The Other Girl in the Tower: Ch. 3

Continued from Chapter 2. . . .

"Rouge!" Rapunzel shrieked.

"What?" Rouge demanded, displeased at being awakened from her nap. Sleeping was just about all there was to do.

"There are two men down there!" Rapunzel gasped, wringing her hands. "What on earth should I do?!"

"Men?" Rouge pressed her face to the little opening, mentally cursing the terrible view. "Well, don't just stand there! Help them up!" Maybe they would have rope and a battering ram, though she doubted it.

Rapunzel looked scared, but she obediently cast her braid over the windowsill.

A few minutes later, after a good amount of thudes, yells, and swearing, a handsome boy about their age stepped into Rapunzel's side of the room. He bowed elaborately and kissed Rapunzel's hand as she stood staring at him with eyes as wide as saucers.

"Who are you?" she squeaked.

"Armand IV, crown prince of Frealla," he said impressively.

A hand appeared on the windowsill, then a foot, then finally a face. Another boy struggled to entangle his shoe from Rapunzel's hair, but suceeded only in tumbling head-over-heels into the room and landing in a heap on the floor.

"And that," Armand said, "is my brother, Adrian."

"At your service," came in slightly muffled tones from beneath Adrian's cloak, which now covered him like a collapsed tent.

"We--we're happy to meet you," Rapunzel said.

"We?" Armand glanced around the room.

"Me and Rouge."

Rouge stuck her hand through the opening and waved.

"Can you get out of there?" Adrian exclaimed, having picked himself up off the floor.

"No," Rouge said sullenly. "I got smart with Gothella, and now I'm gonna rot here."

"Who's Gothella?"

So Rouge and Rapunzel had to explain the whole story. When they finally concluded, Armand said decisively, "We'll get you out of here."

"Oh, would you?" Rapunzel breathed, gazing at him with starry-eyed admiration.

"We'd have to have rope, or a ladder, or something," Adrian said skeptically. He turned to Armand. "Didn't you say you knew the way back to the palace?"

Armand laughed nervously. "Well, we . . . we got a little off the path--"

"What he means," Adrian interrupted, "is we're lost.'

"I did not say that!"

"Well, you can't stay here," said Rouge. "You never know when Gothella might show up. You can camp in the forest and come back tomorrow morning, and we'll talk about this then."

"They can't leave so soon!" Rapunzel pouted, clearly over her fear of them. "We never get any visitors." She batted her eyelashes at Armand. "Especially not . . . princes."

Armand kissed her hand for what seemed like the umpteenth time to Rouge. "We will count the minutes until our return."

Adrian caught Rouge's eye and made a gagging gesture. She smothered a laugh.

~

The moment they were out of sight, Rapunzel let out a squeal and threw herself on the bed. "Oh, weren't they handsome, Rouge? Especially Armand! Oh, did you just see the way he looked at me? Like his midnight eyes were piercing straight to my heart and seeing all the love I--"

"For Pete's sake, Rapunzel, you've barely known him for half an hour."

"Oh, I've always dreamed of this!" she continued, as if she hadn't heard. "My handsome prince will rescue me from the tower and take me back to his palace and we'll be married and become king and queen of Frealla and have four children, two boys and two girls, and . . ."

Rouge lay down on her blanket and effectually zoned out. Armand was indeed handsome, but he wasn't her type. Altogether too flowery, and slightly full of himself. Though she had to admit he'd be perfect for Rapunzel. She smiled as she listened to her friend singing a love song. Rapunzel deserved to be happy.

Rouge entertained no such romantic thoughts for herself. In her own opinion, at least, she was not particaularly pretty or charming. Certainly not attractive enough for . . .

She caught herself. No, it wasn't possible. Rapunzel was the hopeless romantic, not her. And yet here she was with the picture of a curly-haired boy with a lopsided grin stuck in her head.

~

"So how long have you known this Gothella?" Adrian inquired.

"For as long as I can remember," Rouge said with a shrug. "She kind of raised me and Rapunzel."

"Do you know anything about your parents?"

"Nope." She was standing beside the pitiful little hole in the wall and doing her best to have a conversation with Adrian, who stood on the other side. With anyone else, it would have been rather awkward, but for some reason she felt perfectly comfortable talking to him, as if she'd known him for years.

Armand and Rapunzel were seated by the window, clearly engaged in some kind of romantic discussion. Rouge was torn between her happiness for her friend and her long-cherished contempt for all things sentimental. As if that weren't enough, she hersefl was trying desperately to fight off any feelings for--

"Hey, Rouge," Adrian said, interrupting her little reverie. "You still awake?"

She blushed. "Sorry. What were you saying?"

"Rapunzel said you can use magic. Are you a witch?"

"Sort of. I mean, I'm really just Gothella's apprentice. At least, I was . . . I doubt she'll ever let me touch a wand or potion again after what happened."

"Don't worry. We'll think of something." He smiled reassuringly. "When we--"

"I found it!" Rapunzel cried, waving some kind of paper. "The map of Frealla! I knew I had it somewhere; I just didn't expect it to be in my corset drawer." She spread it out on her bed and pointed to something Rouge couldn't see. "Here's this tower, and there's the palace."

"Seven miles," Adrian remarked. "We were close enough to fall in the moat the entire time."

Armand grinned sheepishly.

"That's it, then," Adrian continued. "Armand and I will go back to the castle, get some rope--and a pickaxe," he added, glancing at the wall between himself and Rouge, "and then we'll bust you two out of here."

"And of course you'll have to come back with us to the palace," said Armand, taking Rapunzel's hand. "Father and Mother would love to meet you."

"How soon can you come back?" Rapunzel breathed.

"Tomorrow at seven o'clock, and not a minute later. I promise."

To be continued. . . .