| I'm told that bridal
showers sometimes do turn bawdy, even today. Well, if Princess Gwen's
rhyme is any indication, they come by it honestly! Her father, King
Galowyn, promised that when she came of age, she would be given in marriage
to the warrior then greatest in all the land. Little did he guess
she would be his only child or the fallout that fact would cause throughout
the Three Kingdoms! With no male heir to the throne, the Kingdom
of Galwalk will pass through Gwen to her future husband, with the unhappy
result that for the past several years, there have been few marriages among
the warrior aristocracy of the Three Kingdoms,
because each kingdom's heroes
are pledged to contest for Gwen's hand. Through no fault of her own,
Princess Gwen is the cause of the misery of every other single lady in
the Three Kingdoms — an impossible situation that does not sit well with
the strong-willed princess, either! She would rather give up the
throne than be the prize in her father's game, no matter how valiantly
won, by however noble a contestant. So when, at her birthday feast,
she is baited into performing a rhyme for her suitors, she holds little
back, demurely devastating both her father and the entire noble assembly,
male and female alike. I'll leave the action to your imagination,
but I will tell you that Princess Ulrica of Osterlaw and her Battle Maidens
are all drop-dead gorgeous and were it not for Princess Ulrica's timely response, Gwen's "playful" rhyme might have been cause of violence! |
