It had been about a week since they had left the scatity of the royal city.  Long ago were the towers and spires of civilization behind them.  For seven days they had used the restroom in the bushes, washed whenever they found a spring and changed next to never.  Hair that had been left fashionably streaming at the beginning had since been pinned and filthy with grease.  Yes, many sacrifices had been made in the interest of travel…

And someone had had enough.  "If we don't find a town.  With a bathroom.  And a bath.  I will kill someone."

Joseph gave the princess a startled look.  "Meshial?"  He gasped in confusion and disbelief.

The blue eyed angel with golden hair snarled.  "I will.  I am not kidding."

Quartzite looked up from the scroll he'd been studying as they rode along.  "Are you feeling alright?  Can I get you some water?"

"NO.  I WANT a hot bath.  With lavender.  Now.  Today."

"Whiney bitch…"

Joseph's eyes narrowed as he glared down Sarah and dared her to start something.  "What was that Sarah?"

"Nothing…"  The brunette muttered sullenly.

"Well I have been studying the map here and it appears that we should be coming up on a town later this evening.  We can sleep in an inn and find a bath house there."  Quartz suggested meekly.  

"Now."  Meshial repeated slowly.

Sarah's expression went from cloudy to impending sarcastic doom.  "Hum… well it's not as if we're gonna see a bath house here in the middle of these cabbage fields just waiting for you.  Sorry princess."

"What about that one?"  It was the first thing Tak had said so far that day and he was pointing ahead to a brown spot ahead of them about a mile down the dirt path.

They all looked… peered hard and saw that there was a small building and what appeared to be a few people hanging about it.  It was too far away to make out exactly what it was yet though.

"Sorry Tak, we can't see as well as you."  Quartzite spoke for the group.

"It's an outhouse.  It's got lady sign on it."  Tak supplied, happy to be helpful.

"Really?"  Meshial gasped.

Tak gave her a stoic nod.  She was gone in a cloud of dust.

A few minutes later when the rest had caught up with her Meshial was arguing with three young men.  "I want to use your outhouse.  I will give you gold coin.  What part of this do you not understand?"

One of the men had dark hair and was fiddling with what appeared to be a piece of wire on the top of the receptacle with a few simple tools stuck into his belt.  A red headed young man was sitting on a bolder on the road and having a cut on his arm bandaged by a third taller man with brown hair.

"Sorry.  It's broken."  The dark haired man answered sharply.

"Its an outhouse.  A whole in the ground in a wooden box.  How can it be broken?"  Meshial tried to reason with them gently.

"Er… we forgot to dig the whole?"  The red head asked.

Meshial gave them all a long hard look.  The man on the roof of the outhouse had a strange blue pack strapped to his arm with bandaging and had a streak of dried blood from a cut across an eyebrow.  It seemed to be blossoming into bruise as they spoke.  The brunette's nose was streaming with blood but he didn't seem to notice as he patched up the red head.  He had a strange bag open beside him in the dusty ground with a red cross on it.  Meshial turned up the power on her glare.

"You -can't- forget to dig a whole… that's not how it works.  I'm going to use your outhouse NOW…"  She hissed through her teeth.

"Now Meshial."  Joseph soothed, taking the blond by the arm in case he had to hold her back.  "Who are your new friends?"

"Aya!  Pleased to meet ya!"  The red-head chirped.

"Aya you KNOW that name isn't appropriate to this time period!"  The young man with black hair scolded from his precarious perch atop the outhouse.

"Oh right.  I meant Adam!"

"I'm Christian and that's Thomas.  I'm sorry we can't be of assistance but we must fix our outhouse as soon as possible and we can't delay."  

Oddly enough the brunette didn't speak or even look up during the quick exchange.  His focus seemed entirely taken by his medical work.

"Um right.  Pleased to meet you as well."  Joseph answered, a bit confused by this dialogue.

"What happen?  You get in a fight with the cabbages?"  The sarcastic sneer came from Sarah who was taking way too much amusement by seeing Meshail so uncomfortable.  This odd assortment of strange boys was just icing on the cake of a lovely day.

"Huh?  Oh.  No.  This is all Sakura's fault.  We would be in that town right now instead of licking our wounds if she would only sing!"   Adam, or perhaps Aya, snorted.

"Sing?"  Quartzite asked confused.

"A town!"  Meshial gasped at the same time.

"Sure!  We were gonna' go look for dragons there but we couldn't get in because Sakura is stage shy… apparently."  

"Dragons?!"  Tark asked eagerly, his 'great thwaking sword' already in his hand and ready to strike.

"They don't exist."  Both Quartzite and the strange Christian answered in unison, then looked at each other in puzzlement and surprise.

Joseph shook off the weird silence that followed.  "So there's a town near?"

"Yup!"  Adam answered cheerily.

"Ok.  Then we go.  Before Meshial kills one of us."

Just under an hour later they were at the gates of a small town.  They could tell that there couldn't be much within but there would surely be an inn and the hot bath Meshial so desired.  As Adam described there were two guards manning the gate.  They looked bored and were leaning on rusty pikes.

"Hault."  One of the guards spoke the word in a bored tone.

"I don't think so."  Meshial snapped back.  Her hair was loose about her face and her sweet blue eyes had taken on a hard cold edge.  "We're going in.  And we're taking a bath.  THAT is what we're doing."

"Nope, you gotta halt.  You can't enter till you do the task."  This time it was the second guard who spoke, straightening up and trying to find a pose near 'attention'.

Joseph sighed.  He wasn't exactly sure when he'd become the peace maker of this group.  He'd long found himself keeping Sarah in line.  They had a long history together and there were several bar fights he hadn't been able to prevent that he no longer remembered due to his inability to talk his way out of situations… He had learned a great deal since then.  "Fine, right, not a problem.  What is the task?"

The guard on the left grinned in anticipation.  "All the ladies gotta' sing."

"I… I don't understand.  What is it the ladies are meant to sing?"  Quartzite asked slowly.

The second guard was grinning now.  Almost snickering.  "Anything.  You gotta sing though!"

"Fine!"  Meshial snapped before anyone could answer.  "I've been trained.  I AM a princess after all."  She dismounted and fell into a long practiced singer's posture.

Quando sono sola

sogno all'orizzonte

e mancan le parole,

si lo so che non c'è luce

in una stanza quando manca il sole,

se non ci sei tu con me, con me.

Su le finestre

mostra a tutti il mio cuore

che hai accesso,

chiudi dentro me

la luce che

hai incontrato per strada.

Con te partirò.

Paesi che non ho mai

veduto e vissuto con te,

adesso sì li vivrò.

Con te partirò

su navi per mari

che, io lo so,

no, no, non esistono più,

She took a moment to glower at the two guards.  They were both stunned silent.  "Good enough?"  She asked with a smirk.  "I would go farther but I'd need a male accompaniment.  Any voulenteers?"

"Sing after that?  No."  Tark summed up the thought on everyone's mind.  Meshila had been stunning.  And a bit frightening…

"So.  We're in?"  She asked with an impatient note in her voice.

The guard on the left recovered first.  "Sorry no.  Not until all the women sing."

"Good.  So we're in."

"HEY!"  Sarah didn't want to sing but she wasn't about to let Meshial snipe her like that.  "I can sing.  Just none of that fancy opera stuff."

"Sing whatever you like."  The guard on the right answered.  "We just can't let you go until you do."

"Fine then!  And I can do it ON my horse thanks…"  She straightened herself, cleared her throat and with no further warning to her poor audience, belted out…

I'm quick on the trigger with targets not much bigger than a pinpoint

I'm number one, but my score with a feller

Is lower than a celler, oh you can't get a man with a gun.

When I'm with a pistol, I sparkle like a crystal

yes, I shine like the morning sun,

but I lose all my luster, when with a bronco buster,

oh you can't get a man with a gun.

With a gu-un, with a gu-un, oh you can't get a man with a gun!

"Oh god is it over…?"  The guard on the right managed to mummer.

"Wow!   What a voice!  I didn't know you could sing Sarah!"  Joseph grinned and slapped Sarah on the back as she grinned under his praise.

"What's a gun?"

Tark turned to look at his shorter traveling companion "I donno'…  but it sounds like fun.  Wish I had one."

"You call that singing?  That's not classical, that's not even a bar song!  Where did you learn that?"  Meshial demand, outraged.

Sarah shrugged.  "I don't know.  Just picked it up and thought it was catchy.  So can we get in now?"

"I wish…"  Muttered the guard on the left, who's ears were still ringing.  "But you can't go in until all the girls have sung.  Ever one."

"What?  But we have.  For real this time!"  Meshial whined.

"Sorry.  But nope."  The guards muttered nervously.

There was silence and scuffling in the group as they tried to work this one out.  "But we've all sung…"  Meshial muttered again.

Finally about three minutes of silence later Quartzite spoke up.  "Do you think I’m fat?"

"What?!?"  Sarah and Meshial answered together as Quartzite and that stranger had earlier.

"Really Quartz, what could that possibly have to do with -anything-?"  Joseph demanded.

"Just answer."  Quartzite demanded quietly.

"Er well…"  Meshial muttered.  This close to civilization she was gaining back some of her poise and manners.  Telling people they were fat defiantly didn't fit any premise of polite social behavior.

"If you were a human yeah.  But you're a dwarf.  To look like us you'd be puking up your food after meals."  Sarah answered bluntly.  She didn't get trained to be polite.

"Hum…  right.  I think you just told me I was fat very very politely.  Never mind that though."  Quartzite slid down the side of his horse and approached the guards.  "It's not over until the fat lady sings is it?  Well fine."  With no further warning Quartzite took a deep breath and let out with a volume and a rich bass that shook the walls of the village.

Under the Mountain dark and tall

The King has come unto his hall!

His foe is dead, the Worm of Dread,

And ever so his foes shall fall.

The sword is sharp, the spear is long,

The arrow swift, the Gate is strong;

The heart is bold that looks on gold;

The dwarves no more shall suffer wrong.

The dwarves of yore made mightily spells,

While hammers fell like ringing bells

In places deep, where dark things sleep,

In hollow halls beneath the fells.

"Good enough?"  Quartzite asked in his usual low and rumbling tone.  The air was still heavy with the song and it had shaken everyone to the bones.

"That's a… violent song."  Meshail ventured.

"Traditional."  Quartzite answered, sticking his hands into his belt nervously.

"You're a… no.  You've GOT to be joking me."  Sarah gaped, stunned and confused as everyone else.

"That's good.  In you go!"  Chirped guard on the left.

Guard on the right let the gate swing open and they all passed through in silence.  Once the gates were behind them Joseph spoke for them all.

"So you're a… well… and…  How did you know?"

Quartzite shrugged.  "The one on the left.  His red pendant.  It turns green when all the females in a group have sung.  I've seen something like that before.  Magic charm.  Strange rule for a town though don't you think?"

"But that means you're a…?"  Meshial asked.

"Yup."  Tark answered for Quartzite with a strange and happy grin on his face.

"After all.  It's not over till the fat lady sings…"