I had things to say to reviewers, but sadly my laptop's at home and I'm at work, so hopefully comments on reviews will go up shortly. Enjoy chapter 5….

Preparations for the ball were in full swing the next week. Cythera took Alanna down into town almost every day to visit her dressmakers, as the design and fabrication of the dresses was proving to be problematic. Traditionally both Cythera and Alanna, along with the rest of the young ladies making their court debut, had to be dressed in white. The dressmaker, a Madam Heirat, decided initially that both Cythera and Alanna should wear satin, which would be light to wear and also would be easier for the palace laundry to clean than silk. "Not that we're ever going to wear them again, mind," Cythera groaned as they headed down the narrow streets in the Tailor's Quarter of Corus two afternoons before the ball. "It seems such a waste of money."

Once they actually got to the dressmakers, however, satin and Alanna didn't prove a good mix. The sheen of the satin made Alanna's normally lustrous and shiny hair look dull in comparison, whereas it accentuated Cythera's almost to perfection. "Bother, bother, bother," Alanna said. "It's a perfect shape and everything!"

"How on earth are you going to get a new dress two days before the ball?" Cythera almost wailed. Alanna felt a bit irritated; surely she was the one who should be feeling upset; after all, Cythera was looking a picture already even in the darkened dressmaker's shop, without any makeup and with her hair in a tangled mop of curls.

"Leave it with me," Madam Heirat said. "I've got an idea, I think. If you come back tomorrow, I should have it fixed."

"Nothing too expensive," Alanna said hastily, praying that a whole new dress wasn't going to be necessary.

By the afternoon of the ball, Alanna was beginning to feel the onset of a real panic. She almost ran down to the dressmakers with Cythera, desperately hoping the dress would be alright.

Alanna needn't have worried. She arrived to find that a layer of white silk had been carefully sewn on top of the satin, and when she slipped it on, Cythera gasped.
"Oh, it's perfect," she sighed. "You can just about see the satin underneath, too, but it's more muted." Madam Heirat too was standing back and admiring her handiwork.

"I think I've surpassed myself this time," she said. "That's a unique dress, and no mistake. That'll be three gold pieces, please." Alanna felt relief washing over her; she had worried that she would be paying as much as five.

Cythera and Alanna prepared together in the Elden apartments. Cythera practically doused herself in rosewater, and both girls applied simple face powder and lip paint to each other. "It wouldn't do for debutantes to be wearing too much makeup now, would it?" Cythera frowned. "Though I must say it'll be strange not wearing so much as normal."

"I don't care," Alanna shivered. Normally she got away with wearing nothing at all, and besides, she had more important things to think about besides a made-up face.

At quarter to eight, the debutantes were assembled in a small ante-chamber beside the great ballroom. Delia of Eldorne, whom Alanna had met and disliked almost immediately, was in charge of making sure they all looked the part. "Isn't she wonderful?" Cythera whispered in Alanna's ear. Alanna resisted from saying that Delia's patronising tone did her no favours, and instead said,

"Doesn't Josiane look a fright?" Cythera and Alanna had taken to sniping at Josiane in private, which whilst it was fun, had the distinct danger of being found out. Princess Josiane, her nose in the air, did indeed look a fright. Her hair was piled up high on her head, and as a foreign princess, she was wearing a massive sash in the colours of the Copper Isles. Sadly the colours of the Copper Isles did not complement the colours of Josiane's hair, which left her looking very pale and drained.

At eight o'clock there came a blare of trumpets announcing the arrival of the King and Queen, and they all rushed to line up. Alanna, heading for the front of the middle of the line, was dragged to the back by Cythera. "The later you arrive," Cythera said, "the better they'll remember you when it's time for the dancing." Alanna was especially relieved when she discovered that they would enter the ball room in pairs; so with Cythera, she took her place at the back of the queue, preparing to pick up her skirts. She could see the herald stepping into place beside the doors.

"I feel sick," she muttered to Cythera.

"Princess Josiane of the Copper Isles, and Lady Helena of Summervale!" With their formal introduction, the first two walked into the ballroom, heads held high. Alanna watched as Josiane almost led Helena down the centre of the ballroom to the royal thrones, where they both curtsied low; Josiane significantly lower than Helena.

"Someone's desperate for a Prince," Cythera whispered far too loudly in Alanna's ear, and received a piercing look from Delia for her troubles.

The line moved slowly forwards, until eventually Cythera and Alanna, as the sixth and final couple, were at the doors.
"Lady Cythera of Elden and Lady Alanna of Trebond!" the herald announced, clearly relieved to be at the end. Cythera nudged Alanna, and as a pair, they walked together into the ballroom.