Cats Triumphant Read Online Free Page A

her from the day of her christening sixteen years before, and by the three animals who lived in the forest cottage with them.
    Marco well remembered the day the three good fairies had brought the infant princess home. Marco had been three then, and wise beyond his years. He’d watched with concern as Daffodil, Lavinia and Nocila had warded the house with their strongest spells. They had asked the three animals to help care for her, and they had accepted the task with love. Bruno, a large friendly puppy, had grown up to be her loyal protector, though he was not as well-furnished in the brain department as Marco. Humberto was clever with his small paws, helping the little princess to learn embroidery and fine thread work, though she was forbidden to spin. The fairies had explained that a curse had been laid on her at birth by the Black Fairy, Desdemona, and that Briar Rose was not to touch a spinning wheel or she would die. With all her other activities the girl scarcely missed spinning, so full was her life The godmothers had taught her to sing and read and dance, to cook and bake and brew, to garden and ride and swim, and simply to enjoy life. Briar Rose had been happy and well.
    As all things come to an end, so did their peaceful years in the forest. Three weeks before her sixteenth birthday, the long-awaited summons had arrived from the King and Queen of Cadmonia. Two heralds and six men-at-arms had come to escort the Princess Briar Rose and her godmothers to the castle for the girl’s coming-of-age celebration. To the amazement of the men, Marco and his two companions went with them.
    The king and queen welcomed their daughter’s strange entourage, and gave each of the animals a warm silk cushion on the floor in her chambers. Marco never occupied his. He slept, as he always had, on the princess’s own pillow beside her head, with one paw touching her hair.
    The three animals found life in the castle as puzzling as its occupants must have found them. They did not like it that mice there were considered to be prey to cats and dogs alike. It was far better when the fairy godmothers’ animals organized the mice to keep down the bugs that were eating the tapestries and grain, and making the humans miserable in their beds. The cats turned to hunting garden pests instead of the household rodents. Dogs took more seriously their job of patrolling the castle and ceased bedeviling cats. In no time, all was running in harmony. The king had to admit that things had improved greatly since the arrival of the princess’s odd guardians.
    Preparations for the coming of age party seemed also to be going smoothly. Invitations had gone out six months in advance to every one of the 24 other kingdoms on the continent, inviting every prince over the age of twelve to attend. Now that she was a grown woman, Briar Rose was expected to choose a husband. Since she was an only child, the prince who married her would be ruler of Cadmonia after her father’s death. There were no refusals. By seven days before the party, elegible suitors were pouring over the narrow isthmus of land that separated the peninsula on which Cadmonia sat from the rest of its neighbors.
    The king and queen were determined not to repeat the mistake of the christening celebration. A special invitation had been sent out to all the kingdom’s fairies, but most especially to Desdemona. The miserable page who’d drawn the short straw of delivering hers returned much the worse for wear bearing a scorched piece of parchment with her acceptance. He hadn’t been able to speak since, and had been assigned a quiet chamber to himself high up in one of the distant towers of the castle.
    The last of the princes paraded himself past the silk tent, then retired.
    “Highness?” Daffodil asked, fluttering to the girl’s right shoulder. Fairies were smaller and usually plumper than ordinary humans and had wings on their shoulders. The yellow-clad godmother touched the girl on the hand.