Breagadoir was laughing contentedly to himself as he left the Toadstool.
He knew he'd done what was best for his heir.
Earlier that night...At almost 8:00, the prince had finished up his day of investigating and went to the Toadstool. He had an appointment to keep with the mother of his heir.
"Can I offer you a drink? Something to eat, perhaps?" he asked after she'd arrived.
"No, thank you," she declined politely. "I still can't believe you aren't cross with me."
"Cross with you?" he laughed. "I'm impressed by you. No one else has had both the nerve to take a stand against me and the intelligence to find a good way to do it."
"But you were clever. You contacted Annalove to try to dig up dirt on me,"
"and with her help, you hired a private investigator to follow Sotal. You weren't trying to attack me directly, but you tried to undo my route to the throne by trying to create grounds to take full custody of my heir."
"Quite clever, mother," said Sotal, entering as if on cue. "Quite clever indeed. My favorite touch was when you started a fire in front of the house so people would think Father had done it."
"In fact, if you hadn't used the computer in my room to contact Annalove and Mister Mathews, you might have snuck it past us. Of course, he wasn''t exactly the sneakiest investigator, so I knew I was being followed and told Father immediately."
But even as he was speaking, someone else was making an entrance.
"I thought it would be nice for us to spend some time together, mother," said Damon.
"Oh, I'm not fooled, Damon," she replied, as she stormed up the stairs. "When
Daydream told me you wanted to meet with me, I suspected something was up. And even if I hadn't, I could hear your father's voice as soon as we walked in."
"Well, hello, dear," greeted the prince.
"Don't 'dear' me," she retorted. "What's the meaning of this?"
"You've been plotting against me," said the elven prince, mocking a pained voice.
"I happened to be there when the private investigator left your home," he continued. "Imagine my surprise when young Sotal saw the same man following him around."
"Well, we've found enough dirt on you to get young
Demarco taken away from you," said Annalove, practically spitting the words.
"Let's not be too hasty with that," said Dahlia, obviously swayed by her discussion with the prince.
"You're out of luck anyway," said the voice of the hired investigator walking up the stairs. "It seems I've been offered more money to simply delete the file I'd created for you."
"WHAT?!?" asked both ladies in unison.
"And for a small fee, Nightmare did me the favor of destroying the photos you got last night," added the prince.
"It's the golden rule," offered Damon. "He who has the gold, makes the rules."
"Speaking of gold," said Breagadoir, after swigging a potion.
"What did you just do?" asked Annalove in terror.
"Seems I have the Midas Touch," said the prince.
"We're good, right?" asked the terrified fairy. "You respect that I stood up to you, right?"
"Of course," he replied. "Your care for our son was..."
"touching."
He enjoyed a nice laugh with his fellow investigator.
"...and to think," said Breagadoir, "you deleted all that incriminating information you had on your computer with a single..."
"touch."
Breagadoir laughed contentedly as he left the Toadstool, knowing he'd done what was best for his heir.
