The large double doors to the throne room opened and a liveried servant announced to the room, “Ascendant, Danny Creek of Diadem.”
Danny walked in through the doorway to see easily the largest room he had visited in the palace. The walls went so high that the tree started to twist in on the room and there was no discernible ceiling. The multitude of colorful leaves, hanging from different intervals, seemed to add to this lofty affect.
The walls were decorated with long tapestries and rugs covered the floors. A long stretch of pale green rug connected the doorway, Danny stood in, to the bottom of the dais where the queen sat on her large throne. The throne looked grown from the sacred tree and not carved, as he first suspected. To her right sat the heir, Prince Hawk, and to her left her husband.
Danny looked around and spotted Willow sitting next to Elder Breeze and Elder Frost to one side. He also noticed the elven ambassador to Diadem sitting there as well. The rest of the room was filled with other finely dressed elves. Every single one of them looking at Danny with expressions ranging from curiosity to suspicion and disgust. Danny was a little surprised by the later reactions but had to admit it had to be expected.
Elder Cardinal slipped in behind Danny and walked around to sit with the other elders.
Danny had stopped just inside the room to gather his bearings and reassure Phantom to wait outside, for now.
As Danny walked forward the elves Danny passed suddenly made noises of shock. Following their eyes to his back, Danny remember what he was wearing.
One elven woman in particular stood up and pointed at him, “Your majesty, what is the meaning of this! This… human is wearing a perversion of the symbol of our royal house.”
Before the queen could respond, another elf stood up. He was, of course, beyond handsome and spoke with a refined air, “I see what is going on and I will not allow it! Your majesty, you promised me the princess’ hand in marriage. Now, you are throwing her away to this… boy!”
Others in the room stood and started yelling, struggling to make their own voices heard. Danny stood there in the middle of it all and patiently waited to see what the queen would do.
Rising out of her chair and taking the time to smooth out the voluminous dress that she was wearing, the queen raised a hand daintily to her throat, “SILENCE!”
The sound reverberated around the room and Danny could tell the sound was immediately muffled to his own ears.
*Thanks, Cranny!*
*Anytime*
The nobles around the room were cowering and covering their ears. Danny noticed the royals and elders were not as affected.
The queen turned to address the noble male elf that had spoken up second, “Lord Pine, would you please remind me when it was that I ‘promised’ you my daughters hand in marriage.”
Lord Pine, who was still wincing in pain, looked suddenly worried “Did I say promised, your majesty? I must have misspoken! My, my most sincere apologies.” With that the lord bowed low to the queen and sat down as if to hide his presence as much as possible.
Watching the lord sit there a bit longer the queen turned to address the rest of the room, “As you have told me countless times and in numerous ways this morning, the sacred trees we have are not enough to support our current or future population. Noble Houses, I present to you the answer to this problem.” With that, the queen gestured towards Danny.
The whole room turned again to look at Danny.
Danny hid the annoyance from his face but thought, *Cranny, why are we trying to help them again?*
*…Princess?*
*Try again.*
Danny could hear the smile on Cranny’s face in his next words, *Power!*
Danny walked toward down the aisle and stopped short of the dais. Bowing low to the queen he spoke loudly, “You requested my presence, your majesty?”
The queen smiled and bowed slightly towards Danny before sitting down again in her throne, “Yes Ascendant, thank you for joining us this morning.”
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Turning to her daughter, the queen gestured for Willow to join them, before the queen descended from the dais. Grabbing Danny’s left hand and Willows right, she brought them together between her own hands, “Elders and assembled gentry. I would like to formally announce the engagement of my daughter, Princess Willow, to ascendant, Danny Creek.”
The room broke out into scattered applause, and Danny could see more than half of the nobles sitting there, not clapping. Danny also noticed that the side with the most clapping, chose to sit nearest the elders.
The queen raised a hand for silence, “I would also like to announce that the marriage will be held within two weeks’ time on Princess Willow’s birthday.”
*Well, they are moving fast. You think something happened, Danny?*
*Doesn’t matter, since we now hold all the cards… well seeds.*
The room broke out into applause, but was noticeably more subdued than before. Definitely not a popular decision even among the queen’s supporters.
A lady from the side opposite of the room from the elders stood up, “Your majesty, I feel I must protest this decision. We nobles have so few children already. Our kind cannot afford to have part of our royal bloodline cut off unnecessarily.”
Before the queen could speak Danny stepped forward and addressed the lady directly, “What is the required quota of elven children I will be required to have with the princess to appease you?”
The lady looked at Danny, not appreciating his apparent jest, “Ascendant, humans and elves cannot have children.”
Danny made an obvious show of looking around confused. Slapping his forehead, he acted as if he had just realized that the woman was referring to him. Looking down, he covered his forehead with one head while shaking it despondently. All the while he was laughing loudly as if there was a joke only he understood.
When he raised his head the room broke out in noises of shock.
Danny had activated his nature aspect, but in his elven form this time. Danny’s hair took on a finer quality and his features became sharper and more refined than they had been before. While his high intelligence had rendered him extremely attractive, his elven aspect somehow refined this look even further.
Turning to Willow, Danny asked, “How do I look?”
Willow just stood there with her mouth agape.
Danny’s confident smile fell, “That bad, huh? I tried it out before and didn't think I looked that bad…”
The queen recovered first and quickly whispered, “You look very handsome, Danny.”
Danny rolled his eyes, “Thanks a lot, mom!”
The queen couldn't help but smile at this.
Danny reached into his new robes and pulled something out of a side pocket, “Here your majesty, could you hold this while I speak, it’s getting heavy.”
The queen was too confused by the sudden request and automatically accepted the object.
Quickly walking to the middle of the room Danny raised his hands, “You see, I am not a human or an elf. I am something even better. Now, I consider myself a fair sort of person, so if more than half of you have a problem with me marrying the princess we will call it off. Let's do this with a raise of hands. All opposed with the marriage raise your hand. Come on, get them paws or whatever you elves have in the air.”
The nobles looked around uncertain until a lord, who hadn’t spoken yet, defiantly looked at Danny and raised his hand. Then others hesitantly joined him, until a good bit more than half of the room had their hands raised.
The queen, who was busy looking at what she held and had missed what was going on, asked excitedly, “Danny, is this a sacred tree seed?”
“Danny looked back distracted, “What? Oh yeah, I made that in the sitting room before coming in here. Elder Cardinal watched me do it…
Now, could you please keep it down, your majesty, we are trying to hold a vote here.”
Conversation broke out all across the room as Elder Frost stood to rush over to the queen, “Did you say sacred tree seed?”
Danny was glad Elder Cardinal had kept the news quiet, even from his fellow elders, like Danny had requested. The looks on their faces was too priceless.
Inspecting the large seed in the queen’s hands, Elder Frost announced, “It is a sacred tree seed!”
The throne room exploded into a cacophony of talking and excitement.
Danny looked around the room in feigned annoyance, “QUIET!” Well, he was slightly annoyed that he couldn’t use his air affinity for boosting his voice while in nature aspect.
Everyone stopped and looked towards him in shock.
Danny stood there and let the silence sink in for a moment, “Now, raise your hands if you don't want the princess and me to marry.”
The room stood deathly still as it seemed no one dared to move. Then one lord started to raise his hand. A blur of motion a half second later and the chair was oddly empty.
Looking around and seeing no one else opposing him, Danny clapped his hands once, “Good! Your majesty, this completes our arrangement and I look forward to our wedding, Princess Willow.”
The queen just nodded to him with a huge smile on her face.
Danny turned his head to the side, “Phantom!”
The double doors slammed open as the massive sacred beast ran through to stop next to Danny and lower herself.
A lady stood up, “That’s a sacred beast, and it’s ascended!”
A few of those who had opposed Danny’s presence before grew even paler. While some of them did not hold to some of the old ways, the elven populous in general did. Knowing they had tried to go against one favored by this creature would not go over well.
Looking around, Danny waved to no one in particular as he jumped on the cat’s back, “If anyone needs me I will be in the library catching up on some much needed reading.”
Danny paused, *That sounded a lot cooler in my head…*
*Danny, this would be the perfect point to yell something badass and ride off! Instead you bust out with a nerd alert! Seriously?*
“Danny! Wait,” Princess Willow ran across the room to catch up with him.
Danny looked down at her then reached into his robes again, “Oh, I almost forgot! Happy early birthday! Sorry, I didn't have time to wrap it.”
Danny handed the, now shocked, princess another sacred tree seed before Phantom bounded out of the throne room.
*D... Danny! You are supposed to pick her up on your steed, kiss her in front of everyone, then ride off and make sweet hot princess lov…. Ahhhh! You are useless!”