Santos put a foot forward to approach me, but he hesitated. He studied my features, looking for anything different that may rationalise his regret for letting me beyond the palace walls. He kept his distance, avoiding the familial embrace my mother had granted me, but the look in his eyes told me he wanted nothing more than to fall to his knees with relief.

"You have told him?" He asked my mother, noticing the dimming light in my eyes.

"The investigation will be no more." Mother nodded. My father nodded too, heavy with thought, and he could no longer look me in the eye.

"We should have known something like this would happen, Josefina. Our son is of reckless blood - mine and yours. We were foolish to think he could venture beyond our walls without attracting danger. The Sun knows that we could not."

I felt myself sinking, trying to escape myself. Surely, it was not my fault that the feathered serpent appeared? Or perhaps, it was waiting for me. It could smell my blood, after all, and in doing so, it told me that he wanted revenge. But I still questioned how my father could have known that, or if he knew at all. Maybe this was all just a coincidence; but still an opportunity for my father to shut me away from the freedom I was seeking.

"Do not worry, Andres," my mother said, "you will not be without what you seek."

King Cedric stepped forward and took my hand firmly. He gave me a proud smile.

"Prince Andres, it would be our honour for you to marry Princess Alice."

My hand freed itself from his grasp. I looked to my mother, and then my father, utterly betrayed. They thought that they could give me a woman as a prize to keep me happy in my captivity, like the animals in Gloria Del Flores' avery. I did not seek a bride, or at least just any bride. My happiness lied beyond Mendessa, beyond the sea. To take it all away from not just myself, but another unwilling participant, was nothing more than barbaric.

"Andres. You must think of the kingdom now." My mother said, "Who knows how long it will take before you can begin your investigation again? Anything can happen between then and now. You must marry for the sake of Mendessa's future. And who better than the Princess of the United Realms?"

Rosaline joined her husband, but she looked up on me with sadness, unconvinced by her own words.

"You can make each other happy."

She opened her mouth as though she was going to speak more, but her words got lost in the air.

"Please, your highness. We understand that she was not your first choice, but through this marriage, you and Mendessa will gain so much more prosperity!" Cedric assured, trying and failing to take my hand again, "We can be stronger allies than ever before."

"And we will need strong allies to kill this feathered serpent, my son." My father's stare was stern. "You will be ruler soon enough. Now more than ever, you need to learn to put Mendessa before yourself. If you don't learn that now, I fear you never will."

I almost accepted it. I almost gave into the offer. I took a breath and bit my tongue, ready to face the fate that I had no longer had control over. But Rosaline's eyes seemed as though they were pleading; begging for me to remember the things she believed in. This was not it. Rosaline was a believer of true love, and so was I. Even Cedric couldn't deny that marrying for love rather than power had tied him and his wife together; their kingdoms had been enemies, and yet he broke her curse with true love's kiss.

If I had to fight for anything, it had to be then. If I waited, my opportunity would be ground into dust, left to float away little by little the longer time went on.

"Your majesties. Mother. Could you leave me with my father, please?"

Cedric and Rosaline nodded, not needing to be told twice. They rushed out with mixed emotions, followed by my mother, who delayed her walk somewhat as she readied herself to leave. She began to turn back to me, but stopped herself, and pushed herself out of the room.

Within me, my blood began to boil. I dared to look my father in the eye and see how his pupils shrank when he stepped into the light. He was angered, too; angered that I was no longer controllable now that I had seen even a slither of the world outside of his cage.

"You marry Princess Alice or you never gain your freedom. You cannot have both." He bit back his need to yell.

"What do you want from me, really?" I hissed, "You want me to continue your legacy and be some kind of luminary, but you don't let me go out and have that opportunity. You want me to be brave yet you keep me afraid of the world! You want me to marry who I want and then all of a sudden, you bring this to me? What is this all for? Why am I never enough?"

This story originates from a different website. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

Father wasn't listening, "I wanted you to marry who you wanted, but everything has changed now! There is a feathered serpent out there! I cannot risk the sole heir to our kingdom being killed by such a beast!"

"Did you know?" I snapped.

"What?"

"Did you know?" I repeated slowly through gritted teeth.

For a brief moment, I bore witness to something no one had ever seen before; his lip quivered. His eyes were downcast, thinking carefully over his next words. My stomach sunk, knowing the answer before he could say it.

"The serpent… before I killed it… it spoke to me. It told me it would get its revenge some day for the genocide of its species. After years of searching, we found no more of its kind. We assumed it had been bluffing. I took on the role of a hero because I believed I was. And then you… you came along and I felt true fear for the first time."

"You were afraid that you would lose your honour."

"I was afraid that I would lose you!" The echo of his voice bellowed. I took a breath.

"Which is more important to you?"

He didn't have an answer. The truth was, his son was his legacy. That was why he was so ashamed that I was not just like him. Everything he was reflected in me, but what he saw in me was the worst of himself - the fear, the anxiety, the self-consciousness that knawed at him whenever he was reminded of the feathered serpent's promise, threatening to destroy his intricately-crafted reputation.

I had become more than just my father, despite him. As much as I wanted to yell and scold him with every last breath within me, I controlled myself.

"You let me take down the last feathered serpent. That will restore your honour. And then, you will let me marry Cinderella and travel as I please." Even the thought of carrying out such a promise frightened me, but it was the only solution I could think of which benefited him, "Do we have a deal?"

My skin flushed pale as he shook his head, circling me until he approached his throne. He did not sit, but instead just stood there, making his status known. He had all the power, and my father was not the kind to just let it all go.

"You do not care for your duty as the future king. Do you?" His words were slathered with spite. "No. All I have ever seen you care about is that girl. A girl who does not even want to see you again!"

I opened my mouth to protest, but father's words were an unstoppable force.

"Why else do you think she ran? Even from the prince of Mendessa; the grandson of the great King Andres II; the one they are meant to call Prince Charming?! She does not love you! She does not care for you! Why else would she run?! If she was charmed by your relentless advances, she would have shown herself by now!" He stared into my soul, watching as it contorted with vexation and heartache. "But she does not want to be found. Does she? No. And you know that she does not. She is just an excuse for you to leave this place!"

"SHE IS NOT AN EXCUSE! I LOVE HER!"

Father stood still, as did I. He pierced his eyes into my weakness, cutting me from the inside out with his judgement. I questioned if he believed me. Surely, the way I had cried out could never be faked? Finally, he spat the last of his venom.

"Well, she doesn't love you."

I stepped away, dragged back by my own despondency. What he had said appeared to have no effect on him - he believed every single word. That is what he thought of me; a persistent, self-important liar, unworthy of love. Even with my brave bargain, he saw me as weak, and would rather have his image crumble than set it into my untrustworthy hands any longer. I was not Prince Charming, no matter what the stories said. I was his failure.

My legs carried me away out of the room, and I slammed the doors behind me. Around me, bodies blurred as my pace quickened, burning with rage. My fists clenched and I stormed ahead blindly, as far away from my father's shouting as I could. Tears singed my eyes, only growing the more I tried to blink them away. I grew frustrated at my own weakness, wiping my eyes over and over again to no avail.

I swung my bedroom door open, and felt my lungs collapse. My nails dug into my palms as my father's words replayed over and over again, making me question if he was right. If so, such a truth was unbearable. I had to be rid of it. I had to sabotage all my chances of foolishly pursuing someone who may not return my feelings. I had to sabotage my chances of freedom, before I tried too hard and didn't achieve them despite it all.

I grabbed the slipper which had been left beside my bed. No longer caring for its protection, I pulled it from its box and raised it into the air. With a fiery surge running through my body, I flung the glass slipper.

Time stopped as I watched it mid-air, too far for me to take it back. Instant regret washed over me, turning me pale, and all I could do was witness the slipper as it hit the wall, smashing into a million pieces.

I looked at the mess left before me. The mess that I had made. I had destroyed all my chances. I had given up on myself, just as my father gave up on me.

With shaking legs, I could still hear the piercing crash of the glass exploding. I moved closer towards the wreckage, my head pounding with the noise and the pressure in my mind.

I kneeled, not caring if I was to accidentally slash my skin with a stray shard. My hands trembled, taking pieces of every size, trying to place them back together in order. I tried at this for so long in my desperation, that I never even noticed the sting of blood forming on my fingertips. I eyed every piece, taking in the details so that I could connect them back to one another. The challenge appeared impossible. The shoe's design was comprised of so many images and ideas, all relating to that one place I had given myself no more chances of seeing. Pearls entangled with seaweed, stained glass coral rising to the faint blue waves which caught the light stunningly. I traced my finger over it all, feeling a strange sort of familiarity.

I pieced it together like a mosaic, but often got parts wrong. Instead of upwards, the seaweed moved sideways and diagonally across the image as I strained to lay it all flat on the floor. A curved shard dotted with an elegant whirlpool took its place at the centre, unsure of where exactly it connected. I tried and tried, reorganising and replacing parts which made little sense. The more I changed, the more it looked less like its original self. The slipper had no longer become a slipper as it laid spread before me - it had become an impossible puzzle.

As I turned a shard of seaweed to connect to another, I tilted my head and stood to my feet. Somehow, in its rearranged state, it tugged on my brain, and yet I could not figure out what the image reminded me of.

I traced the snaking seaweed, turned in every direction, and noted the diagonal bridges of coral sprouting once from my feet, and then down at an empty space in the bottom right corner. The bubbles made of air pockets in the glass' fusion were jagged but held together. Somehow each differently-sized piece clicked together on the floor, completely out of place from where they once were, and yet it still created something which I recognised as I held in my breath.

The realisation suddenly hit me.

I had made a map of Mendessa City.

With its magical influence, I knew that this was no coincidence. Once more, I scanned the seaweed pathways, passing the bubble-buildings, reaching up to the lone whirlpool which was now located at the top centre of the map, swirling as though animated to life. The curved structure of it was no coincidence, either - it represented a hill, a hill that I knew.

The whirlpool - the location of what I was seeking - was at Del Flores Manor.