I apologize for the Jerry Springer thing. I don't know what I was thinking. I plead temporary insanity. Please don't hurt me. Okay, I'm getting back on track with this chapter, I promise.
Ch.5- Leaving
"Go away!" I bellowed hopelessly at the light escaping into my room. Heaving a resigned sigh, I managed to drag myself over to the fireplace to stoke up the dying embers. My room was ice-cold and I was eager to retreat back under the warmth of the covers. I would have stayed in bed all morning had it not been for Shauni, who burst into my room soon after I crawled back into bed.
"Lark! Lark! Wake up!" she yelled as she entered.
Don't these people have their own homes? I thought, annoyed. Why was Shauni so unusually chipper this morning? And this morning of all mornings when all I wanted to do was sleep. Any other time I would have greeted her but today I decided I would bite her head off. Literally, if it came to that.
"Come on Lark! You can't still be sleeping!" she declared as she ripped my covers off and shook my shoulders. With my covers on the floor, I had nothing to pull over my head, so instead I slammed a pillow over my face and refused to budge. Shauni knew me too well. She immediately tickled me. As hard as I resisted, I couldn't help but remove the pillow.
"Good, you're awake. I was afraid I would've disturbed you." She smiled sweetly. I waved her closer.
"Shauni, you're my best friend, and I love you like a sister," I said calmly, she nodded. "But I would ask you one small favor," I continued, "Leave me ALONE!" I roared. Shocked at first by my anger, Shauni was not about to let me off easy.
"I'm so glad you are up and not angry. I have some news."
I groaned, knowing there was no way she was going to let me go back to sleep this morning. "Fine. What's the news?" I asked.
"The King and Queen are giving us a farewell ball tonight," she announced.
Now I was really angry. "That's the news that couldn't have waited one hour until I was actually awake?" I demanded. She nodded. Suddenly, I grabbed my pillow and smacked it soundly across her face.
"Hey!" she exclaimed. I smirked. Now I was feeling better. I should strike my friends more often, I resolved.
"I have to go shopping today for supplies. Wanna come with?"
"Sure. How do you know what to buy?"
"Keladry of Mindelan is coming to help me," I replied. A look of astonishment passed over Shauni's features.
"Keladry of Mindelan! The squire?" she cried.
"Yep. What? You don't like her?" I inquired.
"She's only my hero! Her and the Lioness! Goddess, what will I wear? What will I say?" Shauni worried aloud.
I was amazed. The only time I'd seen Shauni this excited and frenzied was when she was beaming over Esmond of Nicoline.
"Shauni, she's not going to care what you're wearing. And as for what to say, don't say anything. We don't want her to run away screaming or anything." She grimaced at my suggestion.
"When are you leaving?"
"After lunch."
"Great. I'll go get ready now," she decided and sprinted out of my room.
I should have asked her to stay and have breakfast. After the incident with the Genliths, my engagement was promptly called off. I was glad of this, but I hadn't anticipated the stony glares and lectures I would receive from my mother for basically the rest of my life. She was so wrapped up in impressing people, Duchess Marjorie being first on her list. But after her fall from grace, I'm positive she'll never achieve that goal. Who was to blame for this utterly disastrous disappointment? Yours truly, of course. As if anything could possibly be on the fault of my mothers'. I wish my mother would've taken out her anger by not talking to me, but that was just too much to hope for, in fact, she talked to me more than ever.
"Morning, Kyleah." My father greeted me. I nodded.
"Kyleah, you do not nod to a greeting. You answer politely," Mother informed me.
"Good morning father. Good morning mother," I said agreeably.
"How did you sleep, daughter?" she asked.
"Fine." I replied simply. She shook her head. I had done something wrong.
"Did they teach you nothing at that finishing school? "Fine" is not an acceptable answer, and you should inquire as to how the other people slept as well." She advised me huffily.
I stifled a groan, as I gave her the answer she required. Breakfast was a constant test of my manners. Every sentence I uttered she held under a magnifying glass and picked apart until she had discovered at least one mistake.
"What are you doing today?"
"Keladry of Mindelan is going shopping with me and Shauni." I said, hoping it was a satisfactory sentence. Mother paused to decide if it was. When she did not make a complaint, I felt a sense of accomplishment. This is pathetic. Honestly, feeling achievement because I voiced a sentence that was not corrected! Why is a single person allowed to have such control over someone else? I think it is a law of nature. Mothers are physically unable to approve of their children. At least mine was. But she was proud of my brothers when they became knights, wasn't she? Of course. That was it. They had made her look good. She was never angrier than when the insane Neal had left the university and became an unusually old page. Which made her look stupid. I began to make a list of things I would never do.
Mental note: Do not have kids because you will undeniably screw them up.
Mental note amendment: Disregard previous mental note if you plan to have other people raise your kids.
Mental note: Under no circumstances allow your mother to interact with your kids.
Mental note amendment to 3rd mental note: If you do allow your mother to be involved with your kids, then you can blame her when they turn out to be serial axe-murderers or mentally disturbed stalkers living with rats underground.
Those make sense right? Or am I the mentally disturbed one? Actually, I don't have time to go through a psychiatric evaluation right now, so I'll get back to you on that, because my mother has another entertaining comment to make.
"Keladry of Mindelan?" she questioned.
"Yes. The squire." I replied. Oh know! I knew I shouldn't have told her, she is sure to disapprove.
"That's wonderful! I totally support what she's doing. It's about time a girl was allowed to become a knight!" she announced.
WHAT!!?? Did my mother just commend an action of mine? NO Way! She has never done that before and she's not about to start now! I stared at her.
"Kyleah! Close your mouth! Do you know how rude it is to stare!? Seriously, I wonder if you weren't born simple. I blame myself, no that finishing school, for not teaching you better manners!" she reprimanded me harshly.
Ahh. Much better. That "good for you" attitude must have been a fluke. An accident, nothing more. Thank the Goddess! I thought for a minute my mother was actually being, well, motherly! Impossible! I laughed aloud for even thinking she could pretend to be halfway human and not quite perfect.
Quite relieved, I went to my room to get dressed. Pulling on a simple blue gown and yanking a comb through my mussed curls, I considered my mother. I had never known my grandmother. How did she form my mother into the seemingly perfect woman she was? Grandfather Emry of Haryse had run a strict household, as I understand, what would you expect from a famed general? But I highly doubt it was he who instilled the bitterness and eagerness to please in my mother. Maybe she's the one who implanted the insanity that Neal and I have inherited. I am insane right? Neal is for sure of course, but me?
But how can you know if you are insane? What if I have always been like this? What if I have been mad since infancy? How would you know if you thought the way you think about things is the way everyone else thinks as well? Are these questions mad? And just how do they know if someone is insane? What are the standards? What if everyone just thinks differently? Perhaps the people locked in asylums are just different. And if you said they were not normal, how do you prove it? What does normal mean? If all human beings are different, how can there be a word like normal to describe them? This conversation that I am carrying on with myself just confirms it. Does everyone talk to themselves? This discussion is not getting me anywhere and is coming across as quite pointless so I'll shut up now because this issue alone is exhausting and I have been debating it and boring you with it for the last five minutes.
Siting in the window seat staring idly out the window was what I had been doing since the end of the insanity chat. It seemed like it had been hours since breakfast. Oh wait, it had. I was reading a book about warrior maids of centuries past. As I finished a chapter about Gwendolyn the Courageous, Shauni arrived. She fluttered cheerfully into the room, and plopped down on my bed. Something had to be up. The very action of Shauni plopping was a give away. She never plopped. In the years I came to know her, she had never ever plopped. What am I talking about? Plopping? Does that make sense?
"Shauni, what is with you lately? Honestly, this behavior of yours is scaring the heck out of me." I told her. She sighed contently.
"Oh, sweet, naïve friend. When it happens to you, you shall understand." She said wisely. Since when was Shauni a sage?
"When what happens to me?" I asked.
"Falling in love of course! What did you think I meant?" she said. I gasped and placed my hand on her forehead to feel for a temperature.
"Are you ill? Who or what are you and where did you put the real Shauni?!" I moaned dramatically. "Have you been hanging around Neal? Talking about love! I'm worried Shauni. I truly am." She giggled and pulled away, giving me that "I'm older and wiser than you, so I know better than you" smile. "Shauni, I'm your friend. And as your friend I must beseech you to have your head examined!" I said, quite seriously. She just laughed again.
"Lark, Lark, Lark. You really are all too adorable." She simpered.
Okay, now I know something is definitely wrong. Never in all the years I had known her had Shauni uttered the word "adorable" or the phrase "all too". The word adorable, was just so, girly, I concluded.
"This has to do with Esmond, doesn't it?" I guessed.
"Ding ding ding! Lark, you'll never guess. We went for a walk in the garden last night, and it was just (sigh) perfect."
That explains it. A guy. Well, good for Shauni. Suddenly, I became aware of voices downstairs. Shauni and I scurried down into the salon. My mother stood daintily pouring Keladry of Mindelan a cup of lemonade.
"Mother! What are you doing?" I gasped.
"Just chatting with Keladry," she replied calmly.
"For how long?!" I demanded to know.
"I know you girls have a lot to do today, so you'd best be going."
We left the house and preceded into the markets of Corus
"What will we need first Kel?" I asked.
"Let's see, how many of you are there?"
"Umm, there's me, Kally, Shauni, Lydi, Jelena, Meliora, Shana, Serena, Bailey, Regan, and Allyrianne, so there's 11 all together."
"What supplies do you already have?"
"We have food and clothes. Have you seen our uniforms? They're really nice."
While Kel and I decided what we needed and where to go, Shauni stared stupidly at Kel. She tried unsuccessfully to say a competent sentence that made sense several times but only managed to mutter incoherently.
Kel eyed her then whispered to me: "Is she always like this?" I laughed at Kel's obvious discomfort caused by Shauni's gaping stare.
"You're her hero. Why do you think she's dressed like that?" And Shauni was dressed rather oddly for going shopping. She wore a most impressive ball gown with more ribbons, lace, and flounces than were on 5 normal dresses combined.
"How am I her hero?" Kel asked, confused but hiding it well.
"You are the first girl squire in like, a bijillion years! Shauni wanted to be a knight, we all did, but her brothers wouldn't let her." I explained.
"Her brothers? Why didn't any of you become pages?" Kel asked, apparently she did not understand the traditional Tortallan noble family.
"Shauni has nine brothers, all knights. You probably know her youngest brother, Faleron." Kel nodded. "Anyway, they didn't think she could handle it. I suppose I could have been a page. But you know about my parents big let down with Neal, not becoming a healer and all. I didn't want to do that to them again. The Princess's Elite was the next best thing for all of us. Did you know Princess Kalasin wanted to be a page, but her father talked her out of it?"
Kel let a gasp escape. "He did? Why?"
"He made a deal with her. If she didn't become a page, she could pick her own royal husband. Pretty slimy, huh?" Kel agreed.
It took us several hours to gather all our supplies. It was dark by the time I checked the last item off the list. Surprisingly, Shauni said a complete sentence.
"We had better get going. We have that party tonight remember?"
"I totally forgot! I'm serving. I'll see you two there." Kel replied then hurried off. Shauni and I went to our separate houses to prepare.
"Kyleah, I bought you a new dress for tonight. It's on your bed." my mother called as I entered.
Approaching my bed, I examined the new dress. It was quite exquisite, if I would allow myself to admit that my mother had great taste in clothes. It was dark blue, sharply contrasted with sunny yellow embroidery. Jenine, my maid, fooled with my hair for half an hour before I descended the stairs to leave. She pulled it up and tied it with a yellow satin ribbon, then pulled down several curls to frame my face. I refused to allow her to put any cosmetic junk on my face. As I have already stated, I am not pretty and do not wish to deceive myself into thinking I am if I wear make-up. Groan. Time for another pointless party. On the other hand, there are sure to be at least a few cute guys. And we're leaving tomorrow. Things could be worse.
Author's Note: This took a long time to get nowhere. I just realized how stupid this chapter is but I wasted the time writing it so I'm going to post it anyway. The party should be interesting though.