Gundam Wing Fan Fiction ❯ The Ice Prince ❯ The Ice Prince: Chapter I ( Chapter 1 )

[ P - Pre-Teen ]

Title: The Ice Prince or Such a Marvelous Rose
Author: Meiran Chang ( bonking_bishies @ swirve.com )
Rating: PG-13
Pairings: DorlianXSylvia, 1+R, 6+2, 3+4, 5+Dorothy, 6x9, 2xH
Warnings: shonen ai, AU, fairy tale, angst, verrrrrrry mild self-insertion in, like, the last sentence. I made Dorlian a total OOC wuss >_<. Also, I've played fast and loose with family relationships and situations.
Comments: Ohhhhh pretty please? --> bonking_bishies @ swirve.com
Archive: 6X2ML Archive can have it. (that's at http://6x2ml.topcities.com) Otherwise, please email me, I don't bite.
Disclaimers: I do not own Gundam Wing or any of its characters, they belong to Bandai and Sunrise and the American rights are owned by Cartoon Network. Please don't sue me, I'll just cry a lot. Also, the original story of "Beauty and the Beast" is by Mme Leprince de Beaumont and not mine either. I don't own anything except… the original portions of this piece of fiction…whatever they are.
Dedication: To the 6X2ML, because they're darlings all and the inspiration for this fic.

The capital city of White Fang was a lively, interesting one. The Peacecraft palace was located there, of course, and the writers, nobles, and other important persons of the day made their home there. Libra Port at the north end of the city on the mouth of the Sea of Taurus was one of the busiest ship ports in the land, and the economy bustled, prodded enthusiastically by the Merchant's Guild. The streets of White Fang weren't paved with gold, though upon occasion, the King had played with the idea, but it was nevertheless known as the City of Dreams. It was divided into the Theater District, the Financial District, and the Residential District, and people traveled from as far away as Brussels and Artemisia to sightsee.

The leader of the Merchant's Guild, a powerful Guild that controlled most of the flow of goods into and out of Oz, was a young and idealistic man named Dorlian Maxwell. His whirlwind romance with the flower of the nobility, Sylvia Noventa, delighted the gossips, and their marriage was attended by everyone who mattered. The cynics praised Dorlian Maxwell for his astuteness in pairing up with a noble, since, after all, business required the right connections, and the romantics sighed over how romantic it all was. Sylvia was admired for her delicate and ethereal beauty, with huge ocean-blue eyes and long, shining gold locks. Those who knew her personally also added praises of her sweet and light-hearted temperament.

A few months after the wedding, Dorlian allowed it to be known that his wife was with child. It was a long, hard delivery for the fragile Sylvia, but with the best doctors Oz could offer at her side, she made it through. The infant was a girl, and the couple named her Relena, after the original Peacecraft Queen and champion of pacifism. Relena had dark blue eyes and dirty blonde hair; she was not an extraordinarily pretty child, but she was intelligent, observant, and persistent.

When Relena was two, Sylvia gave birth to another child, Dorlian's first son. She was two days in labor and there was some fear she might be lost along with her child, but the baby was born before the exhausted mother reached the critical point. After Sylvia rested, she and Dorlian decided to name the infant boy Quatre as a nod to their friend Quatre Winner, the patriarch of the numerous and wealthy Winner clan. Quatre was a cheerful child with bright blue eyes and shining gold hair like his mother. He was, unfortunately, often confused for a girl. He learned to walk and talk early, and his tests as a young child showed that he possessed the spark of genius.

Out of worry for his beloved wife's health, Dorlian restrained himself, and Quatre was five before Dorlian and Sylvia decided to try for one more child. As always, she was provided with all the luxuries and comforts possible, and her bed was ringed by hovering doctors constantly. She broke water one cold winter night, and at once it was clear that she could not live through the childbirth. She died during the delivery. The doctors worked frantically to save her child and succeeded, the only thing that softened Dorlian's rage and pain. The infant was a second son, and a grieving Dorlian named the baby boy Duo, that his mother's spirit might hover with him always.

Duo was a laughing child, bright, playful and mischievous. With large violet eyes, chestnut hair and an impish grin, Duo was easily the loveliest of all three children. He reminded Dorlian strongly of Sylvia, and the puckish boy was Dorlian's anchor to the world after the turbulence of Sylvia's death. It took Dorlian some time to recover, and he never was quite the same, but every time Dorlian glanced at his second son, he thought of the dearness and joy Sylvia had left him.

The three Maxwell children, being the children of a well-known and important man and having talents of their own, became the talk of the city. Relena grew up to be quite the orator, with a skill for rhetoric, a compulsive honesty and an earnestness that never failed to convince. Quatre was sensitive, empathetic, and brilliant, with a particular leaning towards literature and the fine arts. He played lute, violin, piano, flute, and gittern, experimented with composition, and studied everything he could. Duo was rather more active than his siblings and liked to fence and ride. He was a natural actor and visited the Theater District often; he also delighted in music. Much to his siblings' dismay, Duo was a clever trickster. He was also notorious for his obstinacy and had a particular quirk involving his hair: he refused to cut it. It was usually bound in a thick, heavy chestnut braid that ended halfway to his knees.

Relena was a bit too honest upon occasion, and Quatre was always occupied in the study or practice chamber, so it was Duo, a creature of natural social ability, whom the people knew best. It so happened that as Duo matured, he grew from an adorable boy to an exquisite young man. Tales of his loveliness spread through the city, strongly reminiscent of the acclaim his mother had received for her pulchritude, until anyone could pick him out at a glance.

At fifteen, Duo usually enjoyed basking in the attention of others. However, the tales, harmless intentions notwithstanding, began to encroach upon his personal space and dignity. His school companions found them hilarious, he found them embarrassing, he could no longer glance at a mirror without evoking much snickered comment, and strange girls stared at him in the streets on a regular basis. His only accomplishment that seemed to matter to the crowd was birth; all his other achievements were ignored, which got on his nerves because contrary to popular belief, he did not sit at home and pick out what clothing would go best with his eyes all day. He sang with real talent, he fenced foil in tournaments and rode well; he did not stare lovingly into his mirror from dawn to dusk and brush his hair.

The misconceptions abounded, helped along by the fabrications of White Fang's prolific poets. Duo took to hiding in his family's mansion because he could barely walk a peaceful ten paces down the street without being attacked by bards, artists, groupies, and wrathful young women who would have been the focus of admiration had he never been born. Heads turned and people whispered wherever he went. Being locked up in the house drove him and everyone else who had to listen to him mad, and finally, Quatre intervened with a few suggestions. Duo settled on outright, nose-in-the-air snobbery to handle the situation, hoping to be so unpleasant he would be left in peace.

Try as he might, however, Duo simply could not deter the poets from what they saw as their God-given right to floridity. They renamed him -- and of all the possible humiliating things, they stuck him with 'Beauty.' When Duo first heard that, he had to be physically restrained from hunting down the ill-starred man, tying a heavy book of poetry around his neck and kicking him into the River Virgo. When that option was denied him, he raged creatively for hours, pacing the entirety of the mansion, giving the excited servants plenty of scandalous gossip-fodder.

It was Quatre, as always, who succeeded in calming him. He advised making the foppish courtiers twitch by dressing like an acolyte of Shinigami. Duo seized fiercely upon the idea, threatening his tailor with death by pincushion until the harried man fit him for an entire wardrobe of black. Unfortunately for Duo's touchy pride, stark black was a color that suited him much better than the Court outfits he'd previously sported. The whole effect of his sober attire was quite contrary to the one he had been hoping to achieve. Fevered songs and sonnets waxing eloquent on Duo's beauty multiplied overnight to the point where all that kept the beleaguered boy in White Fang was love of his family.

Duo grew desperate for an excuse to leave the city, and in September of his fifteenth year, his wish was granted. Dorlian lost the family's wealth and his position as Head of the Merchant's Guild by indulging in a dubiously legitimate business transaction. With a brave face, the merchant called his children together and told them that they would have to leave the glittering Capital for the only place he had left to his name, a small cottage on the border of Oz and Koelonye.

"From now on," Dorlian finished, "we'll have to make a living by farming." His sad gaze rested on each of his three beloved offspring. There was his favorite child, strong-willed Duo, looking quite serious now as he leaned back, arms crossed, against the wall. There was his scholar, Quatre, drumming his fingers absently on the arm of his chair, clear blue eyes thoughtful. And there was redoubtable Relena, leaning forward earnestly in her seat. "I'm sorry that I can offer you nothing better," sighed the merchant. "I know that your mother would have --"

" -- wanted us to pack as quickly as possible so that we could get to the cottage in time for harvest," Duo interrupted with a quick smile. "Please don't worry, Father. We don't mind. Truly." Seeing his father hesitate, he added forcefully, " Really we don't mind. Right?"

His brother and sister nodded with determination. "We'll make the best of it," Relena declared, rising imperiously and looking around as though she dared a soul to challenge her. "I'm not so city-bred that I can't get down on my hands and knees to grow what I'll be eating!"

"And I'm not so 'brilliant' that I'll die without the university," Quatre added, not quite managing to refrain from being sardonic (the bards had gotten to him as well).

"And I'm not so -- so pretty that I'll melt if I touch a grain of dirt!" Duo finished for them, tone adamant.

Dorlian sighed again. He would not enter a contest of wills with any of his children because they were young and hotheaded and would agitate themselves, but still, his children's talents, wasted...

The poor man put his head in his hands, so that his children would not see him struggle with tears for what would be lost. He had been so prosperous, his family so admired… and now they were to become nothing more than backwoods farmers? Sylvia's sensitive, gifted, noble children, the legacies she had left him, doomed to mere proletarianism. It should not be so!

Seeing her father's distress, Relena's pseudo-stern exterior dissolved and she rushed upon him, cooing soft comforts and reassurances. Quatre and Duo looked at each other in a way that spoke volumes, shrugged, and went off to pack -- after all, Relena could convince the sky to rain monkeys and a politician to be honest, and if she couldn't persuade their father to see the best of things, no one could. Up in his room, Duo rejoiced by tearing up the poetry of the worst of the offenders and belting out the latest awful hits, while Quatre went calmly about his business with plugs in his ears.

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