The Princess and the Pea
by Pat (May 2008)
Rating: PG, BtVs/Ats, Wesley/Cordelia, Fairy Tales Revisited
Yeah! Thank you for nominating this little story for Round 7 or RWSA.
Yippee! This little fic got Runner Up accolade: what a pleasure!
THE PRINCESS AND THE PEA "You will never attend to be anyone!" shouted his father.
"I can't believe that your mom is still cuddling you like the baby you were. When are you going to become a man?" the older man added pacing away.
Wesley stayed silent. He was used to the verbal abuse by now. As usual there was no end in sight.
"I won't let you do it, son. You either wise up and stand up to the council or I'll disavow you." he added now for good measure.
In a soft and controlled voice Wesley Wyndam-Pryce finally answered his overbearing father. "I will do as you wish, Sir. The only thing I want is for the young bride to be to truly represent the finest in British education, so as to keep our family in the good graces of the Council."
Oh how smooth... with their level of education finding this bride to be wasn't going to be a picnic. No. It was going to take forever to find someone that would prevail from his mom bigotry, his dad holier-than-thou attitudes, and his own reticence to get involved with anyone. After all, he still had to find himself. So far the only thing he knew is that he loved research. Just not like his father, he wanted to live his experiences, breathe them in, transform them in living histories; nothing that could be provided by a wife...
*~*~*
And then started the dance, first we had the female recruits of the Academy finding themselves being invited for tea. No good seed appeared from this.
Then we had the daughters of the most influential men in England, and even though they were all well traveled and well mannered, none had an inkling for adventure the way he had, at least when he was away from his father.
Finally, there were the long weekends with what the best of the world had to offer. These women were beautiful, hard to please and quite in a league of their own. In brief, too much for a stressed and not empowered enough young man.
Because the project was much more complex and involved than anyone had thought at first, everyone put it on the back burner in order to fulfill their daily obligations.
~*~~*~~*~~
The storm finally moved on when the knock was heard. Eager to leave behind the tense meal he was sharing with his parents, Wesley went through the large entry to find a drowned rat looking for shelter. The girl was soaking wet, nothing was special about the attire or what was left of the hairdo, but in the great scheme of thing she did represent adventure and brought fore his inquisitive mind.
"Good evening young lady, where you caught by the storm?" he inquired gently.
"I guess you are not blind then..." she muttered under her breath "Yes Sir, can I importune you enough for shelter tonight?" she added more amiably.
"Well I suppose we could accommodate you for an evening, as the closest Inn is still a long drive away" he said looking at her with renewed interest now that the red coat was dropped to the floor.
He lowered himself with practiced grace to gather the wet garment and found himself speechless now that he was looking at the most amazing pair of legs he had an opportunity to assess. Small ankles led to well define calves, muscled legs led to beautiful thighs. One could tell that the young woman was exercising often, he felt a hitch to touch what appeared like satiny skin.
"Thank you for your consideration Mr.?"
"I am sorry, I forgot my manners. I am Wesley Wyndam-Pryce, Headmaster at the Council Academy and this is my parents house." He took her hand while doing the presentation and was now waiting for the reciprocation, letting his warmth seep into her frigid hands.
"My name is Cordelia Chase and I was on my way to Paris after a short stay in London. Thank you for your hospitality." She almost curtsied, taken by the formality of the space and of her host.
He invited the young girl to follow him to the dining room and held a chair to his side to allow her to seat and sustain herself. Discretely he called in the butler and recommended that the guest bedroom was prepared in all haste.
Returning to the table, Wesley was surprised to see his parents engrossed in a lively discussion with their guest. Traveling had always been a favorite subject in this family and Cordelia seemed to have had his share of traipsing around the world. She looked so young though...
He sat and just looked at her, all thoughts of food forgotten. Wesley wandered if this young woman could be his destiny. How can one be certain? Wasn't she in transit anyway? A stupid tale from his youth came back to mind. A pea. Do people even have those non-processed again in their pantries? Well, he wasn't going to ask his princess to sleep on a pea but what will be a good indicator of her worth? If she is what he is looking for, he'd follow her wherever she's heading, he won't let his potential soul mate be lost for later or even forever.
The meal came to a companionable end, a surprise for the Wyndam-Pryce household. Their guest retired shortly after thanking them profusely. Wesley directed Cordelia to the guest quarters and while she was discovering the delicate beauty of the bathroom, he dropped a copy of his 'bible' on the table by her bed, a revised copy of Tabber's Demon Companion, let's see how she'd react to that... With a quick good bye at her door, he left the girl and maybe his dreams behind.
~*~*~
After a fitful night, Wesley was eager to meet with Cordelia. He found her just at the bottom of the steps, on her way to the kitchen. Offering his arm, she took it lightly and laughed at the chivalry in the gesture. He was ready to make her feel like the princess that she appeared to be this morning. Her dry hair were framing her cute face, her tailored pants hugged a lovely behind, the top on her curvaceous form was highlighting the long and gracious neck, he was a goner and ready to admit it...
"Did you sleep well?" he asked, at loss for words already.
"Yes I did, Wes. Your nightly reading material may leave room for discussion though. Not that a compendium is boring to read. Mr. Giles seems to have much worse reading material back home, but let a girl have a little romance would you?" she said with a pearly laugh.
Now he was undone and couldn't wait a moment longer to announce to his parents that he’d found his princess, now he just have to demonstrate to her that he was the answer to her prayers...
The end.
~*~
This is the prompt that inspired the story you just read:
Our dear friend and member Wereleopard suggested a new topic to our summer challenge: rewriting any Fairy tale of our choice with current characters from verses we love.
The fiction work can be as short or as long as you want. Try to stay as true as possible to the original direction of the tale, even if you want to take liberties with the format and story structure.
Present your work in the following format:
Title and author if known of original fairy tale
Title, your name, verse explored
text of the fic
Small commentary from you telling us what was particularly compelling in the fairy tale you pick or/and the story you wrote
To help you get started here are a few links that maybe useful. if you roam the net and find more places to add to this list please do not hesitate to post them in this thread.
Review and summaries of commonly known fairy tales:
http://www.comedyimprov.com/music/schmoll/tales.html
All 209 fairy tales by the Grimm brothers:
http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~spok/grimmtmp/
Similar work for the tales by Hans Christian Andersen:
http://hca.gilead.org.il/
Here you will find fables, fairy tales and other nursery stories:
http://www.ivyjoy.com/fables/index.shtml
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