Haunted House 26 - Unlikely Allies

[aldersprig]

First: A story featuring a male keeper and a female Kept.
Previous: Finding Him

🌳🏚🌳

The poor horses were sad.  Mélanie couldn’t really blame them.

She patted the horse on the nose, reassuring it, and it turned back to the road before the two buffoons noticed what it was doing.  She had just a moment to time this right. The horse seemed to stumble, tripping on thin air, slowing the wagon down to a near-stop.

Mélanie mentally promised the horse all the apples she could find for it, and sugar cubes, and the best currying of its life, all as she hopped up into the wagon.  There was Jasper - drugged, from the looks of it, his eyes open but not tracking - well, not that she could tell if he was tracking her, anyway; she was still invisible - his hands tied behind his back, a heavy canvas gag over his mouth, his feet bound.

read on…

Comments

[sauergeek]

It seems like Mélanie is well-set for espionage or similar work. Lots of stealth, an apparent ability to talk to, or at least influence, animals, and what looks like real-world experience applying same. I have to wonder how she got caught in the first place — did someone catch her sneaking?

I hope the horses stopping like that are them helping out, but I get to wait for next installment to find out.

[aldersprig]

She can… influence animals at least a bit, yep. Might be why she was a cow-lady before.

She got caught by a dragon.

So. Your fairy tale. How did it begin? ‘Once upon a time, there was a beautiful princess…’”

“-Swineherd,” Mélanie countered. “I mean, also dairy maid. Mostly dairy maid.” She ducked her head. Who’d have thought the monsters would come that far out of the cities? “Until she happened upon a hungry dragon who was eating her herds.”

“Oh, it’s one of those stories. A beautiful dairy maid who tried to defend her herd against the dragons. but-”

Mélanie bit her lip. “But the dragon was too big for her, the end.”

[sauergeek]

I'm not sure if that's a metaphorical dragon or an actual one. Or a fae with that as their Change. I suppose some of the more powerful fae could be considered dragons without being 10m long lizards that fly and have horrific breath.