The actor held out his hand for the prince below, smiling down at him. “My prince, how I wish you could hear the birds nesting near my tower window. Such a beautiful song they sing.”
The prince bowed his head before reaching out towards the figure in the wooden tower, “your voice is the only birdsong my heart desires.” He called, bending to one knee, “as sure as the tide coming to the shore, my love for you shall always be.”
The princess in the tower blew a kiss down to the prince and the prince made an effort to “catch” it.
Aurora stuffed a fist in her mouth to stop from laughing. There was something strange about seeing a man in a dress, even a well costumed one like Donatello. And yet the idea of women being actors was as outlandish as Tell going shopping in a dress. Still, she found herself wishing it was her standing in the swaying wooden tower, wanting someone to reach out for her. The play was a tragedy like all good plays, so she had little hope for this romance, and yet she found herself drawn in and hoping maybe one of them would as least survive. She sighed, trying to reimagine Tell as the princess, but all she could see was his stupid grin when he told her he was playing a main lead in the play.
He hadn’t mentioned he was the girl.
Another set of giggles threatened to tear up her throat, making her grimace when she again stuck her fist in her mouth, a ring bumping one of her teeth.
“What are you doing?” Rosaline hissed beside her, “if you’re hungry why didn’t you just say so?” She handed Aurora a small bag of wild strawberries. “Now please, shut up. Tell is rather good isn’t he.”
Aurora took the offered bag and again watched as Donatello called out to his “beloved,” smiling down at the man and singing in his beautiful tenor voice his love. Men with higher voices were naturally cast as the female parts – a fact that never seemed to bother Tell.
And yet, no matter how she tried, all Aurora could see was her friend Tell, piggybacking her when they were kids and she had twisted her ankle. Or the charming smile that had first convinced her to join in his mischief, and then helped them get out of trouble again. He was a trickster and a devil, but he was, she admitted, a pretty good princess as well.
-OoO-
“How was I?” Donatello grinned, offering Aurora one of the flowers he was given for his performance. They were only wildflowers, yet they seemed to set his eyes alight with pride.
“You were –”
“Amazing,” Roseline butted in, taking a flower from the bunch and putting it in her neatly brushed hair.
“Your voice was beautiful, you really can sing Tell.” Aurora added truthfully, twisting the daisy in her hands. “But,” she stabbed a finger into his chest, “you never said you were the GIRL Tell.”
He grinned, shrugging “surprise.”
“Unbelievable. How will you ever get married if everyone knows you as the princesses in a tragedy?”
“Listen to you, all concerned for my future.” He grinned, “maybe I’ll marry you and then not have to worry about it.”
Aurora leaned in closer, smelling his sweat, “not on your life.”
He shrugged, “I’m sure your father has someone in mind anyway.”
Aurora grinned, taking her flower and placing it into his hair, “true. I couldn’t choose you anyway, I’m after a dashing rogue. Not a princess.”
She flipped her hair over her shoulder and walked out of the theater, grinning when she could hear his indignant stamping behind her, “I’m rougish!” He called out to her, towing his sister after him, “I am the world’s worst devil!”
Aurora turned in time to see a church servant sign himself against Tell before hurrying on. She burst out laughing, slowing and allowing him to catch up to her.
“Careful, a demon hunter might come for your tail.”
“Or a sorcerer use you in a potion,” Roseline added, slapping his hand until he let her go, “let go you oaf.”
Donatello murmured an apology and walked between the two girls, using the failing light to locate their carriage.
At the sight of them the coachman deftly jumped from his perch and opened the door, helping Roseline in.
Tell turned to look at Aurora, “I was good – wasn’t I?”
She kissed him on the cheek and took the coachman’s offered hand, “you shone like a star Donatello.”
-OoO- 6 months later -OoO-
“No.”
“Just this once…”
“No Aurora!”
“But women evenings are so boring. They just play cards and gossip after dinner. And you’re an actor…”
Donatello sat on the window’s ledge, ready for any moment someone would come into Aurora’s room and see an unchaperoned man lounging in her bedroom. He would scramble to clutch to the nearby tree he had climbed up from. It was an old routine, one which he had been doing from childhood.
“I’m not that good.”
“With a bit of white powder… and one of mother’s wigs…”
“You cannot be serious.”
Aurora came over to the window and silently pleaded with him, “please. Come into the women’s room after the dinner. They won’t notice. It’s better than that smokey den the men play cards in anyway. We’ll run out to the garden the moment we’re not noticed.”
Tell shook his head, but he was grinning. “Alright, I think I could fit into one of your mother’s gowns. I’m not so very tall. Most of the men wear heels anyway.”
Aurora flung herself at him, wrapping her arms around his waist. “You are, a godsend.”
“I thought I was a devil?” He grinned, his grin widening to shock as he watched Aurora produce one of her mother’s gowns from her dresser.
“How long have you had this planned?!” He demanded, ruefully taking it from her.
“Since yesterday. Since your sister was married, I have had no one.”
“You’ll always have me. Friends to the death.”
She smiled back at him, “I know. Might even name my firstborn child after you.”
She took out all the under things and laid them on the bed, “now, we’re going to become very comfortable with each other.”
Donatello rolled his eyes, plucking the corset out of her hands, “women-actor, remember.”
-OoO-
“I was wrong,” Donatello wheezed, “you are the devil. Not me.”
“Oh shush, Donna,” Aurora said, threading her way through the skirts around her. “we’re almost in the garden.” He gripped her hand tightly, “I can do this for a play, maybe three hours straight. It’s been seven hours Aurora. Seven.”
“Oh, but you are the most beautiful woman in England Donna,” Aurora grinned behind her, “I saw many men watch you.” And they had. She had chosen a name close to his so she would be more likely to remember it.
“You owe me.”
“If you came as a man we’d have had to have a chaperone. This way, who would know?!”
“My ribs. They know.”
Aurora pulled him into the garden of the estate, moving to find the small maze she knew the Lord of the house loved. It was a statement of his wealth. She dropped his hand after a couple of bends and he instantly turned for her to unthread his corset. He batted away layer after layer of material until he was in little more than a kurtle that bunched on his shoulders.
He breathed in, stopped moving, and suddenly pulled her into the bush behind them. Her muffled surprise was the only noise as Donatello pulled himself up to the top of the hedge. Aurora lifted a hand for him to grab, feeling him heave and pull her up beside him.
Footsteps. Laughter.
“Quiet Lyra,” a voice said, “they’ll notice you’re missing.”
“Oh, you worry too much Benjamin, they’re too busy playing cards and gossiping about that new girl – she was awfully pretty.”
They came around the corner to where Donatello had been moments before.
“Who?” Benjamin asked, receiving a playful push from the girl, “oh, she was with Aurora. Don something… Donna I think.”
Aurora who had moved a branch from digging into her back stuffed a fist into her mouth to stop from laughing. Donatello, the prettiest girl at the annual spring ball. She nudged Tell and motioned at the corset hanging from a branch just below them. The rest of the dress had been hastily shoved into the bush as just as the line of the sunset winked out of existence. He shrugged, moving forward to watch the couple.
Lyra was small, with dark serious eyes taking in her surroundings. But she was young, she was in love, and she failed to notice the two figures gawking at her from above.
Aurora watched as the broad-shouldered Benjamin held out a hand to Lyra, his blond hair slightly shinning with sweat. He curled her into him, gently swaying to and fro as they talked.
“You’re so romantic Benjamin,” Lyra murmured, “only you would dance in the middle of a garden.”
Donatello quietly snorted, leaning into Aurora, “I can do better than that. That’s not dancing.” Aurora shushed him, leaning in to watch the couple. She had broken some of the stalks so she could see better, draping her dress over the prickly bush so Donatello would stop moving to find a place to roost.
“See, that’s something your plays can’t create,” Aurora whispered, “that’s pure romance.”
“Until daddy finds out.”
“Or they find us.”
“No one ever looks up,” Donatello said confidently.
Just as the words left his lips the door to the garden opened, streaming light directly to where the pair were perched. Their eyes met, they nodded as one and launched themselves off the hedge, dropping to the ground near the couple.
In moments Donatello had snaked a hand around Lyra’s mouth as Aurora took Benjamin’s hand and ran with him deeper into the maze.
“Come on then darling,” Tell smiled as he pulled the shocked Lyra after the pair, “better go catch that daring girl before she runs away with your man!”
-OoO-
Lyra bit his fingers after the second turn down the maze, but had the sense to keep quiet as they ran.
“Pray tell,” she panted, “why are we running?”
“Err, my friend and I may have been perched on the hedge wall above you when the back door opened. Don’t know if they saw us. We’re taking no chances.”
“Your friend?” Lyra asked, not noticing her kidnapper had stopped running until she was slamming into Aurora in front of her.
“That,” Aurora said as she unattached her skirts from Lyra’s, “would be me.”
Benjamin pointed a finger accusingly as Donatello, “you’re not a woman! Good heavens.”
“I wouldn’t know, haven’t been there.” Tell said, taking off his soft shoes and leaning against the maze wall.
“Sorry for popping in on your moment,” Aurora send gently, “you see, we were there first.”
“In a dress?” Benjamin asked again, shaking his head as though there was water in it.
“Er, yes.” Donatello grinned. “I’m a man! Surprise! There’s been a bit of confusion, I was doing a favour for my friend here, but things turned a little more complicated.”
“More complicated then dressing as a woman?” Benjamin asked. Suddenly, he remembered his lady love. He turned to Lyra and smiled at her, “not worse for wear heart?”
Aurora watched them melt into each other, as though they were sunflowers bending together in the breeze.
“We are sorry for budding into your rendezvous, we just… happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.”
“It was bloody uncomfortable in that dress you see,” Donatello said in a conversational tone, “needed to use the full range of my breathing before I passed out.”
Lyra eyed the two and frowned, “and you’re not…?”
Aurora and Donatello cocked their heads to the side in unison, “we’re not?”
“Together?”
Then, to the surprise of the couple, the two friends did the strangest thing.
They both stuffed a fist into their mouths.
ns 15.158.61.12da2
