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Once upon a time a young princess lived in a lavish chateau. Her mother, the queen, knew her to be the crowning jewel of their kingdom's treasures, and so, to protect her, she kept her in a small chamber within the chateau surrounded by guards.
Many of the guards were large and strong, with arms that could lift the princess and her bed and everything in it without a thought; but one of the guards was merely average, and scrawny, and spent more time in scribbles on parchment than in talk of sword or, worse, the swinging of one. He was a wizard, meant to tend to the magics that guarded the chateau and in turn the princess, and he took his work very seriously.
At first, the young princess thought that she and the wizard might be friends. After all, she loved to read, and he was rarely seen without his books. But his books were boring and dry and his company unfriendly. Where she spent hours staring out her window, dreaming of the world beyond her tiny room, he busied himself with imbuing the walls with protective magic; where she pored over pages of princesses traveling the world to rescue their true love, he read over thick tomes of treatises on minutiae concerning the ley lines that fell within the boundaries of their kingdom. When she spoke to him, he merely grunted in return; when she tried to smile, he scowled back.
The princess didn't know—and how could she? for he never spoke of it—that the wizard could find no joy in life, for many years ago he had been so foolish as to wander into the dark woods beyond his village, and a hag had eaten his heart.
Despite his reticence, the princess insisted that he stay near to her. And so the wizard kept his grumpy guard alongside the princess as she sailed stormy seas on invisible ships and made snow angels on mountain peaks that only she could see; as she spent hours charting the course of the stars beyond her window, memorizing their celestial cycle as year after year slipped away.
Finally, the princess came of age, and for her birthday she made a single request: to feel sand beneath her toes and the ocean's waves against her ankles. The queen feared for her safety, but the princess was determined to go, and at last the queen relented.
"But only for the day, my little sapphire," the queen said. "After that, you must return to the safety of our home."
The princess was grateful, though she plotted to escape the moment she stepped beyond the doors. To her disappointment, her full retinue of guards awaited her at the chateau's threshold, and the wizard himself fell into step beside her as they made their way through the gates.
"So, you're all coming with me?" she asked as they strolled along the city streets, the imposing bulk of the rest of her guard sheltering them from curious passers-by.
"Yes," he said, as rote as the recitation of a cantrip, and their conversation ceased until they reached the shore.
Her guard parted and the princess gasped in delight as she beheld the glittering sand and iridescent waves stretching before her. She broke away from the wizard, running towards the water, and he followed behind, as patient and unmoved as always. By the time he joined her, she had already pulled off her shoes and lifted her skirts to run in the surf, laughing as she kicked at the waves and the ocean spray misted her face.
The wizard felt an ache in his chest, in the hole where his heart had been, but he was accustomed to the pain. He stood at the edge of the water and watched as the princess wriggled her toes into the sand and threw back her head to greet the sun.
"It's beautiful," the princess said. "It's more beautiful than I could have possibly imagined."
"Yes," he agreed, watching her.
The rest of the guard kept watch over the sand and the city at their backs while the wizard and the princess made their way up and down the beach. She collected seashells in her skirt, though he never stooped to join her; she drew castles in the sand, and he watched too as the waves washed them away. The sun made its slow way across the sky, until at last it began to set, and the rest of the guard sounded the call.
The princess looked across the ocean. "It looks like it goes on forever," she said.
"It doesn't," the wizard said. "Your Highness, it is time for you to go home."
"I wish I could see where it ends," she said, as the sky turned to dusk and the first twinkling star appeared. "There's no chance of me convincing you to run away with me, is there?"
"No," he said.
The princess turned away from the ocean, and for a moment the wizard was so struck by the shade of her eyes, a twin color to the purpling sky beyond, that he could see nothing more; and so he did not see the emerald wave rise up from the waters beyond her until it whelmed her, and swept her away from his sight.
The guard sounded the alarm, but even as he stood reaching for the place where she had been the wizard knew she was gone, that he had failed in his duty and no longer had a place amongst them. And so he returned to the chateau to gather his few meager belongings whilst they began the search.
His room was plain and bare, and what little he had he placed into his satchel before closing the door to his room behind him as he left. He walked down the hallway in the lavish chateau, prepared to disappear once more into obscurity, but he stopped before the closed door to the princess's chambers. He had no hope of finding her, and no right to turn the knob; but the door opened easily at his touch, and so he stepped inside.
He meant to stay but a moment, to make a fool's farewell to a room where he had spent so much time, a room that cared nothing for him as he could care nothing for it in return. He looked over the familiar etchings and paintings and books and fabrics, and his eye landed upon something unfamiliar upon the desk.
After a moment's hesitation he crossed the room, and for a moment he looked out the solitary window at the purple and blue sky beyond. Then he looked down at the desk, upon which lay a single sheet of parchment neatly folded with his name written across it in a familiar hand. When he turned it over, the wax bore the princess's seal.
He had no right, and yet this belonged to him; and so, after foolishly brushing his fingers along his name, he picked up the letter and tucked it into a pocket in his coat.
When he turned to go he saw the queen standing in the doorway, watching him. Before he could open his mouth to apologize, she lifted her chin and said, "Find her."
Then she swept away as swiftly as her daughter, and the wizard was alone.
For many days the wizard wandered the streets of the city, further and farther from the lavish chateau at its heart, until he found himself in the sea-drenched mud of the shanties outside the docks. The sludge clung to his boots and the stench of sewage filled his nose, and as he slogged his way in no particular direction he thought that perhaps he would stumble across a sinkhole and be done with the whole affair.
"You look lost," said a voice, high-pitched and scratchy.
The wizard looked and saw a rag-covered goblin watching him from a slanted shack. "I am not," he said.
"Looking for something, then," the goblin said. Her eyes were wide and yellow and her skin a sickly green, and she watched him with hunger.
But he found that he wasn't afraid of her, and so he told her the story of the princess swallowed by the sea and his impossible task to find her, and at the end the goblin nodded and said, "I think I could help you…for a price."
The wizard thought of his empty pockets, then opened his satchel and looked inside. Broken bits and scraps and fragments and junk, mostly, and finally he withdrew a single wooden button, its paint long since flaked off, and held it out to the goblin.
She snatched it from his grasp with a greed that surprised him. "It is not much," he said, as she turned it over in her long fingers, "but I can teach you to turn it to gold."
Her yellow eyes fixed on his, and she smiled with pointed teeth. "Then let's be on our way."
The goblin led the wizard back through the city streets until they reached the doors of an enormous library, its turrets white as sea foam and its banners the ocean's blue. "If there's an answer to be found as to where your princess went," the goblin said, "it will be in here."
"But how can we enter?" the wizard asked.
The goblin shrugged. "It's a library," she said. "I figured we just…walk in."
She took the wizard's hand, and together they pulled open the tall doors and found themselves within a chamber so high they had to crane their necks to see the ceiling. Books lined every wall, tall books, short books, fat books, skinny books, books with gilt covers and some books that were little more than sheets of parchment tied together with twine. In all his studies the wizard had never seen so many books at one time, for his teachers had been a jealous lot who doled out their treasures carefully. But here he stood surrounded by knowledge, and all of it within his reach, and the empty place in his chest hurt again.
"Can I help you?" said a voice, rough and bored.
This voice belonged to a blue-robed monk, her hair shorn on the side, her eyes blue, her skin brown, gold glittering in her nose and ears. The wizard hesitated, and the goblin told the tale of the princess swallowed by the sea and his impossible quest to find her. At the end the monk said, "Well, that's great and all, but if you want to use the library, there's a fee."
The wizard thought of his empty pockets, and the wooden button that could be gold; he reached into his satchel and pulled out one of his useless belongings, the tattered remains of a badly burned book. "It is not much," he said, as the monk leafed through the blackened pages, "but perhaps you can make something of it."
The monk sniffed and shut the book. "Maybe," she said. "Anyway, if your princess got swallowed by the sea, sounds to me like you're gonna need a boat."
The monk led the wizard and the goblin to the docks. Seabirds flew between the tall masts of shipping schooners and over the graceful prows of the luxury yachts and dove towards the decks of the smaller fishing vessels, hoping to steal dinner from last night's catch. Sailors shouted orders and sang shanties as they loaded and unloaded cargo or manned the riggings and prepared to cast off. All the ships seemed very busy, but the monk continued her search as the goblin clung to the wizard's side, as far from the water's edge as she could be.
At last they came to the end of the docks. Beyond them the sea stretched towards the horizon, and the wizard thought again of his hopeless task as the gulls gave mocking cries over his head.
"Y'all lookin' for a ship?" said a voice, drawling and genial.
They turned and saw a green-skinned half-orc standing at the head of the gangplank on a battered long ship, a captain's hat upon his head. The monk looked at the wizard and the goblin, and when neither spoke, she told the captain the tale of the princess swallowed by the sea and the wizard's impossible duty to find her.
"That's all well and good," the captain said, "but where do you need to go?"
The wizard thought of the princess, wide-eyed and wondering, and said, "To the land at the end of the sea."
The captain whistled and scratched his head under his hat. "I can take you there," he said, "for a price."
The wizard looked into his satchel, but he still had no coin with which to pay for such a journey. He drew out a bit of broken sea-colored glass, its edges jagged and sharp, and held it up to catch the midday sun. Then without hesitation he drew it across his palm.
As the blood welled up, he held out his hand and said, "I have no coin to offer, but I give you my word that I will return the favor."
The captain looked at his hand, then took the glass and sliced a similar cut upon his own palm. "We understand each other," he said, and he shook the wizard's hand. Their mingled blood cooled between their palms, sticky as they released their grip, and the wizard curled his fingers against the pain.
"Well," the captain said, tipping his hat to the goblin and the monk, "all aboard who's coming aboard."
The wizard did not take to the sea. For many days he clung to the railing, desperate for fresh air yet nauseated by every glance upon the choppy water. While the goblin played at powder monkey below decks and the monk scaled the riggings with ease, he sat with his head between his knees and thought again and again of his unsuitability for the task at hand. Even as he gained his sea legs, he longed for the surety of dry land and a flat, steady surface upon which to write.
But there were benefits to the sea, to the bright blue of the sky, to the dolphins and other sea folk who sometimes swam alongside the ship, gazing at them with curious eyes before diving back to the endless depths. The wizard's nose and neck burned and then tanned; the fresh air filled his lungs. The captain spoke of the freedoms of the water, the endless drive to pursue the next horizon, and the wizard understood something of that.
Yet ultimately they were trapped within a fragile cage caught in the sea's merciless grip, and then the storm struck.
The captain called for all hands on deck and so the wizard found himself alongside the crew lending his scrawny arms to the impossible task of holding the ropes as the water crashed into them from all sides, waves breaking over the railing and rain pelting their faces as the wind whipped and snapped the lines. The coarse rope bit into the barely healed wound on the wizard's palm, tearing it open anew, but any cry of pain that may have escaped his gritted teeth disappeared amidst the howling of the wind and the crackling boom of thunder as lightning struck the water just off the bow.
The wizard thought that perhaps they would sink now, and put an end to this futile quest, and he thought as he struggled to brace his feet upon the slippery deck that he would not mind the water as it closed over his head. But he thought of the goblin and the monk, pulling the ropes alongside him, and of the captain straining at the helm, and the empty place in his chest ached at the thought of drowning them with him.
He looked up as he felt the muscles in his arm start to snap and his fingertips start to bleed, looked up as lightning struck again, closer this time; and in the lightning's flash he saw an angel flying against the storm, her wings spread wide as she battled her way through the clouds.
The wizard knew that he was delirious, and yet again and again, as they sailed through the heart of the storm, he saw the angel amidst the clouds, heard the echo of her fierce cry in answer to the thunder as she tried to make her way to the clear skies above. And then with a mighty crack that threatened to split the sky in two he saw the lightning find its mark and the angel arch in pain as the wind tore her wings to shreds.
And then she was falling, as the thunder rumbled and the wind swept away, smoothing the sea as it went and leaving naught but a gentle rain in its wake. Before he could think to cast a spell, she crashed into the deck of the ship.
The wizard dropped the rope and slid his way across the wet and splintered wood to the angel, pushing his wet hair out of his face with his bleeding hand. The goblin and the monk and the captain joined him, gathering around the angel as she groaned in the midst of the wrecked deck. Her strong arms were purpled with bruises and battering, her white hair soaked dark with rain. And her wings were featherless and crumpled beneath her, causing her to cry out as she struggled to close them.
The wizard knelt at her side, and she looked at him with eyes full of pain, one the color of the sea, the other a color that took him to the seashore as a wave swept his past and his future away. As helpless now as he had been then, he reached for his satchel by rote, though his fingers burned as he searched through its contents.
At last he emerged with a tattered collection of wrappings, soiled and burned at the edges, and as the angel watched he began to straighten and set her wings. Though she grimaced she made no sound, and he found himself telling her the tale of the princess swallowed by the sea and his impossible need to find her, of the goblin and the monk and the captain who had come with him to find the land at the end of the sea, and even of the hag who had eaten his heart and left nothing but an aching hollow place in his chest.
And when he was done with his tale and the setting of her wings, the angel carefully folded them behind her back, and smiled.
They sailed for many weeks without reaching the horizon, facing storms and fearsome sea creatures and doldrums alike. Slowly the wizard began to believe that he had taken his quest as far as he could, and that he ought to release his companions to return to their lives and continue his voyage alone, doomed to be little more than a speck on the sea.
And then one day, bright and sunny and no different from the many bright and sunny days before it, the monk called from the crow's nest, "Hey, captain? Land ho?"
The captain took out his spyglass, and after a moment he began to shout orders to the helmsman. The ship set a new course, and in a few hours everyone else could see the shoreline with their naked eye, at first merely a dark line above the water. Another day passed and they could see a mountain rising above the rest of the land, smoke curling from its peak, and then the jungle trees rising from the ground, and at last the diamond-white sands of the beach as they weighed anchor.
The wizard and the goblin and the monk and the captain and the angel climbed into the rowboat, and the crew lowered them to the water. The monk and the angel took turns rowing them to shore. No sooner had the wizard stepped foot on dry land than he found himself falling over, landing face-first, sand in his mouth and his beard.
"It's your sea legs," the captain said wisely. "It'll wear off."
The wizard stood and brushed himself off. The sand stretched to either side as far as they could see, and before them the jungle began not far from the shoreline. "So," the monk asked, "where to now?"
They looked to the wizard and the wizard longed to tell them that he did not know. But they looked to the wizard and so the wizard took a deep breath and pointed at the dark green leaves just ahead, and together they plunged into the jungle.
For a day they wandered, more or less straight ahead, and as evening began to fall they found themselves in a strange clearing ringed with tombstones. In the middle stood a tall narrow stone house, and before its wooden door sat a firbolg with a cup of tea in his hands.
"The Mother welcomes you," he said in a rumbly, soothing voice. His fur was grey and his hair was pink, and his eyes were smiling. "Take shelter here for the night, and in the morning we'll discuss your purpose."
So the wizard and the goblin and the monk and the captain and the angel shared the cleric's hearth for the night, and in the morning they took turns telling the tale of the princess swallowed by the sea and the wizard's impossible calling to find her here, at the land at the end of the sea. When they finished the tale, the cleric steepled his fingers and said, "My Mother can help me find the path, but it would help if I knew what I was looking for."
The wizard reached for his satchel in which he carried nothing of worth. His fingers closed upon air, for he had emptied it over the course of his travels, and so instead his hand went to the pocket inside his coat, over his left breast. But he hesitated, and the empty place in his chest ached, for he had carried this with him the whole of the journey and kept it safe from wind and flame. And then he withdrew the princess's letter, addressed to him, and gave it to the cleric.
"It's not important," he said, as the cleric turned it over and broke the seal, "but it was hers."
The cleric read the letter, looked at him with eyes that matched his hair, whimsical and wise; and then he smiled again. "It'll do," he said, and he stood and gathered their empty cups. "Shall we?"
With the cleric's spell to guide them, they traveled through the dense jungle towards the smoke-topped mountain. Birds warbled unfamiliar songs above their heads, and unseen creatures crashed through the underbrush to their left and to their right. Vines draped from the trees and tangled across their path, and bright beautiful flowers beckoned for a poisonous closer look. Strange creatures, the likes of which the wizard had only seen in storybooks, stalked them through the trees. Occasionally their party slipped away through cunning; sometimes they battled their way through; and once or twice they made a curious friend who followed them for a way before returning to its own pursuits.
Eventually the ground beneath their feet gave way from spongy undergrowth to stony incline, and after several days of travel they broke through the trees and found themselves standing at the foot of the mountain. Together they felt the heat rising from the rocks, and together they lifted their eyes to the mountain's peak.
"You sure about this?" the cleric asked, and they looked to the wizard.
His satchel and pockets were empty. He had nothing left to offer, and so he took the first step.
And they fell in behind him, the goblin and the monk and the captain and the angel and the cleric, and together they climbed the mountain with the wizard in the lead. The ground grew hotter beneath their hands and feet as they climbed, and occasionally they had to make their own path through magic and muscle, willing the stone to give them passage. The wind grew fiercer and colder as they ascended to the heights, the rocks sharper, some pitted and coarse and others black and smooth as glass. Their cheeks stung and their hands ached and their feet burned, and still they climbed, until at last they reached a level point at the mountain's peak.
They stood on the edge of a caldera, smoke and steam rising from its depths. The wizard felt the heat ripple against his skin, and the faint red glow visible far below called to him, promising fiery oblivion. But he did not see the princess, and as he looked around he saw the others frowning in similar confusion.
"So this is it?" the goblin asked.
"Are you sure we're in the right place?" the monk asked.
"Seems a bit…empty," the captain said.
The angel said nothing, her eyes on the wizard's face; the cleric shielded his eyes, then pointed farther along the caldera. "There," he said.
They walked in single file behind the cleric, and gradually they saw the uneven edge of the caldera protrude over its depths. As they came to the point where the cliff began, the wizard saw at its farthest point a bier, and laying upon it the unmoving form of the princess. Stillness had never been her strength, which boded poorly, and for a moment he thought it fitting that he should have come so far, only to fail at the end.
And then, before he could take his first step onto the cliff, a voice said, charming and amused, "Oh, good, I was wondering when you'd show up."
The monk grabbed his arm before he stepped off the caldera's edge, and a shimmering form coalesced before them, clothed in an emerald green cloak. His features were elven, but elongated, his hair was a wild mane of red tumbling over his shoulders, and his smile was sly.
"Welcome," he said. "As you can see, we've had a bit of a mishap."
"I'll say," the cleric said, when no one else spoke. "What is this place?"
"A safe place," the archfey said. "A shelter, while I figured out a solution to our little problem. We've had marvelous adventures," he said, "but that last temple was perhaps a little too sacred, and, well, you see the result."
"Is she dead?" the goblin asked, and the empty place in the wizard's chest shuddered with dread.
"Oh no," the archfey said, "just sleeping. One of the Moonweaver's whimsies, I'm afraid."
"And who are you?" the monk asked.
"A simple traveler," the archfey said with a smile. "A concerned friend. A protector. A benefactor!"
"Looks like you did her real good," the captain said.
The archfey's smile vanished. "Very well," he said. "If that is how you wish it to be, then so be it. Which one of you will break the spell?"
They looked to the wizard. He took a step forward, and thought of how he had first been charged to protect the princess from magics such as these, and how he might yet be able to help. "I can try," he said.
"Excellent," the archfey said. "It's a simple charm, easy enough to break as it turns out, just a little beyond my reach."
"Then name your price," the wizard said.
The archfey smiled again. "True love's kiss," he said. "Nothing more, and nothing less."
For a long moment the wizard stood atop the precipice at the caldera's edge, the wind whipping at his coat and at the archfey's cloak, green as the wave that haunted his dreams. Yet the wizard didn't see it; he saw a dim, dark forest, and an old woman with sharp teeth and clawed hands reaching for his chest as his friends' sobs echoed in his ears. The empty place in his chest rattled as he drew breath; and then he said, "I can't."
The archfey cocked his head. "Can't you?"
The wizard opened his mouth to explain, and he felt a gentle tug at his coat.
The goblin stood next to him, looking up at him. So the wizard crouched down to meet her gaze, to apologize to his oldest companion, and instead he found his hand full of gold coins. "You taught me that things can be different from what they were," she said, and in a flicker of magic a halfling woman stood before him. She smiled and said, "Have back what you gave to me."
"Hey," said the monk, and he stood and turned to her, "I finished your book."
Holding the coins in one hand, he took the book he had given her, no longer burned and empty but bursting with thick pages of creamy parchment. He carefully opened the worn leather cover and saw, written in the monk's hand, Day 1. Creepy goblin and stinky wizard need a boat, and I'm bored with library duty. Let's do this. Each page that followed detailed their adventures with her sardonic commentary, and yet the last page was empty, the entry unfinished.
"That part's up to you," the monk said. "Have back what you gave to me."
"Here," said the captain, and the wizard found himself cramming the book and the coins into his pockets as the captain reached out a hand. "You know," he said, in a polished, gentle voice, "I was born an orphan, thought I'd always be alone, just me and the sea. And thanks to you, I'm not." As the wizard took his hand, he found himself pulled into an embrace. "Blood brothers, you and I," the captain said. "Have back what you gave to me."
The wizard stumbled back, his chest starting to hurt, and found himself looking at the angel. She smiled at him, and then threw open her wings, feathered and full and shining brighter than the sun upon the sea. The wizard staggered, dazed, and she gathered her wings around him as the light poured warmth through his body. He looked up at her from within the shelter of her wings, and she smiled again and held up a single white feather, which she tapped against his nose. "Have back what you gave to me," she whispered, and he closed his fingers around it.
The angel released him and his chest burned as he turned to see the cleric leaning against his staff, holding out a folded letter. "Here you go."
The wizard accepted it with trembling fingers. "What is it?" he whispered.
"An invitation," the cleric said. "Which I appreciated, but it's not for me. It's yours," he said, and the wizard's breath caught in the tight burning place in his chest. "Always has been. Have back what you gave to me."
The wizard turned the letter over in his shaking hands, read again his name in her dearly familiar hand, and then carefully opened it and read,
I'm running away today. I don't know where I'll go, but you can come with me, if you want. Meet me by the water's edge at midnight. I'll be hiding, but I know you can find me. And then we can sail away wherever we want to go. Hope to see you there!
And then, scribbled hastily beneath that,
Tell Mama I'm all right. Besides, you'll be with me, so we'll be fine. You do know how to sail, right? And swim too, just in case.
We'll be fine.
And then, at the bottom, quiet and small,
Please come find me. I want you to come.
The words blurred before his eyes as the wind seemed to roar around him, the air itself suffused with magic as it rushed into his lungs, as her letter and the gifts of his friends filled the hollow empty place the hag had left behind. The tight burning pain in his chest burst into flame and he fell to his knees, gasping for breath, as for the first time in years he felt a sluggish pounding where his heart had been. His hands splayed against the rock as the pounding grew stronger, as blood flowed freely and strongly from his head to his feet and back again, as color rose to his cheeks and his gasping turned to laughter. His pockets were heavy and a feather tickled his hand as he climbed back to his feet clutching the princess's letter, his heart beating against his bones, its rhythm a song of nothing less than life and love and joy.
The halfling and the monk and the captain and the angel and the cleric stood around him, and he looked at them all and said, "I—"
"Yeah, yeah, you're welcome," said the monk. "Now go get her."
But she grinned at him as she said it, and he took their smiles with him as he turned to face the archfey. "Be my guest," he said, bowing as he swept his arm towards the edge of the cliff.
The wizard stepped towards the place where the princess lay. The heat from the caldera below bubbled up around him, a comforting warmth that matched the heat in his cheeks as he looked at her. Her twilight eyes were closed, her features calm; her clasped hands rested upon her chest. Not a hair lay out of place till he stirred them with his breath. She was beautiful, but of course she was, and of course he had always thought so, though he had never said anything. He had never said too many things, and she deserved to hear them all; and with that thought in his head he bent down and kissed her gently on the lips.
"I give you my heart," he whispered, feeling magic crackle in every word. "It has always been yours." And then he drew back and waited, blood pounding in his ears.
Her eyes fluttered open, and so intent was he upon the sight that he didn't notice her movement until she'd raised herself from the bier to fling her arms around him, squeezing the breath from his lungs. "As mine is yours," the princess cried, the words muffled against his chest. "Have back what you gave to me."
The wizard shook his head, bending to press his lips to the top of her head. "You can keep it," he said, and the princess laughed.
"I knew you'd find me," she said, in the careless, assured way he remembered. And then, more quietly, she said, "Thank you."
"Always," the wizard said, his scrawny arms around her, feeling her heart beat in answer to his.
And for a moment they stood there upon the precipice at the top of the mountain at the land at the end of the sea, safe at last in each other's embrace; and then the wizard loosened his grip and took the princess's hand, drawing her with him to the caldera's edge. "Come, let me introduce you to my friends," he said, as she smiled at him with a joy that matched the one in his heart. "They've traveled a long way to meet you."
Once upon a time, a princess lived in a lavish chateau, though she didn't always stay there. Her mother, the queen, learned to hold her worry in her heart each time the princess stepped beyond the chateau's walls, though she always held her daughter close when she returned.
In place of guards, the princess had learned to defend herself with axe and spell, and the wizard himself was no shabby conjurer of mere parlor tricks. Their friends were strong and powerful, too, and in their travels they all protected each other in turn. The halfling and the monk and the captain and the angel and the cleric all loved the princess as dearly as she loved them, which warmed the wizard's heart indeed, though his was the hand she always chose.
And together they sailed the stormy seas on the captain's ship, holding the riggings side-by-side. And together they traveled to his homeland and made angels in the snow, while the angel herself flew above and laughed at their efforts. Together they brought the halfling woman to her family and the monk to a place of honor in her library, and together they shared many other adventures with their friends, and occasionally with the archfey as well.
And together they walked to the shore at midnight where the sea had once swept her away, and they lay on their backs in the sand and told each other stories of the stars that shone over their heads, their hands clasped as their hearts beat as one.
And together, they lived happily ever after.