As the carriage continued to pick up the speed, the driver noticed one of the knights tasked with escorting the princess riding up closer to him. The soldier raised his visor and spoke in a low voice so Arianna wouldn't overhear.
"There's a caravan coming up the road. Is everything ready?"
The driver nodded. "She's been asleep for the last two hours. Are you sure the king won't suspect anything?"
"Let the chamberlain do the talking once we arrive. He came with this whole ridiculous scheme, and he'll be the one to make it work. Think of it this way: we won't ever have to put up with the royal brat again."
The driver briefly considered the horrific death by torture that awaited him if the chamberlain's scheme unraveled. The king may have despised his daughter, but this was going too far. But then he thought about every time the princess had screeched and yipped at him like an undisciplined dog, every time she'd ordered him dragged from his bed at the crack of dawn to take her on another shopping trip, every time he'd been forced to listen to her whine about how bored she was by the monotony of traveling itself, and suddenly his mind was made up. He carefully steered the carriage to a halt as the caravan stopped and three faces emerged.
One was an old, fat woman in a layered dress, her stringy hair and plump face wrapped up in three scarves. The second was a tall, short-haired wearing only a pair of ragged pants with a belt made from a length of rope. His tanned muscles gleamed in the shining sun. The third was a girl around Arianna's age. Everything about her - the color of her hair, her slender frame, her sharp little eyes - matched the princess perfectly. Only their faces marked them as different.
The driver and the carriage footman carefully opened the side door, where Arianna was still passed out from the drugged scented vial they had placed under her seat. The tall muscular man carried her over to the lead wagon in the caravan, where the old woman and two ragged maids were waiting. In seconds, they had stripped Arianna of her fine gown and jewels and bundled her up in an old rug. The imposter put on her clothing as the driver got the carriage ready to continue on its way.
The lead knight took several bags stuffed with gold and silver coins from the muscular man and passed them out to his fellow conspirators. Meanwhile, the two maids were spreading a thin white goop on Arianna's face, making sure to cover her throat as well. Once the slime was applied, it hardened quickly into a thin eggshell, white-colored crust with a perfect outline of the princess's cheeks, nose, chin, ears, mouth, forehead, eyebrows, eyelashes, and neck. This was given to the imposter as she boarded the carriage. Once the driver whipped the horses to move, the mask was applied. As it melted away, the face of Arianna was carefully grafted onto that of her replacement. The real princess was placed inside an empty chest, loaded in the back of the wagon, and secured as the caravan drove off.
The old woman sat in the front as her son handled the reins. She and the royal chamberlain had made a simple arrangement. Find a girl who could be altered to assume Arianna's identity, swap her for the irredeemable monster the princess had become, and thus protect the future of the kingdom. But also make sure that the real Arianna would never be found again. Not kill her, per say, for that was needlessly cruel. Just do whatever else you wanted with her. She was no longer a member of the royal family - just a dirty little commoner.