the_seafarer | The Frog Prince, or: Kate Was Right All Along

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The Frog Prince, or: Kate Was Right All Along

The world is larger now.

Not just larger; taller, stranger. Everything caught in odd angles, flat and imposing. Blades of grass tower over him, ants the size of small dogs bump into his feet, and he startles --

Sending the world into a spinning, alarmed leap. A blink, and everything has shifted; he might be miles from the door, for all he can tell the difference.

The tea. It could only have been the tea. There was a splash of warmth, and his shirt soaked in a crooked strip, and deep violet plumes of choking smoke, and then everything grew horribly large and strange. Could it? Truly, there have been times when he'd been warned off food or drink in this place in the past, but he'd always felt tea would never betray him in such a fashion.

It appears Milliways is not yet through with surprising him.

Be that as it may, he cannot continue in this fashion. Large eyes blink, bewildered, at the green, long-fingered hand replacing his own; he attempts to edge towards his right and finds himself catapulted into the rough wood of the back step. A twitch forward sends him sailing in an arc that turns steadily less graceful as he tumbles back into the ground, heart thrumming a panicked pace somewhere nowhere near his usual steady beat.

There must be a way to reverse this spell, whatever it is. A wizard, perchance, or sorcerer, if he can find one -- but any attempt to move back into the bar proper would result in a scramble to keep from being trod upon, and in his present state, he can hardly call for help, or draw attention to himself.

He sits, for a moment, shivering in a clump of tall grass, flips into a bewildered cut of a half-leap at a bugling call sounding nearby, a sharp whinny that freezes him into a shell he cannot seem to break from for a lifetime's worth of worried breaths and buzzing pulse.

The horses. The stables. Possibly, there, he might find aid -- there are fewer feet to trample him, when the horses are in the stalls, and the place is peaceful enough he might find a moment to think, or plan.

It has simply never seemed such a very insurmountable distance, before.

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Those first words are quite relieving. Enough so that she's actually already considering whether she'll need a second cup of tea. To let Kate tell her about whatever project or dilemma has placed this serious graveness within Kate's blue eyes. As she'd be glad to help as much as she can, for as long as she is still here.

Before she's certain she must have heard that wrong.

Marian's mouth draws closed, lips pressed together. Eyelashes fluttering through quick blinks of confusion. Her lips pressed together. Head tilting in direct, sharp unspoken question first. Dark curls falling to one side, over a shoulder. Eyebrows pushing upward. Too many words falling against them. The thought that it's not possible hitting every proof of Milliways since the day she walked

"Caspian is a frog?" A sharp, next possible moment, repetition.

Her mind at how and where, but her mouth, shooting out next, "Is he alright?"

Marian's blue-grey eyes were suddenly checking across Kate's hands and the pockets of her duster, as she was pushing up from her chair, leaving everything else, instantly, behind.

"As well as anyone could be expected in that kinda situation, far as I can tell. We're havin' some difficulty communicatin'."

She rises, hands out once more, this time to calm and console her friend as well as show that he is not currently with her.

"Come with me, an' I'll take you to 'im. He's ... well, he's in a state."

Marian gets the first message easily, with the hands held out. Caspian is not here. Caspian is somewhere else. Once, again, it repeats in her head. Caspian is a frog. She nodded, and gestured, hands slightly faster moving than normal, in a waved gesture to lead the way.

"Do you know how it happened? How long he's been this way?"

It seems strange that Caspian would fall under the workings of the general magic worked here.

He was on the people that warned her of everything here. But the magic did like to change in new and expected ways.
There's a seconds thought about writing this up for Security. That will wait until the problem has been handled though.

"I'm sorry t'say I don't know much more'n you do now."

She opens the door for her, recounting everything that's happened in the past twenty minutes as they make their way out into the afternoon sun.

"So, y'see, it ain't the normal bar fare, so far as I'm understandin'. Sounds t'me like someone, or some thing, had a hand in this. Which is how come I thought y'might be able t'help. Short'a findin' who did this, which appears nigh on impossible right now, there's only a few things that might help."

The closer they get to the little shelter she set him in, the clearer a small bounding ball of frenetic energy can be seen. Kate clucks.

"I told 'im t'stay hidden."

No self-preservation.

Kate leaves, in a brushing wave of grass, her duster sweeping over the blade tops, moving too fast for him to keep up even if he hadn't been told, sternly, if not unkindly, to keep himself put.

Easier said than done. He hears the words, and intends to obey, but the frog is edgy and unhappy, hopping in startled circles at every brief shadow or tremor in the ground. It's mortifying, being required to hide from birds he'd never have noticed in his natural state, and the minutes drag like years.

Kate's plan -- what is it? Could it possibly work? If not -- well, such things have historically worn off, in the past.

Haven't they?

A large shadow falls over him, and the frog freezes, trembling, until grass is bent by familiar skirts and Kate's boots, and he hops closer, towards Marian, who has never let him down, who will surely know what to do.

"Ribbit."

There is certainly a small frantic frog, green and, occasional, flashing gold. Hoping about everywhere. In a circle. Haphazard and in every direction. It's confusing and pitiful, tugging at her heart, even as it bewilders her. Sending her to her knees, in pile of skirts a few feet from him. Leaning down and reaching out, even as she's asking, "Caspian?"

She didn't like or dislike frogs, and couldn't even remember the last time she'd touched one. Maybe when she was a young girl, when Much and Robin could collect them and toss them into sewing circles through windows. Subtly until their laughter couldn't be drowned out by the screams even, when she'd collected them from under the feet of girls more likely to trample them on accident than cause any ill in the opposing direction.

But she was careful or at least tried to be very careful as she was picking him up. Even thought her fingers caught on the hard little crown, surprising her, when she was being so delicate. Making her look up toward Kate, "What is this f--" She'd tugged at it lightly, only to realize it wouldn't come off. "Is it stuck on him?"

"Beats me."

At least they're of one mind so far as initial reactions. Kate kneels beside them, brow furrowed deeply.

"S'the only reason I stopped t'consider he wasn't just any other frog. There are stories, where I'm from. Stories 'bout royalty fallin' under curses like this one. Why Caspian would be affected, I couldn't tell you. But if'n that's the reason for all this, the cure might be simple."

It's so Milliways. That she's very probably holding a friend, her closest here, small and a little more slimy than she really like, hearing that there are worlds out there that have frog curses specifically for royalty, and the second part is the part she can easily just make an odd face at and not drag out the necessary surprise toward. Milliways had doors to every kind of world, even she hadn't associated anything like that with Kate's world yet.

Her fingers stopped tugging the tiny gold crown, still looking at him very close, and the small shiny crown.

"What is the cure?" She was looking back up at Kate. "He's the brother of the Queen of Amergeldar, and was a king, back in his own world."

"A king?"

Isn't that the kind of thing you tell a body before you've known them, say, a whole year? All these months. All the impropriety.

Kate wants to press her further, eyes darting to the frog king — she isn't upset, Caspian, she's just very disappointed — but knows now isn't the moment. So he simply garners an arched eyebrow and the thinning of her lips before she answers Marian.

"A kiss."

There's a very particular expression universal to schoolteachers everywhere -- a specific angle of eyebrow, a degree or two of winter chilling the voice. The frog-who-was-Caspian shrinks under it, thin throat skin thrumming, the only clue the frog hasn't turned into a stone against Marian's palm.

Perhaps, if he's still enough, Kate will cease looking at him with that expression. Or maybe a hawk will appear and remove him from her frosty disappointment by eating him.

It may well be preferable.

Marian, on the other hand, looks only surprised aside from the concern widening her eyes. It's an expression he regrets putting on her face, and he's wishes Kate had simply kissed him herself, if indeed that is the cute for his sorry state. Was there truly a need to worry another friend, no matter how comforting he finds her presence?

"It was a long time ago," Marian said, the faintest sharp edge to her tongue sliding out fast, as she instinctively pulled her hands, and the little frog -- Caspian --, closer to her at the not entirely expected, or unexpected, ice to Kate's surprise. Not entirely at obvious odds from her own both protectiveness and defensiveness.

And, perhaps, even a shaft of guilt. It was not her story to tell, and it was not a normal one even for here. A whole other 'whole life' from beginning to end. Rather like his war, and his loss, even this was something she held delicate, precious, and was humbled to hold. Whatever he chose to share with her, that she kept carefully for him.

She didn't share his truths lightly. Only the hairbreadth from the edge of never. Except for Amy. Alanna. Mal. He would have to understand. He was a frog.

"I can assume it didn't work when you tried, then?" As he was still a very little be-crowned frog in her hands, trembling and still in the cage of her fingers.

How Milliways of it not be that simple. "What else can we can try? Should we find one the Gods or Tricksters?"

Both eyebrows creep almost imperceptibly toward her hairline. There may even be the fledgling wings of a smirk curling her lips. The protectiveness always in tandem with the affection, the fond spark.

"However, still royalty."

Her eyes shift between the two. She's weighing her next words.

"Ah, I haven't tried myself. I don't, ah — know 'im as well as you do."

Kate hadn't even tried, which is rather hard, and Caspian isn't sure that not knowing him well is really a fair enough excuse.

Still, she had just pointed out he'd been less than entirely forthcoming with her, so he supposes judgement should be bypassed, no matter how distressing the situation might be.

And he appreciates Marian's defense, whether necessary or not. The truth is, he ought to have told Kate, he supposes. When she'd teased him about having a fortunate childhood, at least. And he hadn't meant to lie, had certainly never desired her to feel he'd kept it from her purposely. It is -- a hard truth. Not what he once was, but what remains, mayhaps.

Well. He can explain later, once his form has been returned. For now, the little frog stares up at Marian, and blinks, before inflating to comment.

"Ribbit."

Dash it all.

Marian's brow wrinkled, head tilting backward, to look up and over toward Kate finally. A little bewildered. "That matters?"

At, admittedly, both the notion that Kate hadn't tried, and the one where Kate felt she didn't know Caspian well enough for merit, and, if she was being honest, at the first passing notion of being referenced off the task of kissing a frog. The holding of which, small, clammy and a little slick, was still an oddity she wasn't entirely settled to. Except that it was Caspian.

Which was rather how the settling of shoulders and decisions went. Except that it was Caspian.

Making her look at the frog in her hands and back to Kate, again. The cultured raise of eyebrows, past the first impulse, and the following thoughts, that it was an odd, albeit far simpler solution that most any of the magic usually worked in the bar. Save that mistletoe freezing. Which this wasn't. "You want me to kiss him and see if this wears off?"

Wherein him is probably gestured a little with the movement of the frog between them.

Innocent face is innocent.

"It matters."

Caspian had made the situation rather clear to her the day she remarked, nonchalant, on he and Marian being lovers. As he'd nearly burst into flame on the spot, stammering and denying. And Marian, of course, with her complicated situation in Sherwood Kate does her best not to press her on.

However, call it a theory. A theory based on the light in their eyes and the irrepressible smiles that come to their faces at the mere mention of the other's name; the devotion and loyalty, the unbreakable and untarnished ferocity of their friendship.

'True love's kiss' as an explanation won't go over well, she knows, but presented as a theory ...

"If he an' I are understandin' each other well enough, it seems the best move t'make. Only other ways I see are trackin' down whoever did this t'him, but I got the feelin' that'll be like lookin' for a needle in a haystack. At the time, huntin' you down seemed most practical."

Practicality, Marian. You like that, right?

"At least simpler, and more direct," Marian supposed, looking from Kate back to Caspian in her hands. "Knowing who to look for."

Marian isn't really one to argue. Well, she is. With Robin. With every momentary level of eyes, and hold of tongue, or slip and snap of it, in the presence of the Sheriff. But not with her friends, and not over things they understand that she doesn't. Magic, especially of another world, Milliways and Arch has trained both trust of friends and patient reticence toward strangers deeply into her.

Kate, being of the first caliber, and category, of course. A dear friend, and one who would not lie to her or lead her in the wrong direction. Especially in dire circumstances. If she says that this is Caspian and that somehow being his friend will help this, then Marian will believe her. Even if she does hesitate with something incredibly fleetingly like a small grimace when she studying the small green, very much so still a frog in her hands. With a sad, bright little crown.

"Only one way to find out, then," Marian said, straightening her shoulders and spine. To herself. To the-frog-that-was-supposedly-Caspian. To Kate, perhaps, even. Before she takes a breath and gives up whatever hesitation she has. Lifting the frog a small way, but more so bowing her own head, down toward the frog and her piles of skirts billowing beneath him and her hands. A curtain of curls drifting against the back of her cheeks.

Closing her eyes, and pressing her lips to the bumpy green skin in front of the small, pointed golden crown.

Marian's lips touch his forehead, and the world pauses.

Ceases previously ceaseless spinning, sends the universe whirling around it, instead, in a backwards spiral that pulls at the center of him like the moon tugging the tide.

A breath is held, and released with a low, dull break of sound that hits the air around them like dragonfire, bursting into a blossom of rainbow light, rapidly expanding and shining brilliant and clear, racing ahead of a strong, sudden wind.

Clearing the air into the scent of seawater, and deep woods. Of lilies, and clean grass.

And leaving Caspian, dazed, kneeling in a patch of grass with the sun warm on his bare back, Marian's lips warm on his forehead, and a headache threatening to shatter his skull from the inside out, starting with these blasted hammers thumping at his temples.

Edited 2013-02-24 07:40 (UTC)

Kate sways in the sudden blast, taken aback by the startling clarity of it all. Hair moving in the wind, eyelashes fluttering, breathing deep the sweet scents.

The surprise clears, and the realization that something worked strikes like a hammer on hot steel before

well.

Before.

"Good heavens."

That is one very naked man.

Her hat is the first to be shoved at him, her eyes toward heaven. Her duster is quick to follow, dumb limbs frantically shrugging it off.

There's a crazy sudden, very strong, blast of wind. At least she thinks it's wind, even as she's sure somehow, that it doesn't just blow past and around her, but slams straight through her. Warm, and wide. The way sunshine in the full of summer falls through the thickest of bright emerald leaves on Sherwood trees older than the oldest people and stories she's ever heard. Alive and more beautiful than words can contain.

A startling, confusing thing all in itself. Causing her to breathe in and blink. Right before there are hands being thrust between them, startling her and seizing her shoulders. Before the gold of Caspian's hair is cut with the off-white of a well-timed cowboy hat suddenly blocking a good chunk of the alarming view that widens her blue-grey on the first flush of recognition. With the fact it is Caspian.

Caspian. And Caspian's sun-bright hair. That had been tickling against the skin of her mouth and chin, making her pull back. And see. Caspian's skin. A lot of Caspian's skin. All of Caspian's skin. And no clothing. When she can't even decide if the bigger problem is that she can't remember to breathe, while blinking at him, unable to shift yet, like those horrible moments at home, in court, when she's frozen display, except with, here, with, at Caspian, Caspian, Caspian no longer a frog and incredibly -- and Kate's hands and hat.

Or if she did and it turned out it couldn't be air, it turned into that confused tiny gasp of suddenly all too aware alarm that is rushing warmth to her cheeks like she's suddenly in the middle of a fever, startling her gaze anywhere else but at his hair, hair face, the rise of collar bones and span of a leg right below the hat, and knees. Pulling back startled, even in the swamp of skirts that don't help. But at least aren't. Aren't. Everything they aren't, when they fill up her vision, but can't blot out the race of shock.

She's almost too frantically glad when there's a coat being shoved between them only a second after that. But breathing might take a moment.

Edited 2013-02-24 08:15 (UTC)

He feels suddenly washed overboard, into a cool fresh sea, sunlit and sweet, buoying him back to the surface in a rush and the feeling of being smashed through a pane of glass that turns out to be water, shattering in a brilliant burst and a rising wind.

And Marian, kneeling in front of him, now eye to eye, blinking wide, startled eyes, face pale aside from the pink starting to fill in her cheeks. Shocked, rather than triumphant. As if his disenchantment had opened up the ground beneath her, or --

A sudden flurry of cloth pushes between them; ivory hat and tan duster that fills his hands and is shoved past them, covering skin laid bare and -- and --

He isn't wholly certain it mightn't be preferable if the blasted theory hadn't worked and he'd remained the frog.

Marian is looking away, long past startled, well into the utter loss of lacking words or action, but Kate has, thankfully, gained her sense back well enough to help him cover himself, a deep blush heating his face and the frog, now released, taking up residence in his throat, forcing him to clear it three full times before trusting any words to his voice.

"Thank you," he says, with as much grace as he can muster, despite the sun on his naked shoulders and the duster clenched firmly in front of him. "Your -- aid is much appreciated, Marian." His voice does something odd on her name, and he has to look away from her, a little desperately, searching out Kate, who at least is doing more than staring at him.

"Kate. That was..." A slight pause, tone as even and calm as he can make it . "Quick thinking."

It really is a lovely day, isn't it? The sky is such a perfect, deep shade of blue, Kate can't stop staring at it.

She politely refrains from remarking on the hitch in Caspian's voice as he utter's Marian's name, smirk already threatening at the corners of her mouth but resolutely being penned in. She catches his eyes quickly, running her hand through her hair.

"There are suitable clean clothes in the tack room. Might be a size or two big."

Best not to bandy words and get straight to the meat and potatoes. Er, so to speak.

Her eyes stray skyward again.

"No." It struggles out of her throat. Faltered, into firm. Marian is very uncertain what is lodged in her throat, but action.

Action is so much easier to move toward. Action. Reaction. She's moving, very suddenly but not very quickly. There is surprise, but nothing like panic allows itself to exist in her face any longer. It's the kind of trained grace, in the worst of easily turned to deadly, and possibly even more deadlier, situations, that has only deserted her in the few times she could barely stand under her own volition.

"I'll get something that fits from the Bar." Her fingers are in her skirts, spreading them back out, and her eyes forcing themselves to meet across Kate and the only partially duster laden Caspian. If her gaze flickers, features flicker, on the second, the set of her shoulders and the hold of her chin never does. Milliways. Milliways always excelled at finding way to make one unfoot themselves from everything.

If it takes the effort of the second, to settle on Caspian's face, and nothing lower than gold hair and such reddened cheeks, it's with the knowledge that she'd want no less than to crawl under the grass if it were her, feeling half undone. Fingers too comforted by heavy cloth under them, which annoys her at herself. Knowing that he'd probably do no less if she needed his help. Like anytime she ever had.

Her mouth pressed, trying to curve toward something like a firm reassurance, aiming to catch his grey eyes. "I'll be right back."

And she will. At least it did not do her any disservice in getting to move quickly back toward the bar.

He nods, glancing up to meet her eyes, seeking self-containment enough to school his features, still the muscles that want to send him either burying into the ground or fleeing for the cooling, covering safety of the water. "Thank you."

This can be relied upon, at least. The measured words, calm voice. Lessons wrought into him, woven over each other, year by year, in the castle rooms long ago. Necessary for interactions with Aunt Prunaprismia, and, to a lesser extent, the dignitaries of his later years. Perfect control of tone, timbre, word choice; the mantle of manners that has served him so well.

That is so less than the most helpful sort of mantle he might have at this exact moment, but threadbare though it is, he clings to it like he clings to Kate's duster, doing his best to cover -- well, whatever he can with the worn brown cloth.

None of it can keep relief at Marian's disappearance from appearing on his face, and he chances a look at Kate, staring so determinedly up at the blue sky above.

How long, he wonders, will it be before he can clear his throat without expecting it to come out as another pathetic ribbit?

This one works, at least. "I'm grateful, Kate. And I -- apologize for the disturbance."

"Oh, no. No, no bother at all."

Nope. No bother, no fuss; this is a perfectly normal conversation shared between two perfectly respectable friends in a perfectly ordinary setting. Certainly neither of them are as naked as a jaybird, or trying desperately to rein in laughter.

"Things here have a way of takin' you by surprise. I'm only glad it ain't permanent, an' that we don't hafta go huntin' for some villain through the bar proper."

She absently points to the horizon.

There's a bird.

Birds are a safe focal point.

"Y'might want t'shift things an inch t'the left, however."

Ahem.

He hazards a glance, colors brightly, and adjusts the borrowed duster.

Caspian has been raised to move with grace since birth. He is not prone to nervous tics, or allowing surprise or shock to get the better of him.

But Kate will perhaps understand why, once he has made certain that the duster has made him as decent as might be expected, one hand lifts to scrub through his hair, rub over his jaw. Or why he coughs, uncomfortable.

"Surprise, aye.

"I must say, this was somewhat unexpected."

To say the least.

Edited 2013-02-24 18:14 (UTC)

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