Princed

Chapter 11

"Prince Froglip? Are you in there?"

The princess!

Froglip leapt in the air and jumped to the door, but just before he was able to swing it open, the wood creaked back noisily and the princess appeared in the gap, clasping her hands with something hidden inside them.

"Follow me!" She said with a stiff nod before spinning on her toe and walking quickly down the hall.

Froglip's shoulders rose up quickly and he fell into a wooden march to catch up with the princess. Although, something slinky and black slipped in-between his paces as he fought to make up the distance between himself and the princess.

"Rattleth'tax!" Froglip gasped and the goblin cat chirped back at him.

That boded well, at least. Clearly the prince's gift had at least been well received since she allowed it to travel with her.

With a few more long strides, the goblin was now just slightly behind the princess who continued to march down the long stairwell. From his vantage point, her face was indescribable but the prince only had a few seconds before mid way down a spiral staircase, Irenie whirled around and stopped.

"Sit down," the princess demanded. She gave an extra flick of her eyes at the prince before adding 'please' but he had been so overcome by the authority of the command that he had already taken a seat on the cold steps.

His mind drifted for a second when the princess leaned into him, her nose wrinkled.

They were now close in height although due to the fact he was sitting on the stone stairs, Princess Irenie was slightly taller.

"Prince Froglip."

There was a very long pause where Froglip slowly sunk his head into a hunch.

"Ye'th...?" he answered hesitantly, uncertain of what the princess intended to do.

Her pale eyes scanned him from the point of his chin to the tips of his ears and spiky, pink hair. All Froglip could do was stay frozen and stare nervously at the ceiling. However, without warning, she released a sigh that sounded defeated. He stared at her in frozen disbelief as the once tenacious princess seemingly collapsed on herself and sat down on the stair next to him, as far away as physically possible.

Froglip, and goblins in general for that matter, weren't known for their perceptive skills of sun-people's emotions, however, based on what he knew of the princess' calm demeanour, he thought her behaviour was totally out of the usual.

"Ith th'omething bothering you, printh'eth?" Froglip asked, however, with his eyes still staring into the wall of the spiral staircase.

Out of the corner of his eye, the princess looked Froglip's way, but didn't make so much of a sound.

She didn't really have time before Rattlestax came bounding down the darkened steps, chasing what looking to be a grey blur.

"I don't think I'll ever get used to that," the princess laughed nervously after having jumped. "Rat is a lovely mouser, but it almost makes me sorry for the mouse."

Froglip didn't exactly support the most successful of the goblin mousers being called 'rat' like the vermin, but he shrugged it off easily enough.

"Goblin cats don't feel th'orry for their prey," Froglip said uncompromisingly so that Irenie looked at him again.

"But if the mou'the eth'capes it th'urely wanted to live more than Rattleth'tax wanted to eat it. We goblins believe you get what you de'therve in life," Froglip said as he and Princess Irenie watched the goblin cat chase the mouse down the stairwell and out of sight.