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The wig sat on the floor, like a haystack full of flowers, beside the shoes Eden couldn't remember kicking off, though she knew she definitely didn't want to put them back on. She'd be perfectly happy never to wear heels again. Actually, given how much money she'd raised for the sanctuary, she could probably look forward to only wearing gumboots for at least the next year or two, after she graduated. As long as she worked out how to get out of this room...

The door was as solid as the stone walls, even if it was wood. The bed and the table were too heavy for her to pick up and heave at the door, and the chairs were too spindly to do much.

Her only other hope was the window, hidden behind the curtains, but this high up, it was a faint hope. She could hardly climb all the way down the tower. She was probably in the one that pierced the clouds, knowing her luck.

She parted the curtains, to find they hid a door to a balcony, not a window at all.

Eden stepped out onto the balcony, which went right the way around the tower, but it was barely wide enough for her, and when she leaned over and shouted down at anyone down in the garden, nobody heard her. The few couples who'd braved the chill night air for some privacy were too caught up in each other to notice someone way up at the top of the tower in need of help.

Even if she tried to turn the wig and the bedclothes into a rope, there was no way it would reach all the way to the ground. Just like Rapunzel, she was trapped in this tower until someone came to open the door.

Eden considered going back inside, where the empty champagne bottle on the table would be within easy reach for when Prince Charming finally turned up. She still wanted to clock him for luring her up here, locking her in this room and then making her wait so long.

Why couldn't Prince Charming have wanted to meet her in the garden? Unless he didn't want them to be seen together, but surely someone had seen her come up here, and would see him when he followed her.

She was still going to hit him, though. No matter who he was.

Well, maybe...

If he was that Prince Charming she'd thought was Diana, maybe she wouldn't hit him as hard as if he was...oh, Craig Tremotino, or even that butler. Though she should have asked the butler about Diana before he left...

Though, come to think of it, silver was an odd colour in a young person. Diana was the only person she knew with naturally silvery blonde hair. Maybe he was a relative of hers? If he was, then she should have asked Prince Charming what had happened to her. Surely her relatives would know who her supposed husband was...

What the ever loving fuck was THAT?

Flying over the forest was the biggest bird she'd ever seen. It could have been a plane, if she hadn't seen definite flapping going on.

How did something that big even get into the air? It looked like a giant swan or a pelican or a freaking pterodactyl. One of those extinct eagles that preyed on the giant emu things that used to live in New Zealand. Only it kept coming closer, and the closer it got, the bigger it seemed.

If she didn't know better, she'd swear she was staring at a real, live dragon. Coming straight for her.

Eden squeezed her eyes shut and screamed.

Whump.

That...sounded like something landing on the roof. Something heavy, with big clodhopping feet in work boots, like the time a bunch of roof tiles had blown off the house during a storm, and her foster father had taken two of the bigger boys up there with him to cover the holes, to stop the rain pouring into the attic and doing any more damage.

The roof creaked ominously.

Eden dared to open her eyes.

All intelligent thought left her head as she stared into the unblinking reptilian eyes of what could only be described as a dragon.