The Quest

Twenty years. That’s how long Prince Rupert the Simple’s quest had taken. Now, here he was, looking every inch the hero and about to save his first damsel in distress. A damsel with whom he planned to live happily ever after with. An ending he felt he deserved given the trials of the last two decades.

He stood in a clearing, his torso naked and his oiled muscles glistening. Over one shoulder was slung a massive sword and over the other was a small satchel. A satchel that contained the one item that had been a constant throughout his entire quest.

He was bloody freezing and wondering whether he should have considered some more suitable apparel. But he reckoned that at the end of a twenty-year quest he ought to look the part, so despite the blizzard and the freezing temperatures, here he stood - half-naked with nipples that could cut glass staring at the little cottage.

The cottage, he was sure, represented the culmination of his years of toil. For it was here that he was bound to find the match to the precious item he held in his satchel, and finally rescue the damsel. The fair lady who had consumed his thoughts throughout his long, arduous, and dangerous quest.

He’d fought dragons and bears, he’d duelled with knights beyond counting, he’d traversed mountain passes, and crossed vast stormy oceans alive with monsters of the deep. But now all he had to do was cross a threshold. He took a deep breath and keeping as heroic a posture as possible he entered the cottage.

She wasn’t in, the house was deserted - which was somewhat of an anti-climax. Then there was the smell, the horrific stench reminded him of when he was imprisoned in a far-off land in a small cell with twenty other men and no latrine. He opened a door and took a tentative step down into a damp cellar. The light from a window high up in the wall illuminated a little room, it was a cluttered space with a rolled-up carpet against one wall and a tiny door on another wall.

But he didn’t notice any of this. He was staring at the single skate that hung on the wall, he took the skate from his satchel and with shaking hands, he compared them. It was a match; the quest was truly over. It was the skate that the damsel had left behind the night he’d witnessed her being abducted, those twenty long years ago. But where was she? He decided to go back upstairs and wait. At a loose end, he found himself thinking about his quest and how different his life was going to be when he finally rescued the woman of his dreams and she became his princess. He smiled as he imagined himself on a bended knee slipping the skate onto the stockinged foot of his fair maiden.

It wasn’t long before a cacophony of shouts and cries interrupted his thoughts. “Come on you lot, keep up, I ain’t got all day! you lot have been murder since that no-good piece of shit that was yer father walked out.” Her voice, if it was her, managed the twin feats of being coarse and piercing at the same time. It was certainly less cultured than he’d imagined, he stood up and tried to look his heroic best for the arrival of his true love.

The door burst open and a horrifically haggard-looking woman, surrounded by a horde of unkempt children, stormed into view. She wasn’t quite the beauty he’d been expecting, but the face was familiar. It was indeed the girl from twenty years ago on that frozen night by the village pond. A pond that lay less than a mile from this very cottage, and yet his quest had spanned the globe and taken twenty years. With increasing hindsight, he found himself wondering if all that questing had been entirely necessary.

She didn’t notice him at first, being too busy corralling her brood. “And you, whatever your name is, stop that wailing, or I’ll give you something to wail about!” As she turned, her gaze finally caught Rupert’s, who was by now displaying a serious lack of heroic posture.

“Who the hell are you? If it’s money yer after, I ain’t got any,” she snapped, eyeing him warily.

“Eh, money, no, I am not seeking treasure,” said Prince Rupert.

“Hmm,” said the woman with a look that left the Prince in no doubt that he’d been well and truly appraised. Then she looked down and slapped a nose-picking child on the back of the head; an action that drove the finger deeper into the grimy child’s skull. “You there, thingummyjig, go see if he’s got any cash on him.” Then she turned her attention back to the Prince. “If it’s personal services yer after, you’ll need to wait, go downstairs, and roll out the carpet, you’ll find the whips and handcuffs behind the little door. There’s some magazines to help you get in the mood too.”

“I think there might be some mistake,” he said as he swatted at the approaching child. He started wading through the swarm of children, heading to the front door. “I think I have the wrong address, so sorry to take up your valuable time.”

“Mind yourself,” said the damsel, “some of the little blighters have rabies. Got any food?”

“No sorry,” said Prince Rupert over his shoulder his voice trailing off as he beat a hasty retreat, running into the distance as fast as his heroic legs could muster. He stopped only once, to throw the skate as far as he could into the depths of a fast-flowing river. He watched as it sunk into the murky water and thought to himself – that’s twenty years of my life I’m not getting back.

Moral of the story: Your heroes should never meet you.