess? Will the prince catch his thoroughly wrong bride? Will anyone develop basic pattern recognition skills?’

            ‘Tune in next time,’ Tavo added with flair, ‘for what promises to be the most ridiculous conclusion to a fairy tale intervention in recorded history!’

The hay bale gave one final, violent shudder and began descending rapidly toward the dark forest below, with Rhea clinging to it for dear life.