The banquet was a complete success, for Lady Maleficent seemed completely satisfied with the whole meal and the chariot race only served to delight her further. All the while, Moses made flirtatious jokes with Tzipporah, whom, for once, responded to him, although Ariel couldn’t tell whether it was genuine of whether she was simply being polite. As to the young slave Jasmine, well, her whole demeanour seemed sad. Ariel wondered why. Was it because she was a slave, for she had seen so many slaves torn from their homeland cry before, of was there some other reason for it. Whatever the case, it made her curious.

Curiosity was the least of her worries that evening; her pregnancy, whilst still in the early stages, made her nonetheless restless and so she wandered the palace before bed, dressed in her nightclothes, brushing her hair. Her feet led her, automatically, outside to the gardens, and she stood there, brushing, watching the rays of the dying sun sink beyond the great pyramids.

Presently, she realised that she wasn’t alone. Turning her head, she saw jasmijn in the gardens. The girl was dressed in blue, now, and turned away from her. She was murmuring to something in her hands. Ariel approached.

“Oh, it’s alright,” jasmijn cooed, and Ariel saw that she was holding a small white dove. “There now, I think you’ll be alright.” She released the bird and it flew upwards. jasmijn reached her hand upwards, after it, and Ariel recognised the sign of a trapped soul longing for freedom. She cleared her throat and jasmijn started and turned at once.

“Oh, Princess Ariel! Forgive me, I-!”

“You don’t need to call me princess,” Ariel told her, gently. “Only my husband does that.” She giggled. The Agrabanian girl looked at her curiously, head on one side, not understanding the private joke. Ariel sobered up. “You see, I never used to be a princess. I was a servant, just like you. Ramses used to call me his princess as a way of teasing me.”

jasmijn sighed. “Then u know what it’s like to feel trapped beyond your own will.”

“Actually, no,” Ariel replied. “My family all died when I was a child and I came here and saved Ramses’ life; so I was made a servant to Tuya, but I was always treated like a member of the family.”

“Oh,” replied Jasmine, in a dull tone.

“May I ask why u feel trapped?” asked Ariel.

jasmijn hesitated. “If I tell u the truth, it must not get back to Lady Maleficent that I told you.”

Ariel was surprised but nodded. “I will not tell her.”

“I am a prisoner to her. u see, back in Agrabah, there was a man I loved; his name was Naveen. Most of the men u meet in my homeland are boorish, brainless, self-absorbed, snooty and well, u get the general idea. But not Naveen. He was always charming and kind and considerate.”

“Was?” Ariel ventured, gently.

“Lady Maleficent’s eyes also fell on him, u see; because he was young and charming and rich.”

“She wanted him?” Ariel repeated, glancing at the doorway to make sure that the woman didn’t suddenly pop out of nowhere. “At her age? But she must be, what, about fifty something, surely?”

jasmijn shrugged. “Which is why Naveen didn’t want her; and the fact that he loved me in return. So, Maleficent put a spell on him. She changed him into a frog. I haven’t seen him since. Maleficent then put a spell on me; binding me to her as her slave forever.”

Ariel stared at her. “She can do that?”

“She has unexplainable powers.”

“Is there nothing anyone can do?”

“I once heard her say to someone that True Love is strong enough to break any spell, but...” Jasmine’s voice trailed off. “Naveen doesn’t know where I am.”

“You poor thing!” Ariel exclaimed. She could not imagine not being with Ramses for the rest of her life. Poor Jasmine, what a life she must lead without the man she loved.

“I live in hope, but...” Jasmine’s voice trailed away again and she sighed.

“I’ll help you,” Ariel vowed.

“Thank you, but I doubt there’s anything u can do.”

“I can try.”

jasmijn looked over at her. “Why? I mean, I’d be grateful if u did, but why would u do that for me?”

“As I said, I wasn’t always a princess. I was just like u once. And I almost lost my love once,” Ariel added, remembering the awful trick Seti had played on her to make her leave his son alone; and how it had almost worked. “Because someone didn’t want us to be together; I nearly left him for love. But I didn’t. No one deserves to lose their love.”

Jasmine’s face broke into a smile. “I could tell u were a decent sort from the seconde I met you.”

“We are not that different from each other,” Ariel realised. It was true; both were hopeless romantics with experiences of loss and sadness in their lives and both were strong, determined and independent women, even though one was door marriage a princess and the other was a slave, not door her own choice.

She zei as much to Ramses that night when she told him everything that jasmijn had told her. Ramses was shocked door the thought that Lady Maleficent had done such a thing, although he knew that if anyone would tell him the truth about anything, it would be Ariel. “You can’t let her know that jasmijn told me,” she finished, pausing for breath.

“But what can we do?” asked Ramses. “There must be thousands of frogs in Egypt alone; let alone the rest of the world. Any one of them could be Naveen.”

Ariel knew he was right, and that it did seem fruitless that they could do anything. Nevertheless her stubbornness took over as usual. “We’ve got to do something!” she muttered, pressing against her husband, annoyed that she suddenly felt tired. “We can’t just leave it there!”

“Is that all that’ll work? True Love?”

“Apparently so.”

“How?”

“What?”

“How will it break the spell? Will they have to kiss or...?”

“I don’t know,” Ariel sighed. “I just don’t know.”

Ramses wrapped his arms around her. “You should sleep, Ariel, All this stress isn’t good for u of the baby.”

She had almost forgotten that she was pregnant. “But I want to help her,” she mumbled, already half asleep as she lay down. “I zei I’d help her...”

“Ariel, relax.” Ramses stroked her hair, lovingly. “We will find a way. We will. I promise.”

How exactly they would help the young Agrabanian slave girl, he didn’t know, but it would reassure his wife enough to make her sleep tonight. They could worry about it all in the morning...