Excerpt: To Hell with Snow White

The next morning, even before daybreak, Zev was in the palace kitchens, taking a few loaves of bread, apples, and cheeses. He pushed them into a saddlebag, and slung it over his shoulder. His mare was saddled and waiting, it had been arranged in advance with the stablemaster. A second horse stood by her, for carrying provisions, some of which were already loaded. He added his few saddlebags to that, as well as a sword, a crossbow and quarrel, and a spare pair of boots. A third horse was saddled beside this horse, with provisions of its own, as if for a long ride, and he looked at it curiously, a fine, fast horse, but not one he’d seen before. Someone else must have an early morning task, he thought, checking the harnesses of both his horses, before mounting.
He clicked to get her walking, and she obeyed, and as she did so, and out of the corner of his eye, he saw a dark shape slide out of the shadows and around the head of the third horse, and mount, and that horse joined his two, at a slight distance, but coming with them nonetheless.
In the tricky light that proceeds the dawn, it was hard to figure out what might be going on, and he tried to ignore the other rider, at least until the sun came up, but the third horse kept pace and would not go its separate way, and finally he could stand it no more, but halted, and let the rider come up, and hopefully go past. The rider stopped the horse, however, and waited for the prince to resume his progress.
“What is your business?” he inquired angrily acrosst the gap.
“My own,” said the rider, in a distinctly feminine and familiar voice. After a pause Jessica added, “Well, that’s not true, but it sounds better than the truth.”
“Jessica...” said the prince in exasperated disbelief. “Whatever are you doing here?”
“My father sent me, as I would not be missed, and I can ride at least as well as you.”
“What for?”
“You don’t think you can just sneak out on my father, do you?” she asked. “I mean, your father, certainly, is well, continually distracted, but to my father, those distractions are things to be pinned down and organized and thought out.”
“He knows where I’m going? What he’s sending you towards?”
“I’ve got my winter cape on, don’t I?” she said with a twisted smile. “He’s got faith in me, anyway, more faith than he does for you to come back in one piece without my help.”
“I didn’t know he cared.”
“Did it ever occur to you who would be the next king of Aedra if anything untoward happened to you, your majesty?”
Actually, it hadn’t, for what would ever happen to him? But, of course, the answer came to him instantly, the Duke... the mad, ridiculous duke. “Ah,” he said.
“So, should we turn back, then?”
“No, no,” said Zev, breezily, though he no longer felt so breezy. “I’m convinced of the necessity to ride out and do one great deed before I’m staked to that throne for good.”
“You’re convinced that possible death is a better prospect than probable marriage.”
“Yes,” he said with a halfhearted laugh, and spurred the mare forward. And without further comment, Jessica followed.