Continuing the fairy tale I wrote in Czech and am translating into English for fun. You might be able to just jump in here with part 5, but if you want to start from the beginning, all the previous parts are here: The Proud Princess and the Masked Mage. Otherwise lol–>
IN THE PREVIOUS INSTALLMENT:
Her next query tumbled desperately out. “At least show me your face!” Maybe, behind the mask, he would be desperately ugly.
But after he promptly complied, removing his mask in an undeniably elegant motion, Damarishka went weak.
This was worse than she could have imagined.
DUN DUN DUN! The continuation:
A deep scar bisected his entire face—a jagged pucker that ran from the corner of his left eye, over his nose, and down to his opposite jaw, as though someone had cleaved his face in half and taken some of his skull with it, for part of his cheek was sunken in at the deepest section.
Damarishka should recoil, her stomach churning, her dinner disgorging, but her stomach went fluttery, her breaths shallow, her heart rampant because this harrowing scar showed that he had been dragged to the threshold of death and had dragged himself back. He had spat at the feet of the person who had so reviled him that they’d striven to cut him in half, and he had shoved himself back into life.
As if his triumph were hers, Damarishka reveled in the proof of survival that the scar practically screamed from him.
While she stood motionless, however, the rest of the fellowship of nobles around her howled. Ladies and empathic men fainted. Brave men turned coward and averted their heads.
A corner of the stranger’s mouth quirked. “I’m glad my face isn’t a cause for fainting,” he stated with a certain seep of irony, for at least ten ladies and empathic men had passed out around them, and he was rightly and smugly taking credit for this phenomenon.
The king’s mid-air thrashing abruptly assumed a startling resurrection. “Out of my kingdom!” he thundered. “Out! Into the oubliette with you! Exiled, wizard, do you hear? You’re ousted! Banished!”
Lazily, the man re-donned his golden mask. “Tedious king. Why so afraid?”
“Pcha! Afraid? Who’s afraid? Not I! I’m not afraid!”
The wizard shook his head, sending his evil-dark hair shivering over his mouth in a way that made Damarishka unaccountably shiver, too.
“Such lies,” the wizard chided. “No matter where I am in the world, King, you will always fear me.”
“Show me respect, you despicable warlock! You filthy worm!”
“I’ll do what I want: insult you; affront you, demean you. In the end, though, I will never esteem you.”
“Out!” The king’s face went mottled, splotched, ruddy with anger. He hurtled his knife (O valiant attempt!), but the weapon scarcely flew a few hand-spans before it struck an unseen barrier, ricocheted off, and plunged to the floor. It skidded across the checkered tile with a clatter as loud as the king’s ensuing tantrum.
The masked man smiled, unpleasantly stretching his scar. “Don’t dare to defy a wizard, King. You’re not a big enough man for that.” And then, amid the king’s bawling, the masked wizard waved his hand.
At once, all of Princess Damarishka’s gifts—the cloaks and gloves and shawls, necklaces and rings and pins, the flutes and violins and piano—all whirled into the air, spun in a dizzying vortex, and soared out the window in a glittering plume of pink powder.
Everyone present (barring those deciding to stay passed out) gaped up, their jaws ignobly slack.
Only Damarishka never let her gaze waver from the wizard. She considered bolting for the door as a last resort.
But what hope had she of outrunning the wizard?
All too soon, only vacancy echoed in the places where her gifts had been heaped.
The wizard turned to her. “Will you come with me your own volition, Princess, or must I carry you in shame over my shoulder? Because will you or nil you, you’re coming with me tonight.”
Rifling through every political nicety she had absorbed in her life, she ventured out with tremulous hope: “What if I ever-so-gently refuse your kind offer?”
“It’s not an offer. It’s not even a proposal. It’s a bargain.” He paused, head cocked, his tone abruptly lacking any inflection at all. “Unless you break your father’s word.”
Odd that he said that. Was that even a choice? A certain curiosity dwelt in his look as he followed her response. Testing whether or not she considered it a choice.
Absurd, of course. She couldn’t break her father’s promise. She took pride in being a proper princess. An obedient daughter. An empty space. She did everything precisely (and vacantly) down to the point of royal precision.
But everything up until now had fallen in line with her mother’s command.
To marry this wizard meant flouting her mother’s warning.
Inspiration struck. Pit wizard against feline! Outwit and out-con him with distraction.
“I’m not going anywhere without my cat!” she cried, and she prayed that the cat had faster feet than she did.
The wizard glanced at the cat.
As if the cat understood that things were not going to go well with him, he really did start to dart off.
Unfortunately, not even cats can outrun magic.
The wizard sailed said cat into the air with a magical flick of his finger, then steered the wildly meowing creature straight to him, at which he securely tucked the tom under his arm.
Then he angled his cockiness at Damarishka. Will you come with me now? his arrogantly raised brow indubitably inquired. I have your cat.
DUN DUN DUN!!!! Find the next section here.
Dang, I am having SO MUCH FUN translating this! The ridiculousness! The Drama (with a capital D)! Also, when I put the following two things into Google Translate, it obviously didn’t understand the Czech term for ‘use the formal address’ (as in addressing someone formally / respectfully) and ‘use the informal address’, because it translated “Use the formal address with me, banished wizard! You dirty worm!” to this:
“Fuck me, banished sorcerer! You filthy worm!” scolded the king.
And it translated the wizard’s reply, which was “Use the informal address, use the formal, I’ll do what I want, since in the end I won’t be the one to pay (as in pay penance for what he’s done).” to:
“Sneak, sneeze, I won’t be the one to snore in the end.”
Like what? Lol. In any case, I hope someone out there is having fun reading this little tale 😀
Also! Here is a thing I finally did regarding what you can do to help make a cleaner world: How I’m Trying to Make a Better World and You Can, Too.
And videos! Y’all, I angered the People That Watch, because this video got almost 50% dislikes on YouTube and over 400 views (when my usual videos don’t even usually get 40 views)! And the tikTok version only got 15 likes out of also over 400 views while my other tikTok vid with over 400 views had 45 likes–three times as many! Methinks I do not know how to do cliffies. If you’re curious, you may also be angered by watching one of the ones below (basically same text, different music).
YouTube version:
tikTok version:
Thrice the Shadow. [nope, no idea what that means still]
If you want to support me(!), you can:
- read my books and yell about how great they are EVERYWHERE lol
- OR sign up to my ARC list if it’s still open at the bottom of this page
- OR if you want to throw money at me, you can ‘buy me a coffee’ via buy me a coffee
- OR support me regularly via the patreon (though I never post anything there cuz I suuuuuuuuck). However, the funds from this regularly feed me when I run out of money, so if you want to help me financially, this is probably the best way.
When I was twenty-two, I ran away to Prague, where I now sing to my black cat (who collects dustballs in her whiskers), eat chocolate for breakfast, and have lemon tarts every Thursday.
Sonya Lano 
[…] DUN DUN DUN! The next part is here! […]