"What? You think I would taint my food to transform you? I am insulted, I don't need potions to transform
people. That is unless they are already enchanted. Are you sure your Princess Jasmine wasn't really a horse
transformed into a princess? The panacea would have broken that curse and returned her to her true form."
"Jasmine is human! Or she was until she drank your panacea!" Aladdin said pushing the plate away, standing
and pointing.
"Yeah, Aladdin's right. I would have known if she wasn't human. It's a genie thing," Genie said softly. Then
he broke out in song with a hayseed accent, "The ol' grey mare, she ain't what she used to be. She ain't what
she used to be..."
"Enough, Genie!" Aladdin shouted.
"Calm down, prince. Your food is safe. See," Morgana said taking a bite, "It's just food. Quite tasty if I do
say so myself," she added smacking her lips.
"Alright, but you said you didn't need potions to transform people? So why do we need to wait until morning?"
"Because, the panacea was a potion. So if it had a permanent side effect only another potion can reverse it.
Now eat up. You can bed down in the barn for the night."
"Why can't I stay in the castle?"
"Because at dawn everyone within the walls will be female. It's a quaint curse, but quite unbreakable as more
than one former man has found out."
"What!"
My eyes widened. She had turned that prince into a woman, but if she had kept him in the dungeon overnight he
would have been transformed anyway. Then why? I looked at Morgana, she knew my thoughts and smiled and
nodded. She would tell me later.
After dinner, I cleared the plates away. Then Morgana showed our guests to the barn.
"I think you and your princess should be comfortable here," she said opening a stall door. The stall floor was
covered with hay, and Aladdin threw himself into a pile of hay. Morgana raised one finger, and said, "Let me
make you more comfortable."
There was a flash of light, and a black Arabian stallion stood next to the grey mare.
"Wait a sec!" shouted the genie.
A second flash of light - this one blue- and there was naked Aladdin standing in the barn stall next to the
horse.
"Some clothes, Genie!"
The genie snapped his fingers and Aladdin was clothed again.
Morgana laughed.
"That was just a temporary spell, princeling. Even your genie can tell you how easy it was to break. It would
have broken at sunrise, anyway. Now do you want to make her comfortable and sleep next to her as a horse, or
make her self conscious as you sleep on the lumpy hay?"
Genie shrugged, "It was an easy spell to break, Al. I think she might be telling the truth. I used all my
powers and I couldn't even turn Jasmine into a thoroughbred, let alone break her spell."
Jasmine whinnied.
"Alright, Morgana, I'll accept your hospitality, and let you change me into a horse for the night only."
"Done!" Morgana said with another flash of light. She closed the door on the two horses. Jago nested in the
hay loft, and Abou in the rafters.
As we walked back from the barn, Genie whispered to Aladdin, "Morgana uses some strange magic. Your clothing
should have reappeared when I broke your spell. She must have done something else with them."
Inside the castle, Morgana explained.