The announcement came on fine parchment, thin and so shiny no one could imagine how anyone could properly write on it. But it was a wedding announcement, and plenty elegant to impress the kingdom of Corlblen, who hadn't seen much of a wedding in years. The happy couple was not of a kingdom with which Corlblen was familiar in any diplomatic sense, but that did not matter; a wedding was a wedding and they were near enough to be considered.

The King smiled as he read the invitation. He didn't smile very often, and to be perfectly honest this was not much of a smile. People liked to joke that he merely was not happy with the old King retiring as he had done, though this particular King had never been much for a humorous personality.

There was a story behind this wedding: Prince Isaac, heir to the throne, had finally announced his engagement. Not to a princess or a lady of the court, but to a common maid of the palace. Shocking and yet dreamily romantic. Rumor had it that she had nursed him back to health after some incident with a palace infiltrator.

About time, the King thought. He had spent some time in that palace during the time of his quest; he had seen how things were. That had been months ago, when he had left that place.

He wondered if he could possibly attend the wedding of Prince Isaac and soon-to-be Princess Caroline. Would that not be on the awkward side of things?
Maybe he would just have to send a royal wedding gift. He did not like to think of himself as a sensitive man, but he wasn't happy with everything that had happened at the palace of Prince Isaac.

So he sent a gift, signed rather anonymously, simply the Royal Family of Corlblen.

Around this time the rumors began. They came from the people, in the beginning just peasant chatter. Soon it reached the King. Rumors of a miller's daughter, a lovely young woman who could spin straw into gold.

Advisors and other members of the court were a little surprised at the King's reaction. He knew that. Well, they would have to deal with it. He would most certainly invite this girl to the palace.

There couldn't be two girls working the same ruse.

The summon was sent out.

He wondered what she would be like this time.

A tough girl, spirited but naïve, a proper help to her father, likely to handle more work than spinning. At least on the outside.

She smiled at him, and not the kind of smile he would have expected from a strong farm-girl stranger. But no one else seemed to notice. He smiled back, one of those rare smiles. Let the advisors say what they would.

He had been waiting a long time to be robbed.

THE END