Chapter 10
The words
reverberated in her ears like a death march. The position had been
filled. Her dream was over. A numbness began to flood her from head
to toe. She had not even had the chance to sing. She had always felt
that the place of Primma Donna was beyond her reach, but Taphmon; her
angel of music, had convinced her that she was not only capable of
the position, but deserved it. She had worked so hard under his
tutelage, gone without sleep and much needed dance practice, and all
for nothing. She cast her cloak and wig into the arms of the
stage-hand and fled towards the principal dressing room which she
knew would be empty. She flung herself down before the towering guilt
mirror which adorned the room, and tried to cry. No tears would come.
In desperation, she called out, praying that somewhere in the gloom,
she would be heard.
"Master" she whispered, her voice
sated with the misery she felt. "Master, are you there?"
Only cruel silence met her ears. "They wouldn't even listen to
me! They wouldn't even hear me sing. They gave the part to another
girl before they even saw me."
As if prompted by these
words, she heard an answer, echoing quietly through the room,
comforting and soothing the distraught young girl.
"Fear not
Marianne. You're time will come. The world shall know of your gift"
"NO!" she retorted, irrationally angry at the being who
had inspired such hope in her. "That's not true! No one will
ever know me as anybody but Marianne, the fat, orphaned, talentless
dancer." Marianne knew in her heart that it was not her master's
fault that she had been shunned from the audition, but it had been he
who had aroused in her, for the first time since her parents' death,
dreams of anything or anyone but sorrow, pain and her lost family.
Now that those dreams had been shattered, she wished that she had
never had them at all.