The Twelve Adventures Of Christmas ((Sample))

Maurice decided to head to Princess Ieshia’s rooms to search for that so-called special Christmas list. He moved through the palace corridors of the west wing alone and for the most part unnoticed by anyone. When he did pass anyone, he tried to appear calm. Act casual, like you belong, and by no means like an exiled apprentice skulking through the halls of the palace you were once banished from.

All the corridors were the same, with blue walls, gray wood floors, and blue rugs. Even all the same paintings hung in the same places they had before, but Maurice didn’t have time to stop and reminisce, although something in him was glad to see this old place again. It had been the only place he had truly thought of as home since he had moved from Remus to Geir two years ago.

Bounding up the last set of stairs to his goal, Maurice came to the lavish corridor which housed the princess’ rooms. He moved with great caution to the set of white double doors of the royal chambers and froze. How could he be certain she wasn’t within her rooms at this very moment? It was early in the afternoon. If his memory served him correctly, the princess usually spent time in the gardens or art gallery at this time of the day.

It’s now or never, he supposed. Bracing himself to bolt if the need should arise, Maurice knocked loudly and clearly on the doors and waited with bated breath. Seconds passed into moments and moments bled into minutes and everything remained silent.

Mentally reassuring himself, he slowly pushed open one of the heavy doors, barely poking his head in before opening the door a little wider and stepping inside. He willed himself to start breathing again. It was empty. For now.

Quietly as possible, Maurice shut the door and then turned only to stop short.

The bedroom was huge! It was furnished with a mammoth, peony-pink bed, overstuffed chairs, and a settee. Two individual glass doors leading out to a balcony stood on either side of the bed. The sunlight spilling through the crystal panes illuminated the rest of the room, highlighting several mounted pieces of artwork and glinting off the swirled marble floor covered by rugs of pink.

About a dozen ivory shelves lined the peony-pink walls, filled to the max with books of every shape and size, snow globes, jewelry boxes, music boxes, and other frivolous baubles. What wouldn’t fit in the bookshelves was neatly arranged on each of the few glass-top tables positioned around the room.

I have to search all of this? Where would I even start? Maurice put a hand to his hat and scratched his head through the worn cloth. I better get to it. I don’t have a moment to waste.

He then set about searching, sifting through the bookshelves, in the jewelry boxes, on the tables, and around the bed. He looked anywhere someone might leave their Christmas list, all the while being especially careful to put everything back the way it had been. His pulse pounded harder with each passing second. He had already stayed too long, and his search had come up empty. There was no list to be found.

He leaned back on his heels and scrubbed a hand over his jaw. Where could it be? Maurice wondered, only then to realize, Of course the list wouldn’t be in here. This close to Christmas, the princess would have already given the list to her father.

He bit back a groan. “Perfect. Now what?”

He weighed his options and then moved back to the doorway, listening carefully before slipping into the blissfully vacant hall. He quit the room and slunk down the hallway, but the sound of approaching footsteps came from around the corner ahead. The mixture of candlelight and sunshine cast wavering shadows on the wall, and they moved in his direction as their voices drew closer.

Maurice panicked and dove for the doors to the princess’ room but immediately reconsidered that choice. Abandoning the idea of hiding, he ran down the hall in the opposite direction of the approaching steps. He rounded the corner and promptly collided with someone else.

He instinctively reached out to grab the person and steady them, but the young woman stumbled out of his grasp and stubbornly righted herself.

“Watch where you’re going, you clumsy oaf!” The woman huffed and smacked the sleeves of her dress as if to clean where he had touched her.

Maurice suddenly stilled, and his stomach sank. Oh, no. Princess Ieshia. He ducked his head and tried to scramble away. Of all the people I had to run into, why did it have to be her?

The burgundy-haired princess shot him a withering glare, but her anger faded as recognition quickly dawned in her eyes. “You! What are you doing here? You were exiled. How dare you enter this kingdom again?”

“Shhh! Keep your voice down!” Maurice hissed in a frantic whisper, flapping his hands in a futile attempt to quiet her.

Ieshia looked appalled. “How dare you? My father will have your head for this! Guards! Guar-”

Maurice clamped a hand over the princess’ mouth. She tried to pull away, but his other hand grabbed her by the waist and pulled her against him. He dragged the resisting princess along as she shouted muffled protests under his hand. He stopped at the first doorway in that hall and struggled to turn the knob with the princess fighting against him.

The door suddenly swung open and he stumbled in, barely keeping on his feet. He wrestled her into an old, musty storage room, kicked the door shut, and pushed his back against the rough wood of the entry.

The princess thrashed about and fought the criminal with everything she had, but his unyielding grip pinned her arms to her sides and kept her from calling out for help.

“All right, princess...” Maurice’s breath brushed her ear, aggravating her further. “I’m going to let you go now, but only if you give me your word you won’t make a sound once I do.”

Ieshia grew still and nodded against his chest. Slowly, Maurice removed his hand from her mouth, and she took the opportunity to scream. “Guards! Guar-”

Maurice clamped his hand over her mouth again, muffling the calls that soon died down in her throat. He kept his mouth near her ear. “Now, I don’t want any trouble. Please, just cooperate, and I’ll let you go.”

He felt her nod again. Cautiously, he released the princess, but she slammed the high heel of her shoe into the top of his boot and spun away from him in a swirl of burgundy hair and scarlet skirts.

“Oww!” Maurice yelped and hopped on his uninjured foot, rubbing the top of his boot where the skin underneath was throbbing and sure to bruise.

“How dare you show your face in this kingdom again? Why have you returned?” Ieshia demanded. A hasty scan of the room for some sort of weapon proved unsuccessful. The only things in the room were stacks of crates and the dust that was stirred up and now floated in the air, shimmering in the sunshine shining in through the sole window in the entire room. Her nose was tickled and she sneezed twice. Now she was livid.

“For the last time, Princess, I did not steal your mother’s crown!” Maurice stomped his injured foot down on the floor and then winced at the sharp pain.

“If you didn’t take it, then why is it gone?” Ieshia insisted as if she expected him to confess at any moment. “You were the only person supposedly guarding the crown when it was discovered missing!”

“Neither your suspicion nor your father’s means that I stole it!”

This entire problem was the reason Maurice was banished from Geir. It all happened seven months ago. He had been the only person near the room possessing the crown of the departed queen when the jeweled circlet, priceless in value and in memory, had been discovered missing. More than half the palace guards had scoured every inch of the palace and the town. When the crown was not found, and with not enough solid evidence against the simple herbalist’s apprentice to charge him with high treason, King Jamal exiled Maurice from the kingdom, only to return on pain of death.

That was when he had traveled back to his home kingdom of Remus where Duke Romar had found him and given him the position of his squire and trusted errand boy, as Romar liked to call him. And so here he was, back in the palace he was banned from entering again and trapped in a stuffy storage room with the very princess he was trying to avoid.

“I didn’t take the crown,” Maurice repeated, although he was sure it did nothing to convince her.

“Why have you returned to my father’s kingdom?” Ieshia questioned again.

Maurice hesitated. Should I tell her? The duke would have my head if I do. He gulped. And she would have my head if I don’t.

The princess’ eyes narrowed at him. “You are trying my patience.”

I guess I have no choice. “I’m here now because I’m on an important task for Duke Romar.”

Ieshia visibly stiffened. Her anger vanished only to be replaced with alarm. Her voice raised a pitch. “You’re working for that ill-bred man now?”

“Umm...” Maurice stalled. Was it wise to tell her? He might as well admit it. At this point he didn’t have much else to lose. “Well... yes. I’ve had the position of his squire since I left. Now he’s given me the near impossible task of finding your special Christmas list and collecting the gifts to give to you in his name.”

Ieshia looked like she wanted to strangle someone, preferably Maurice. “Why the nerve of that boorish, half witted, ostentatious, insufferable-” She barely restrained her tongue from running away with itself. With a snap of her skirts, she began to pace back and forth across the span of the room, stirring up the layer of dust on the floor. She stubbornly resisted the urge to sneeze again. “How dare he try to win my favor with another one of those dreadful schemes! Of all the thickheaded, despicable things he’s ever done! Why does he never give up?”

Maurice rushed to the princess and caught her by her shoulders. “Hush, Princess! Keep your voice down. Someone might hear you!”

Ieshia jerked herself out of the scoundrel’s grasp with a huff. She swept past him and flounced straight to the doorway. “I am going to report your return to my father. He will see to it you receive the proper punishment.”

Oh, no. Maurice scrambled for the right thing to say to stop her. “I know where the queen’s crown is!” He dumbly blurted and mentally kicked himself.

That stopped her. Ieshia stilled in the middle of reaching for the doorknob, and slowly her frame turned until she was facing him again. The downturned set of her lips and the skeptical lift of one brow indicated she didn’t believe him. “You do?”

He didn’t. “Yes. You were right. I did take the crown. If you let me go, I’ll bring it back to you.” He really couldn’t.

Maurice expected the princess to do or say any number of things: continue on her way out and report him to the king, inform him that she knew he was lying and report him anyway, or maybe, just maybe, she would believe his lie and let him go as long as he kept his promise to her.

Instead, she seemed to be contemplating something. “You said you would be needing my Christmas list? Correct?”

“Umm...” The way she had asked, he wasn’t sure how to respond. “Yes?”

“Very well then,” Ieshia decided. “I shall accompany you on your quests. When Christmas comes and we are through with this silly situation, you will return my mother’s crown to me. In return, I will have my father drop the charges against you. You will be a free man once again.” Her smile was smug. She had trapped him in a corner, and she knew it.

Maurice gaped at her openly. “You want to go with me to find the gifts?”

“Why not?” she asked. “It’s dreadfully boring being cooped up here all day. It would be nice to see something besides the inside of the palace walls.”

Maurice stared at her with his mouth hanging open. “There’s no way I’m letting you come with me! Do you know what Duke Romar would do to me if he finds out you did?”

“I can get you my Christmas list,” Ieshia coaxed. “Providing you haven’t already found it.”

Maurice swayed on his feet as his stomach began to turn. “Can’t you just tell me what the gifts are?”

“Tell you? Oh, no. Where would be the fun in that? Anyway, I’ve already given that list to my father. You can’t get it without me.”

Maurice slammed a clenched fist into his thigh and began to grouse. “I knew it! I just knew something would go wrong! I’m going to lose my head. The duke is going to kill me for messing this up!” He blew out a long breath of air and massaged the bridge of his nose beneath his specs.

Ieshia waited impatiently, putting her hands on her hips as she tapped the toe of her shoe on the wooden floor. She fully expected the squire to accept her offer, but he pushed his glasses back up the bridge of his nose and firmly declined. “No. I can’t let you come with me. Even if it could possibly mean my freedom.”

Ieshia scoffed and her slender shoulders lifted in an unconcerned shrug. “Very well.” She turned back to the doorway and laid a hand on the knob, only to be stopped again by his voice.

“No, wait. Stop.”

The princess spun on her heel back to Maurice. A single ray of sunlight shone on her face, turning the hazel color of her eyes to a glittering gold. “Yes?”

“If I don’t let you come with me, you’ll tell the king that I was here, and I’ll be in even more trouble than I already am. Then again, if I let you come, and the duke finds out, I could lose my head anyway.” Maurice considered his fate with either choice. He visibly swallowed, opting for the lesser of two evils. “All right, Princess, you can come with me.”

For the first time, Ieshia was completely satisfied. “A wise choice. All right, I’ll get the list for you. Meet me outside the palace gates tomorrow morning at eight o’clock sharp. But,” she thrust a slender finger at Maurice, “do not expect me to keep anything that comes from that loathsome man.”

Maurice balked. “But you have to accept his gifts! The duke will blame me for it if you don’t. I’ll lose my job. I’ll lose my head!”

Ieshia rolled her eyes, then she paused. “Did you say the duke would be coming here Christmas day?”

“Um… yes?” Maurice more asked than answered.

“Hmm.” Ieshia tapped a finger against her chin. “Very well. Until this is over, I will make believe that I am accepting the bestowals of that odious man. You will keep your standing with the duke, and I can keep a careful watch on you. He will be none the wiser.”

Maurice eyed her. “What’s in it for you?”

“Me?” Ieshia gave a light chuckle with no hint of mirth to it. “Oh, I will have the immense pleasure of seeing the duke in two weeks’ time and giving him a send-off he won’t soon forget.”

Maurice hesitated. “I don’t know. I have a bad feeling about this.”

“You speak as though you had a choice,” Ieshia scoffed.

He cast his gaze to the ceiling of the storage room and gritted his teeth, breathing slowly. She’s right. I don’t have a choice. I’m likely doomed either way. At least maybe this way I can at least keep my head a little while longer. “All right, princess. I’ll do as you say.”

“Excellent. We have a deal. Remember the plan and don’t be late.” Her fingers flicked in a short wave and she exited the storage room, leaving Maurice standing alone amongst the crates and dust.

Maurice gave his cap a sharp yank. Perfect. This situation just keeps getting better and better.