He was an actor, though not a very good one...other than in his own mind. He certainly wasn't the simple but regal Prince Melos, but he had to pretend to be, to save the lives of the kind women and men who had taken him in. But when the spurious prince arrives at court, after barely dodging two attempts on his life—one before breakfast!—he finds that his troubles are just beginning. Queen Ffazia is on her deathbed—a multitude of ravenous princesses are after his hand in marriage and other body parts for quite different reasons—and the woman he loves cannot possibly love him back; in fact, her former lover is on the way to the castle to murder...someone or other. Add in a line of dancing princes, a friendly rat, and a slug with a bug on its rug, and it all just goes to show that some days it doesn't pay to be the new ruler of the land!