"I know how you can get out."
"Shut up Fred," Zac said. "If we can't figure it out, what make you think you can?"
There was silence.
"What's the idea?" Isaac asked, then to Zac's incredulous expression, he added, "I'm so desperate I'd even ask Fred."
"The hot coals don't go right up to the walls," Fred pointed out. "Just put one foot on each side of the coals next to the wall and get out like that."
"Are you kidding? If I fall I'll burn my butt!"
"Then you have to try not to fall."
Isaac grumbled about this, but eventually he finally admitted that there was no other way out. He was very careful, and finally made it to the other side, without burning himself.
**********
Meanwhile, Taylor was sitting in a rather comfortable room in a castle tower. The griffin had informed him in no uncertain terms, that Taylor had to marry his daughter. Or else.
"Or else what?" Taylor had demanded.
He had gotten no reply other that a particular expression from the griffin that made him shut up.
So know Taylor sat slumped against the window, gazing out into the world and wondering when lunch was being served. Oh, and how he could escape.
"I'm not marrying her," he muttered. "She's probably super ugly. She's the daughter of a griffin for goodness sake!"
There was a knock on the door and in came the pretty young girl that had brought him breakfast earlier that morning.
"Oh great! Food!" Taylor said happily.
Then the girl revealed to him what it was.
"Stale bread? Water?"
"Until you marry, this is all you get," the girl replied.
"But... but... but breakfast..."
"You got that so you'd know what you would be missing out on. So that you'd know what you could get."
Taylor scowled.
"Sorry," she replied with an apologetic smile.
Taylor continued to glower even after she had left.
"This is extortion!" he yelled.