Waking up to the sound of noise and a possible brawl in the morning was never a good thing. This was the thought on Sigrid’s mind as her eye trembled open. The sound of swords clashing against each other was not the only thing that had forced her to wake up, someone was licking the bottom of her feet.
The feeling was ticklish and her first thought was that Roland was playing around.
"Roland stop." she mumbled into the pillow.
The disturbance continued and her brain awakened fully, it hit her then that Roland would not be licking the bottom of her feet, another culprit was responsible for it.
"Sunny." she growled out and sat up, pulling her feet up towards her chest.
Her guess was correct, Sunny was the culprit. The silly dog sat on the bed, panting lightly which a look that was similar to a ridiculous grin.
"Why are you on the bed?" she croaked out. "And is why is your fur less than sparking white? Have you been disturbing the chickens again?"
"Woof!" Sunny barked.
"I will take that as a yes." Sigrid yawned loudly, and stepped out of the bed.
The first thing she did was open the curtains and peek outside. It was her intention to bellow at the knights to take their training elsewhere. Her big plan had been to sleep in until midday. The sky was overcast, it was drizzling, the weather was perfect for staying in bed.
When she opened the window, cold hit her like a wall of frozen air, causing her to wince and quickly shut the window. Sunny barked twice and she guessed he was complaining about the cold.
"Me too buddy." she said slowly. Sigrid stopped herself, frowned and looked down at the dog. Something she had said had surprised her and it was the word buddy. It seemed she had come to accept Sunny and surrendered to his persistent desire to follow her around. "Damn it, now he is growing on me."
She opened the doors for the maids and her morning routine started, brushing her teeth, taking a bath and dressing up.
"Why are the knights training in the rain?" she asked Lanai. Her voice was loaded with complaints.
"It’s not training your highness." Lanai shared with a smile. "Lord Givenchy brought one hundred knights to Stormwind in search of Mr. John. His daughter Lady Abigail was on horseback, she led the Givenchy knights inside and as soon as she saw Mr. John, she struck him on the cheek."
Sigrid’s mouth opened wide and she gasped. "No way."
Lama came closer to share in the gossip. "Oh yes, your highness I witnessed it myself. I was rushing outside to save one of the jockey’s from Venom’s wrath when it happened."
"It happened like this." Bella was quick on her feet, eager to demonstrate. "After striking him, she swept her leg out like this and Mr. John went tumbling to the ground. Then she sat on his chest and just hammered away."
Sigrid covered her mouth to keep the laughter in. ’What happened?"
Lanai hurried to share the gossip before someone else beat her to it. "Lady Abigail was very unhappy that Mr. John has not officially gone to her family to propose marriage after what happened at the ball. He called on her two times and made it obvious that he was courting her but then he left the city without sending her word. Apparently, rumors have been swirling around that he left because he did not want to make an honest woman of her."
So Abigail Givenchy had a temper, it seemed they had miscalculated when they targeted her. But it was a good thing that she was fiery, John needed a woman like that to keep him in line. He was too kind and nice that people took advantage of him all the time.
"Lord Givenchy brought a priest, he says that Mr. John must marry his daughter today or surrender his head. The crown prince has been up for hours trying to talk sense into Lord Givenchy and Duke Thorin." As Lanai put a yellow cloak over Sigrid she continued to fill her in on what was happening.
As Sigrid was coming up with a response, a most unbelievable thing happened. Lanai bent down and put a small similar cloak over Sunny.
"What the hell!" Sigrid exclaimed. The words were barely a whisper.
The maids were giggling and taking pictures of the dog.
"Why is Sunny dressed in a cloak similar to mine?" Sigrid whirled around and questioned them. "Whose idea was it to put the dog in clothes?"
"It was the crown prince." Lanai laughed. "He asked a seamstress to make some small cloaks for Sunny because of the weather. He told us to match your cloaks with Sunny’s."
Sunny trotted out of the room proudly in his cloak, his tail was swinging left and right. The dog was just too damn happy.
Sigrid was not as happy, she was wondering who Roland liked more between her and Sunny.
"I can’t believe it." she croaked out. "I am jealous of a dog now!"
Bella covered the chortle that spilled from her mouth with her right hand palm. "His highness loves you very much..."
"He just loves Sunny more." Sigrid mumbled.
"No." Bella said.
"Absolutely not." Lanai added.
"You are far more beautiful than Sunny." Lama said.
Lama’s words did not make Sigrid feel better at all. "Oh great, now my beauty is being compared to a dog. One of these days I will make a cloak out of its fur and change my name to Cruella." She mumbled.
For all her sulking, she got her crystal camera and took a picture of Sunny in the cloak. She was not willing to say out loud that the dog looked silly and cute.
Still, Sigrid sent a prayer up to the Lord, requesting that she not turn into those people that called their dogs babies and took them everywhere, acting as if they were infants. She had always found such people ridiculous.
She had nothing against dogs, she liked them fine enough. She just didn’t love them to the point of making baby sounds at them like Roland did.
Sigrid had breakfast, accompanied by Sunny who spent of the time looking out of the window mournfully because he wanted to go out and play. By the time she finished breakfast, the duel between the Givenchy’s and the Thorin’s and Roland’s white knights was over.
Not wasting time, she joined her family in the chapel to participate in John’s shotgun wedding.