“This,” Ella said to herself as she sat by the fireplace pondering the way her life had gone to hell after her father remarried, “sucks.” The suckage, of course, revolved around her stepmother and two older stepsisters. She wasn’t entirely certain which of her many grievances against the three bitches was the worst; they kept shifting order depending on which one she thought of at the moment.

At this particular moment, though, they were gone to their hairdresser’s appointment, and would go to the Prince’s ball directly from there; she had the place to herself (and, of course, the maid, the butler, the kitchen staff, the housekeeper and the gardener,) until her father Nunzio came home, which he seemed to be managing later and later as time went on.

The staff all treated her like dirt; they were beholden to her stepmother, not to her. Before her mother died, they had managed with a much smaller (and if truth be told, a much more competent) staff.

“Miss Cinder,” the maid interrupted her thoughts. “There is a gentleman to see you.”

“Did he say who he was?” Ella asked.

“E’ said he was Uncle Guido, your godfather.”

“Oh!” Ella exclaimed, springing from her seat so fast she almost overbalanced on her too high heels. “I haven’t seen Uncle in ages!”

“He’s got a bunch of boxes with him,” the maid added darkly.

“Well, show him in,” Ella instructed. “And have someone see to the boxes!”

The maid turned to go without a curtsy, as if affronted at being asked to do some real work.

“Uncle Guido,” Ella squealed as he walked into the room. She advanced on him in a swirl of patched, out of fashion skirts, and flung herself into his arms. “It’s been so long since I’ve seen you! Where have you been?”

“Pining for the sight of my favorite niece while waiting for the situation with those money-hungry strumpets to reach a resolution,” he answered as he gave her a paternal hug.

“What?” she asked as she reluctantly left the safety of his arms.

“It should resolve itself tonight,” he said mysteriously. “After you return from the Prince’s ball.”

“I’m not going,” she said bitterly. “They say there’s not enough money.”

“For once, they’re right,” he said, smiling mysteriously. “However, I’ve got a ticket for you, and it’s on my ducat, not your father’s.”

“Where you want them, gov?” the footman broke in as he wheeled in an assemblage of boxes.

“By the side,” Uncle Guido said with a wave of his hand as he subtly passed the man a tip.

The footman left and they walked over to inspect the boxes.

“This,” Guido said, pointing at a slender box that was taller than either of them, “is your gown. Let’s get it open and see if my dressmaker managed to get it right.”

“It’s,” she said in awe as she gazed at it, “beautiful.” Then her face fell a bit.

“I know it’s not what you’d really like to wear,” he said, “but we do need to maintain at least the pretense of normality.”

“That,” she said a bit bitterly, “is one of the things I don’t like about those,” she practically spat the word, “bitches. They insist I must be a lady at all times.”

“So you get back at them by wearing that patched up monstrosity,” he said dryly. “Did it ever occur to you that you’re just playing into their game that way?”

“What they want me to wear is worse. It makes me look like one of the servants.”

“Well, it’s your choice of poisons,” he said dismissively. “Now back to the gown.”

“It’s a bit on the plain side,” she said with a bit of a frown. “The rest of the women will be wearing something a lot fancier.”

 “And a lot more expensive,” her uncle said. “There are a couple of reasons I decided to go with the simple look. One of them is that, while the kingdom is quite wealthy, at least part of that is due to the royal family being quite, let us say prudent, in their financial outlays. The family will definitely be evaluating any future Princess about how much value she gets for her expenditures, and that isn’t just how little she managed to pay the dressmaker.”

“And the other?”

“A good part of style is adapting fashion to what suits you, and you simply don’t gush all over the place with ribbons, bows and such frippery.”

“That’s true,” she mused. “Well, I suppose I’d cause a sensation if I showed up the way I’d like, but it wouldn’t be the right sensation.”

“True. This isn’t a drag ball.”

“You’ve convinced me that’s the right gown, and the ball will be fun,” she said, “but what makes you think I’m interested in marrying the Prince?”

“I know you’d prefer to marry a Princess, pet,” he said, “but there are a few things that people don’t talk about. Money and power buy discretion, especially when the penalties for being indiscrete are so severe.”

Her brow furrowed. “You’re not being clear, uncle. With the number of strumpets he’s seen with …” she tailed off as a thought creased her brow. “You’re not trying to say he’s gay and they’re doing something other than rutting?”

“That’s exactly what I’m avoiding saying. My sources say that he actually discusses the plays and actors with the two he escorts to the theater.”

“And the others?”

“I’m told Parcheesi is popular, although one plays tarocchi and another has a reputation as a very good double dummy bridge player. Then,” he paused as if he was weighing whether to share another delicious rumor, “two of them are wardrobe mistresses for the theatre, and they’re quite good at costuming the male actors as girls.”

She tried to visualize the Prince in a dress, and suddenly realized that her reaction wasn’t exactly what she expected! She licked her lips unconsciously and then shook herself out of the fantasy.

“Talk about misdirection! At least I wouldn’t have him in my bed.”

“And you in his. That, by the way, is what’s happened with all of the eligible princesses. They accept that political marriages come with the privileges, but they want whoever they wind up stuck with to make them enjoy it.”

“So he really is wife hunting, and they’re looking for someone a bit, um, kinky. How exciting! I never realized that little old me might be eligible. What about heirs?”

Her uncle looked at her like she was being a bit slow.

“Oh, right. You’re gay, and your children do take after you, so there must be some way.”

“Exactly. When you find out, you’ll think it’s obvious. Messy, but obvious.”

“So, what’s in the next box?” She dove in and pulled things out onto the couch. “Fur slippers, a corset, and a chastity belt?” she practically screeched at that last.

“Got to keep up appearances,” he said. “Most of the staff knows the Prince isn’t interested in sex with anything vaguely female, but the rest of the world doesn’t. And they most definitely don’t know that you have no interest in having him, or any male, inside you.”

“Vibrators are more hygienic,” she muttered under her breath as she pulled the despised outworn dress over her head and began to change. “I suppose I’m going to have to learn that appearances are everything.”

A remarkably short time later she had managed to fit herself into the gown. The simple lime green strapless dress fit her torso like a glove, with only a slight hint of the unyielding steel of the chastity belt. The dressmaker had done a superb job of emphasizing her rather small breasts, adding at least a full cup size without making it obvious that she needed support. From her waist down, it fell in soft folds to an inch or so above the floor, where one could see just the hint of her fur slippers peaking out.

“What about my hair?” she asked, referring to the short, misbarbered mess that failed to adorn her head.

“That’s the other box,” he said with a smile. He opened it and took out a stylishly coiffured wig. A moment later, the sable locks framed her face and flowed down her back to where they just kissed the top of the gown.

“Ooh!” she exclaimed as she examined herself in the mirror she had been studiously ignoring for the past several years. “A little makeup,” she said doubtfully.

“Allow me,” her uncle said, picking the makeup kit out of the bottom of the wig box.

A half hour later, the two of them walked out the front door of the mansion. She stopped in mild astonishment as she saw the conveyance standing in the drive.

It wasn’t noticeable for opulence, quite the opposite in fact. It was a simple, open three seat carriage, decorated in, of all colors, orange and green. At least, she thought, the green matched her gown. The astonishing thing was the four scantily clad women harnessed to the shafts. “Ponygirls?” she exclaimed. “You didn’t!”

“Why not?” he said. “I’ve got them in my stable, and it’s permissible to drive them on the street as long as they’re wearing at least the legal minimum. Take a look.”

She walked down to examine the foursome. Their feet were shod in sturdy boots that had horseshoes on the soles. The black leather harness held their waists solidly and came down into a thong style bikini that covered their private parts adequately but came up the back in a thin strap between their ass cheeks. Each of them sported a luxurious tail which came from the general vicinity of the tailbone.

Above the waist, the harness divided into straps that crisscrossed their torso, framing their breasts and topping out in padded shoulder straps.

Their hands were shackled to the shafts by short chains and wrist cuffs; the hands themselves were loosely wrapped around handholds that came up from the shafts at the proper place to give them leverage when they were moving the carriage.

A solid, workmanlike bridle encased their heads and held their bits firmly in place. The bridles were attached to their thick leather collars and the shoulder straps by thin check reins that insured that they could not move their heads. Triple blinders completed the ensemble: a leather flap on each side, and a small leather flap in the center of their face. The latter insured that they couldn’t see to the side around their noses.

The reins led from the vertical sidebars on their bits through rings on their shoulder harnesses and then looped over the railing at the front of the carriage, just in front of where the center passenger would sit.

The entire ensemble finished up with decorative plumes that sprouted from the top of their bridles, and bells on their ears and breast rings.

The quartet stood in place, eyes incuriously staring straight ahead, not that they had any option in the matter. Ella looked at them, a bit puzzled by her feelings. She remembered the ponygirls from visits to her Uncle’s estate before her mother had died, but then they had just seemed kind of normal. Exotic, but normal. Now, she wasn’t so sure.

“What did they do to deserve this?” she asked.

“Deserve?” he asked rhetorically. “You could say they were in the right place at the wrong time. The one on the front left was a croupier at my casino. She worked out a scheme with the one on the back right to cheat me. Raked in quite a bit before I turned them in to the authorities.”

“I thought you kept closer watch than that.”

“Oh, I do. I needed an object lesson about then, so I let this pair go long enough to dig themselves in beyond their ability to repay. The law says that debt slaves get to choose, but that depends on who bids.”

“I still don’t see…” she trailed off.

“A word here, a favor there, a few ducats in the right palm and the only bidders for this pair were the mines and a ponygirl training stable.”

“And the mines are a miserable way to die,” she finished the thought.

“So this pair decided that being healthy, well trained ponygirls was preferable to coughing their lungs out harnessed to ore carts in the mines. The other two,” he continued, “decided to supplement their income as courtesans by asking for additional money to not talk about certain things. The penalty for blackmail is to have the tongue cut out and then be enslaved; not very many people want slaves that can’t talk.”

“And of course it doesn’t matter for ponygirls.” She shook her head as she finished examining them.

“Would you like to drive?” he asked.

“Why, yes,” she answered as he assisted her into the seat. She took the reins from the rail and sorted them in her hands so she knew which one led to which ‘girl, and then gave them a firm flick. “Ge-hup!” she said to get them moving, pulling on the right rein so they moved away from the curb. The four tethered women leaned forward, grasped the handles and heaved at their harnesses to get the cart rolling.

Once she had them trotting down the street, she turned to her companion and asked another question. “Why the pumpkin motif?”

“Well,” he chuckled, “I indulged myself a bit. It’s the season, and that silly rhyme about Peter and eating pumpkins ran through my head. Since you were going to be wearing a chastity belt, it seemed to fit.”

“Huh?” she said as she steered her team around a curve and thought about it. “Oh! So they were stepping out on each other, and then he put her in a chastity belt. Doesn’t seem all that fair, does it?”

Uncle Guido just chuckled.

Ella enjoyed the ball thoroughly, although she never could tell anyone anything coherent about it. As she said later, the announcement that the Prince was going to ask the Royal Council for permission to ask for her hand in marriage just drove everything else out of her mind.

What she did remember came after. Uncle Guido took the reins driving his four ponygirls back to her father’s mansion as she worried about what would happen when she arrived. His smug assurance that everything was being taken care of did nothing to quell her misgivings.

He drove up just as the ornate rental carriage that her stepmother and stepsisters had used drove off, the four coal black horses trotting proudly, necks curved just so. He pulled the foursome in behind a much larger, massively built carriage headed by four powerful, but otherwise undistinguished draft horses.

“Guido,” her father boomed from across the massive living room. “It’s been a while. Who is your companion … Oh! I almost didn’t recognize Ella! Taking her was kind of you.”

“Good to see you, brother,” Guido said cheerily. “And what brings Mr. Marley here today? Surely you’re not in financial difficulty?”

“Not me.” Nunzio motioned to his wife and stepdaughters. “These three are, though. I disavowed financial responsibility for them except for necessities two months ago, and the letter is registered with the courts.”

“They led me to believe you would come to the rescue if one of the daughters wasn’t selected,” Marley growled.

“Greed,” Nunzio said a bit sententiously, “causes people to do foolish things. Given your firm’s reputation, you’ll have a hard time convincing a court that you didn’t know about the disclaimer when you advanced the money.”

“Especially,” Guido added, “with your associate’s signature on the application for a records search. I’ve had it checked, and it’s there.”

“What about her parents?” Marley asked.

“They died a year ago, and she ran through her part of the inheritance like water through a sieve.”

“Other relatives?”

“You can ask, but her brother posted a disclaimer of responsibility a day after I did.”

“Guido?”

“Mine’s on file too,” he answered cheerfully as the overdressed women looked from one to the other fearfully.

“What,” Mr. Marley asked Guido, grasping at straws, “is your honest appraisal of one of them being selected?”

“Just about zero, and always has been. They’re the only ones that think they had a chance.” The two daughters drew themselves up and gasped in outrage.

“Why?”

“Let me ask you a question that may clarify matters for you. When was the last time anyone from the royal family used your services?”

“Can’t say I remember them ever asking us for a loan. Or anyone else on moneylender’s lane that I’ve heard of, come to that.”

“Exactly. They make a point of financial prudence, but they don’t like to publicize it. They want a spendthrift like they want a political reformer.”

“I see your point about greed,” Marley told Nunzio thoughtfully. “It looks like I’m going to have to swallow this one. They’re going to have to come with me; I can’t take a chance on my only security trying to run.”

The two heavily built men and one woman that had been sitting quietly by the side, nursing their drinks, got up fluidly and walked up to the three women. “Going to come quietly, ladies?” the heaviest of the trio asked.

Nunzio’s soon to be ex-wife cast him a despairing glance backwards as the little group walked out the door, guards trailing behind. The expression of profound relief on his face did nothing to cheer her up.

“Talk about mistakes,” Nunzio said as the moneylender and his entourage left with the feminine security for the debt.

“Some cost more than others,” Guido observed.

“This one almost cost me a daughter. Now that we’ve got some space, Ella, you look positively beautiful! I take it my brother selected the outfit?”

“He did,” Ella practically caroled. “He’s incredible, and the Prince selected me!”

“The Prince did what?” Nunzio’s jaw dropped. “Guido?”

“He certainly did. Of course, that’s still got to go through the Royal Council, a Palace Guard investigation and all sorts of other political bother, but candidly I think she’s got the inside track. Getting rid of those three helped immensely.”

“So you were telling Mr. Marley the truth about their finances?”

“They like to appear open handed, but they know exactly what they expect from every ducat they spend. Right now, I think a little celebration is in order.”

“It’s awfully late,” Nunzio demurred.

“So it is, but the Casino never closes, and I reserved a private room in case this worked out. You can afford to be late one day; your business isn’t going to collapse if you’re not there for a couple of hours.”

“You’ve talked me into it,” Nunzio said.

“I’m too wired to sleep anyway,” Ella agreed. “Let’s go celebrate!”

A moment later, Ella grabbed a fur wrap from one of her ex-step-sister’s rooms, and joined them as she guided the team of ponygirls down the street toward the Casino.

“What’s going to happen to them?” she asked.

“I don’t know about your stepmother,” Guido said seriously. “She’s a poisonous bitch, so she’ll go somewhere she gets worked to death in short order. Her daughters? They’re both poisonous bitches too, but they’re young and strong; someone might take them for heavy labor somewhere they want a female rather than a male.”

“What about?” Ella motioned toward the four ponygirls stolidly pulling the trap forward through the streets.

Guido laughed. “They’re built strongly enough. Are you asking if I’d buy them for you?”

“Would you?” she asked excitedly. “I’d love to train them,” she added with real venom in her voice.

“Revenge,” her father mused. “I can understand that; I wouldn’t mind a bit of it myself, although I can’t imagine that it would accomplish anything worthwhile. I doubt if anything you’d do to them would be worse than dying in the mines.”

“Pity,” his daughter said, as she guided the ponygirls into the driveway in front of the Casino.