“Oh, come on!” The princess cried. “I'm a princess too, you know - I can be a damsel in distress!”

“No,” said the dragon, holding up one hand. “Your rarity isn't high enough.”

The princess fumed and stomped her feet, but the dragon was firm. He pointed to the cave mouth, where the wind howled and the snow blew twice the height of a man, such that the entryway was nearly occluded. “Go on, git.”

The princess groaned.

But perhaps I should step back for a moment. Who was the princess? Who was the dragon? Why was the princess so hellbent on staying in the dragon's cave? And what, moreover, does any of this have to do with our narration?

Our story starts long, long, long, long, long, long, long ago - about a chapter and three hours or so back. Deep, deep in the Prickleback Mountains, a caravan was moving slowly across the stormy heights.

A dozen guards were paying careful heed to the wagons, for their content was a precious one. Said precious content was sitting in the central wagon, thinking.

“Hmmm,” said the princess, thinking. “I'm thinking hard, but I can't seem to recall how I got here.”

And she put her hand to her chin and stroked it, just to make extra special sure she’d thought properly. But sure enough, she could recall nothing.

One moment she was about to enter her house in the lovely small town of Wheridigg Bend, the next there was a flash, and she was inside a wagon, rattling slowly up the side of a mountain during a misty midwinter’s morn.

She was still wearing the clothing she’d been wearing earlier, replete with her purse; the guards outside her carriage, however, were dressed like they were in a fantasy or fairy story, their armour jingling as they marched alongside the carriage.

She thought and thought and thought about it, but no matter how hard she thought she couldn’t recall how she’d gone from point A to point B. And indeed, it is doubtless that she would have gone right on thinking until the caravan reached wherever it was heading, had it not been swept up in its entirety by an avalanche.

“Aargh,” cried the princess, as her caravan was separated from the others and hurled down the cliff face. It was a rocky, bumpy journey, made only slightly more bearable by the winter padding lining the inside of the caravan’s walls.

BANG

BANG

BANG

Went the carriage, as its smashed its way across the mountaintops, and

AIEE

AIEE

AIEE

Went the princess, as she went bouncing around inside the carriage. When at last it reached a rest, however, she was pleasantly surprised to find herself unharmed and largely uninjured, barring several bruises that would last a day at most.

Her next step, she knew, should be to seek shelter and wait for her men to find her. Her clothing was not made for winter, and even had it been comfy cosy winter gear she wouldn’t last more than a few hours in this storm.

The winds hammered at her as she shuffled through the snow, eyes flicking back and forth as she scanned for a cave, crevice, cavern, covering, chasm, or cavity in which she might hide from the storm.

The Prickleback Mountains towered high above, descending steeply beneath her such that they seemed almost to spill down, and one wrong step, she knew, would send her tumbling into the void.

The princess had to walk carefully to avoid being tossed off, holding her arms out like she was on a tightrope. Eventually, however, her diligence was rewarded, and she saw the mouth of a cave before her. Even better, she could see the flickering light of a fire from out of the cave’s mouth, indicating that there was human life inside.

Her feet involuntarily skipping in spite of herself, the princess glided into the cave… and abruptly stopped.

The dragon looked at her in surprise, waved, and then went back to roasting fungi over the fire. He was whistling a merry tune, and kept turning the skewers the fungi were cooking in tune with his song, with a one-two, one-two, heya ho-a hey.

The princess was momentarily stunned by the realisation that dragons existed in this world, but after a moment she decided that the existence of dragons must logically follow from the existence of princesses - otherwise, who would kidnap princesses for knights to rescue them? - and so she decided to do the rational thing and take advantage of the impossible dragon’s impossible fire.

She shuffled over to the fire - a massive, blazing ball of flame placed carefully in the middle of the cavern, with a slight crack in the cavern roof sufficing as a chimney - shook her snow-covered clothes off, and began to warm her hands over the flames.

The dragon looked at her in consternation.

“Woah now, that’s no way to treat hypothermia. You're going to catch a nasty illness if you keep that up; you want to be wearing dry clothes as soon as possible. Here, wait just a moment - I have a spare change of clothes for you. Should match your current ones, too.”

The dragon propped its skewers up so they wouldn’t burn then, still whistling, went into what the princess took to be the back of the cave, although it was too black for her to see.

There was the sound of rummaging in the darkness, a bit of clattering, and a couple cheerful curses, and after several moments a dress, pair of shoes, and conical hat with a ribbon were tossed out, landing at Jessica's feet.

“Here, this should fit; let me know if I guessed the sizing wrong. You can change into these till your current clothes are dry. I'm afraid I don't have a changing room, so you'll have to change out here, though I promise not to look.”

The princess gratefully accepted the clothes and began to change in a corner.

She wasn't altogether sure why a strange dragon living in a cave high up in the mountains would have a complete princess outfit in her exact size, but then again, she'd been wearing half of one herself (namely, the hennin), so it wasn't like she could talk. Maybe there was something in the air which caused totally normal people to suddenly don princess outfits.

She finished changing and carefully piled her wet clothes near the fire, then bowed towards the back of the cave. “Done! Thank you so much.”

There was a distance to the voice when it replied, a distance which implied it had been looking at the back wall, and not at her. “No problem. Here - take this.”

And a blanket also flew out, landing in the grateful princess’ outstretched hands. She slung it over her shoulders, wrapping the soft blanket about herself, and began to warm herself over the fire.

After a few moments the dragon idled back out of the back of the cave, hands in its pockets. He hung her wet clothing up to dry, then returned to his mushroom skewers, continuing his merry ditty as he tested the mushrooms.

They were, evidently, insufficiently spiced - doubtless a cause of much concern, but fortunately an easily rectifiable one - and it wasn’t long until he’d finished roasting them.

The dragon offered one of the skewers to the princess, then chowed down on his own, closing his eyes in ecstasy as he savoured the taste. The princess could see why - the spicing was just right, the fungi cooked just long enough to remove the rubbery texture, but not long enough to make them crispy.

“These are delicious,” she said appreciatively. “You have my thanks for your kindness.”

“Well, it’s the least I can do for someone in immediate peril,” the dragon observed, as he savoured another mushroom.

Stolen novel; please report.

“Indeed; you have been really very kind to me, when I found myself all alone out in the mountains.”

“But you know you’ll have to leave,” the dragon said reasonably.

The new princess froze. “What, back out there?”

“Oh, make no mistake. I’ll make sure to give you a nice winter coat, boats, and earmuffs, before I send you out there,” the dragon said, gesturing in the direction of the outside world, which was as frozen as the princess. “I also have a thermos of hot choccy and some broth. But you can’t stay here.”

“Whyever not?” The princess cried plaintively.

“Because this is my house,” the dragon politely responded, “and it’s a bachelor pad.”

“But… aren’t dragons supposed to be great collectors of princesses?” Sophie tried.

“Were. Dragons were great collectors of princesses. But of course we gave that all up decades ago… shouldn’t you know that, though, given that you’re a princess? In fact, don’t you have your own model?”

The princess sniffed. “Sniff. It's okay - I'm sure my guards will find me soon.”

***

Don the guard whistled merrily as the caravan completed turning about, and began its journey home.

“To think,” he commented to his fellow guard, “that we'd lose the princess and have to come back this early. Score!”

“Do you think she’ll be alright?” The other guard, Juan, asked. In spite of the words he said his question seemed purely perfunctory, as not the slightest ounce of a genuine worry could be heard in his voice.

Don waved him off. “Enh, she’ll be fine. She’ll find her way back to the castle on her own time.”

***

“Yes, I'm sure the guards will be here imminently,” the princess finished triumphantly.

“Enh,” said the dragon. “I wouldn't count on it.”

“At any rate,” said the princess, hoping to use a change of topic to get the dragon to give up on his plan, “what did you mean by ‘own model’?”

“Your damsel in distress model. Duh.”

“My what now? What models would these be?”

The dragon looked at her in surprise. “Darn. I don’t want to be rude, but you must be from somewhere really obscure if you haven’t even heard of damsel in distress models.”

The princess coughed. “I’ve only recently arrived in civilisation.”

This wasn’t a lie - she had only appeared in this world a day ago, having come from our own, and had never even seen a dragon before today, never mind a damsel in distress model.

The dragon considered this. “Well, you see it’s… actually, it might be better just to show you.”

And, whistling, he retreated into the depths of the cave, motioning for the princess to follow him. She did, surprised to discover that the cave did not end when it entered the shadows, but instead opened upon an entire nexus of tunnels - and these, not the rough and tumble tunnel rock of the entryway, but the carefully carved halls of a proper underground home.

They were tastefully done up with soft and cosy carpets, the walls decorated with woodblocks of monsters, and after a short pause of pure darkness were lit by lanterns, shaded in a gentle orange with funny faces drawn on the side.

The dragon strode to a side room, pulled a key from off his neck, unlocked it, and posed to the side as the door slowly, swung, open.

Inside were rack upon rack of… princesses. They were made to life, gorgeously handcrafted, and set in disturbingly realistic poses, but still, rather clearly, dolls.

“Tada!” The dragon cried triumphantly, posing with his hands spread wide. He had a big goofy grin on his face, halfway between pride and delight.

“You… you…” The princess said, staring in shock at the dolls.

“That’s right - I collect damsels. We all do, really - both the dragons, and the knights. We decided years ago that fighting over collectable damsels, instead of the real thing, would save everyone simply a ton of effort and bloodshed, not to mention increasing the fun factor of the entire hobby by twenty to thirty times.”

“You… got rid of real damsels… to decrease the fighting?”

“To decrease the bloodshed,” the dragon corrected. “We’re totally fine with the fighting - we just figured we’d make the conflict more like a competition, or play, rather than a combat.”

“And the real damsels were peripheral to this project?”

“Well, part of the problem was that we were kidnapping damsels, so we figured, you know, how about we replace the people with objects? Surely that’ll decrease the irritation of seeing people inconvenienced.”

“I guess that makes sense,” the princess admitted.

“Plus, the dolls are silent, and cost nothing in upkeep. You wouldn’t believe the problems we had way back in the day, when there were living damsels all over the place. Ugh. There was the screaming, the crying, the whining, the cowering, whimpering fear. Then you had to take care of feeding them, watering them, providing for their waste management needs… and if you were feeling generous (and I always was), showers and clothes. What a waste of time. The new method is much simpler, and more entertaining.”

“On one level, I feel vaguely offended. On another, I totally understand,” the princess admitted, adjusting her conical hat.

The dragon nodded triumphantly. “So you see, I have no need for you, although I’d be happy enough to get a doll in your image. What is your rarity, anyway? The doll you, that is.”

“I, uhh, don’t know. I don’t think I have a doll,” the princess admitted, rubbing the back of her neck. The dragon stroked his chin.

“Well, it’s easy enough to check. Let me get my Collectable Princess Guidebook.”

The dragon strolled to a nearby shelf and removed his Collectable Princess Guidebook - a massive, hardcover tome, embossed with gold leaf and trim. He opened it with pride, revealing that each princess entry contained illustrated images of the princess from every angle, an informatory blurb on the princess in question, her stat sheet, and info on her rarity, accessibility, etcetera etcetera.

“Hum dee dum dee dum, dee dum dee dee… Oh, and what do you know. It turns out you aren’t in the Collectable Princess Guidebook - and I have the latest edition. You must not have a collectable model at all,” and with that problem solved, the dragon closed his book with a comfy bang, and put it back on the shelf. He patted it a couple times with fondness.

“Ah.” The princess said sadly. Somehow, she had thought she would be the type of princess to not have a collectable doll made in her image.

“Enh, don't worry about it too much. These things happen - could mean anything from there being no dragon in your region who wanted to kidnap you, to the dragon holding a weird grudge against your family for some reason, to your knights requesting an exemption from our Damsel Artisans on account of you having a nervous disposition. There is only one thing it does unequivocally mean: You’re not in the princess guide, and there are no damsels of you. You have no market value. Hence, to return to the substance of our argument, there is no reason for me to keep you here.”

“Oh, come on!” The princess cried. “I'm a princess too, you know - I can be a damsel in distress!”

“No,” said the dragon, holding up one hand. “Your rarity isn't high enough.”

The princess fumed and stomped her feet, but it was true - her kingdom just wasn't valuable enough to merit its own collectable damsels. The dragon's pontifications had opened a door to memory, and she remembered that much.

“On another note, the fact that I'm not in your Collectable Damsels Guidebook means, paradoxically, that I'm beyond rare - I'm a priceless, one of a kind collectible.”

“Hmm, true. Do you think if I cash you in, they’ll let me have another gacha pull at the Damsel Depository?”

“Oh, come on!”

“I’m absolutely certain I’ll get an SSR-rank damsel this time around.”

“Bwuh- huh- hagh-” the princess spluttered.

“You can relax - I'm just joking. It would be entirely irresponsible of me to take a real damsel, rather than a fake damsel - it would be rude, uncouth, even, dare I say, barbarous, were I to imprison someone in that fashion. So you'll have to go.”

“We are on the top of a mountain!”

“Nothing like a good bit of exercise to get the blood pumping.”

“It is over forty below!”

“It’s a bit nippy out, yeah, but that only makes the hot chocolate taste all the warmer.”

“There is at least ten feet of snow piled outside your cave entrance.”

“Far be it from me to condemn getting good exercise."

“Can I not just stay here till spring?”

“Hmmm, I don’t know. On the one hand, I see nothing wrong with the proposition; but on the other, I’m worried about domestication. You won’t lose your inborn survival skills, will you?”

“What inborn survival skills?!! That's the entire reason I was asking for help in the first place.”

The princess sighed. It had been a long, hard day. After leaving her home world under suspicious circumstances, she had nearly left her new world under ‘suspicious circumstances’ when her carriage plunged off a cliff, hurling her into a wintry abyss. Now she'd have to enter that wintry abyss again unless she could convince a dragon to do his job and distress a damsel, a persuasion which seemed woefully dependent upon the dragon seeing her as somehow more valuable than his collection of collectable princess dolls.

“Well, if there's nothing else, I'd like to get back to my happy, laidback, princess-free bachelor lifestyle.”

Hurriedly, desperately, the princess tried to think up a compelling excuse to get the dragon to add her to his collection. All her thinking facilities were activated. Her face screwed up, her eyes stared straight ahead, she rubbed her temples. She even made thinking noises, such as “Hmmm.”

“Don't strain yourself, princess,” the dragon commented.

“Aha!” The princess cried. “You claimed I'm actually a real damsel, whereas you only accept fake ones, but isn't this incorrect - am I not, rather, a limited time offer fake damsel in distress?”

The dragon considered this. “I suppose. Well, we'll give it a shot, and see if you're really the tradable merch you claim to be.”

The princess pumped her fist and jumped for joy. “I'll show you - I'll be the most valuable damsel you've ever distressed!”

“Uh huh. If you say so. Speaking of, what is your name, oh fair damsel?”

It suddenly occurred to the princess that she had never given the dragon her name, an unacceptable omission given that she planned to live with him. Hurriedly, she dropped into a curtsey, bowing her head. “It's Sophie.”

The dragon stuck out his hand. “Pleasure to meet you, Sophie, and welcome to the collection.”

And the two shook on it.