A whole new world chapter 3
Exhausted from having to deal with Diaspro yesterday, with her whining and arrogance, and still not fully recovered from the incident with Prince O'Neil, knowing it quickly spread throughout the realm and was the hot gossip everyone was talking about, the princess had no desire to go anywhere the following day. She was able to convince her dad to cancel her lessons with all her tutors for the day, had the maids send on messages to the princesses she was suppose to meet for tea and princes her dad invited she couldn't make it, and was able to have to have the whole day to be herself with no one hollering at her about where to go and what to do.
She spent most the of the day inside her room, rarely coming out except for meals and requested no one was to disturbed her unless it was important. She tended to her plants, flowers, and small rose garden she was growing in her room, making sure they were extra watered and given good soil to help them grow better. She relaxed in her couch and read a collection of her favorite books, nearly reading every book on the shelf, including old fairytale stories she hasn't read in what felt like ages.
Reading about brave sword fights, exciting adventures, and everlasting love shared between the beautiful girl and her Prince Charming near the end of the story, where they lived happily ever after. She remembered when she was little, her father read fairytale stories deeming on romance and true love to the young princess every night before bed and Flora would dream about her Prince Charming she hoped she would meet someday.
Many years have passed since then, but she still remembered it clearly like it was only yesterday. And thinking about those memories made her feel more confused about the situation she was facing with, and brought up some fragments of the conversation she had with Diaspro yesterday.
Diaspro said it was every girl's dream to get married and she was right. Even she, herself, used to be one of those girls who dreamt of being married, throwing a huge and grand wedding, wearing a beautiful white dress that made her feel beautiful like a true princess, and her prince waiting for her at the alter, smiling lovingly at her. But now she was older, no longer than little girl with those dreams, and knew if she did get married then there was a huge chance it wasn't going to be anything like she once dreamt.
The wedding would still be huge and grand, she was sure of that. Knowing her father, money would no worry and he'd go to no expense to make sure her wedding was one everyone remembered for years, making sure everything was perfect from the ceremony to the food. The seamstress would create a belle-of-the-ball, masterpiece gown, making it elegant as well as beautiful. And even though that all seemed amazing, there was still going to be one thing missing as she walks down that aisle.
Love.
The very thing her parents had when they were married, and still remained deep to this day even though her mother was no longer with them. The thing she knew that made marriage more special and worth wild, bringing the joining together and taking it deeper. And the thing she knew whoever her husband could possibly be, it was going to be one thing he wasn't going to feel for her.
The only two reasons the bachelors want her was to be king and have her as a trophy wife. Someone expected to be by her husband's side and serve him, keeping quiet unless needed and being looked over as if she were a prized racing horse instead of a girl. She couldn't imagine living such a life, being married to someone who didn't love her and treated like a possession instead of a person.
She wished she had someone to talk about things like this with, but knew there was really no one who could really understand. Not her father, who was too busy. Not Diaspro, who thought love was pointless and the only point of marriage was to be paired up with a handsome, strong man. No one really.
Frustrated by her thoughts, Flora sighed heavily before she closed her book, placed it back on the book shelf, and went out to her balcony to get some much-needed fresh air. Breathing in the cool night helped soothed her, but didn't completely clear her mind from the trouble. She still needed some sort of a plan and needed it soon.
As she was in deep thought, she barely noticed the paper airplane sent her way till her eyes followed it as the plane whirled around her head, soaring high till it landed on the ground and lightly hit her foot. Curious, she bent down to pick it up, slowly unfolded it, and read what it said.
Her voice is the whisper of wind sweaped trees
Putting my troubled mind at ease
Her eyes are lit with the new stars aura
I long to be close to my dear Flora.
Beautiful, she smiled as she read it over again, feeling her heartbeat racing as she was growing more giddy. And it was signed your secret admirer with a small, perfect heart draw in front of your.
She had a secret admirer? This wasn't the first time she had one, because she knew plenty of guys who developed a crush on her. But this was the first time an admirer done something so sweet like writing such an incredible poem for her. She wondered who it could be.
Looking out her balcony, her jaded eyes scanned over the entire area of her large estate of her palace. After searching and searching, her eyes spotted him. Beautiful face, pale yet beautiful skin, alluring and deep blue eyes, and dark, silk hair.
She recognized him as the recently new servant her father hired during the beginning of the year, which was over a month ago. And he was also the same one who served them tea, accidentally spilling everything as he tripped and nearly got blamed for it till she stepped up and defended him.
Although she didn't remember his name, with there being so many servants coming in and going out from her home, she did knew she could never forget a face like his. He seemed almost too perfect to be real, and when she first met him she honestly believed that. He was so beautiful but didn't have a trace of conceit in his features, and those soulful deeply gaze into hers.
She sighed while watching him in the rose gardens, dressed in the hunter green gardening jumpsuit, tending to the roses and treating each one with utmost care. Staring was rude, but she couldn't peel her eyes away from him.
Could he have been the one who wrote the poem? She thought with her cheeks blushing bright red as she felt those strange, tingle butterflies in her stomach from the thought of it.
"Boo!" With a start, she snapped out from her thoughts and whirled around, with her hand pressed against her chest to contain her startled heart and her lips sealed, containing her loud scream stuck in her throat.
She was scared out of her mind, but the fear only lasted for a moment. It quickly decreased into nothing as she looked into midnight blue eyes staring back at her, belonging to a dark-haired girl smiling a bit mischievously at her.
"Musa." She said, trying to sound angry with her and give her a look that says she shouldn't have scared her in the first place. She perfected the look for a minute till her lips, being a traitor to her, quivered uncontrollably and blossomed into a smile reserved for the maid the princess came to love as a sister-like friend.
"S'up." She greeted with a smile, out of uniform-again. Her father wasn't so strict and didn't make a lot of rules for the servants, but he did strongly applied they were always supposed to be in uniform. For the servants, long-sleeved white shirts, black plants, and black loafers with blakc socks. The maids were required to wear long-sleeved blouse and black skirt, with matching tights underneath and black heels, their little hats always presented on their heads and aprons ironed. Musa, being the tomboy she was and rule-breaker, added some kinks to her uniform to make it more her style.
She ripped the sleeves of the blouse she was given, making it a sleeveless tank top and then fixed it up into a one-sleeved tank top. Instead of the black skirt, she wore black jeans that were baggy and tomboy-ish, and her favorite black high-top sneakers she said were much comfortable than "those sissy, girly foot-killers." And instead of wearing small amid hat, she wore a white baseball hat over her long, enchanted dark tied in their usual loose pigtails.
"Oops," Musa fixed her face into an innocent, sheepish expression, placing her hand over her slightly opened mouth. "I'm so sorry. I was being far too causal with my speech, and that is just unacceptable." Fixing herself, she did a low curtsy before Flora and said "Good evening, your highness. I live to serve you and only you, my lady."
Flora chuckled, something she hasn't done in what felt like such a long time. It felt so good to laugh again, and she was glad Musa was the reason why.
Musa was one of the dearest people she made friends with in the castle, a completely true friend who treats her like a normal girl and was her best friend she liked to view as her sister. The two have been best friends for years ever since Musa came to Linepa, a poor five year orphan who lost her family in a fire, and she was hired as Flora's own handmaid. Friendship quickly blossomed between the two young girls after they've met and they've been inseparable ever since. They've been friends for so long, there was no need for Musa to talk and act formal around her like the other maids do and it was because of their friendship Musa was allowed to break a few rules, including voliating the dress code.
Shaking her head at her best friend's ridiculousness and telling her she was crazy while laughing, Flora walked over to her huge, wall-length, walk-in closet. She opened the doors wide and stepped inside, feeling the smooth surface of the polished wooden floor beneath her feet and enjoying the smoothness, looking around for the appreciate thing to wear. With Musa coming to her room at early night, it meant it was dinnertime so she needed to needed to change out from her flimsy pajamas, which were comfortable but didn't quality as appropriate clothes to wear to dinner.
Eyeing nearly every piece of clothing hanging on the rack, she was having trouble deciding what to wear till she finally settled with an outfit: a pink midriff top with puff, short sleeves and dark pink polka dots, a red skirt with a pink sash, below-the-knee pink socks, red heels and a dark green ribbon she tied around her neck into a bow.
"What do you think?" Flora asked Musa as she came out from the closet and modeled the ensemble for her, doing a small twirl.
Until the moment she was talking to her, Musa was too busy playing with a lock of her hair while thinking about something she knew about tonight's dinner plans the master had in store for his daughter. It was something she knew would devastate and anger her friend if she told her, but knew if she didn't get her at least a warning then that would be horrible. She was trying to think of a way to talk her.
"What?" she asked in a bit of a daze, slowly recovering from the affect of deep thinking. Seeing Flora's changed clothes, she knew her friend was waiting for her to give her opinion on the outfit.
"Do you like it?" she asked, doing another twirl. She stopped short as she saw the serious look in her friend's eyes, worrying about it but decided to brush it off.
Cocking her head to a side, Musa eyed the outfit. It was very cute and adorable, very much Flora's style, but remembered the master's request for what the princess should wear for this particular dinner.
"It's cute, but your dad had another idea of what you should wear tonight," She saw the confusion of Flora's face, but offered no other explanation. She walked into the closet and came back a few seconds later with the dressiest gown Flora owed. "This one, on the other hand, reaches his high standards. It's very pretty." Musa added weakly, offering a small and weak smile.
Flora didn't say anything, too busy staring at the dress Musa was holding in wide-eyed, panicked horror. The dress was a work of creation the dressmakers spent weeks putting together and making into an absolute masterpiece. The color was a deep emerald green she was told made her eyes look greener and bigger, detailed with fine sequined lace, a strapless lace-up corset bodice, and a fully wide skirt. But as beautiful as the dress was, it was also a dreaded thing she hated wearing because the bodice was suffocating and the dress itself was uncomfortable.
Because the gown was the finest gown she owed, she was forced to wear to balls and parties. And just recently it seemed to be the outfit her father wanted her to wear when a bachelor prince comes to the castle, wanting her to look perfect and fancy when her possible future husband arrives. Looking at the dress, she realized, with a nervous pang going through her heart, why her father wanted her to wear it in the first place.
"He invited a prince to meet me, didn't he?" After the disastrous encounter with the smug Prince O'Neil, Flora made it clear she didn't want anymore obnoxious princess coming to her home. She thought her father respected her wishes, but it was clear if he wanted her to wear such a fancy dress for this particular gown he really didn't.
Musa glance at her quickly before casting her gaze back at the gown, fidgeting with the lace detail. By the way she refused to meet Flora's eyes and didn't answer her question, it was clear she knew something she didn't want to tell. And she couldn't tell if it was because her friend didn't want her to know because she knew it would upset her or wanted her to find out on her own.
Flora walked over to Musa, grabbed the girl gently by the shoulders, and forced her to meet her eyes. "Sweetie, please. I need to know the truth. Musa, you're my best friend and one of the very few people I can actually trust. If you know something, then I need to know."
She really did hated when Flora would pull that 'best friend' card because by the oath of best friends and her being the best friend, she needed to follow that oath. She tried looking away, but Flora was able to hold her gaze, trapping her with that serious look in her eyes. She sighed, finally admitting defeat, and confessed "Yes, he did. He arranged a meeting between you and a prince you've met before. He hoped with this dinner you both would settle your difference and finally get you to be engaged to someone."
Flora frowned, trying to come up with something. Thanks to the many meetings her father arranged for nearly every prince in the magical universe, their faces were a constant blur and the names entangled together into blurs, too. She bit her bottom lip when she couldn't think of anyone, knowing all of them she didn't like one bit. "Who is it?"
For the longest time Musa didn't say anything till she finally broke down and uttered one name that shocked Flora into silence.
"Prince O'Neil."
Hearing that name slipped out from Musa's lips caused Flora to freeze in shock, both physically and mentally. Memories of him being so arrogant and kissing her in front of everyone, disgracing her and making her feel like a fool, caused her stomach to churn in nausea while she was trying to remind herself how to breathe.
Meanwhile, Musa continued talking, aware of shocked Flora was but knew she would want to hear the rest. "I, and pretty much everyone else, was shocked to see him again. I wasn't able to hear what they were staying because the walls between the kitchen and dining room were too thick for even my sonic ears to hear. But I did hear the word 'marriage' being discussed between the two of them. I don't want to freak you out, Flo, but I think they might be talking about…well…"
Prince O'Neil possibly being my fiancé? Flora's eyes widened in shock, her blood immediately turning cold and numbing her body from the thought of something so horrible.
She couldn't believe it; she didn't want to believe it. But she wondered if her father was starting to get too impatient with her and decided he should be the one to pick the husband for her. If so, then was he actually considering matching her up with someone who was clearly her opposite and she hated? Where her father and the prince actually in the dining room right now discussing plans of the wedding over dinner while she was still left out in the dark?
Not wanting to wait around to think about it or without a moment delay, Flora immediately ran out from her, with Musa coming behind and running besides her, heading straight to the dining room in hopes she wasn't to late of stopping plans for a horrible future for her.
Please, let this be some kind of dream, the princess thought as the two girls raced down the staircase and made a turn to the left as they entered a wide hallway. Or some kind of joke we'll laugh about later.
She tried to tell herself this, trying to keep positive, but she had a strong feeling in the back of her mind it really wasn't. And she was hoping with everything she had the feeling was wrong.