A/N: Sorry it's been so long! I was gone at a music camp for two weeks and am working on a few other project…but at last, here is a nice chapter of the seven rooms.
And so the Masque began.
All the foul creatures of the earth had gathered here t dance in sin.
They were the nobility of a certain country befouled by their whim and arrogant presence.
Now they were here to escape the death that awaited them outside these walls. Here they were living in illusions and fraud. Here the law was only thus: sin with noble revelry.
And so they did. And so she stood in the centre of the hall, with the symbol of the night shining as the moon from the chandelier.
The music was delicate and strange with its harmonies. Sometimes the musicians played with joyful minuets, or minor sonatas, or lively snapping dances or suites of mourning. Whichever it was, the masque dancers giggled and sang as they danced.
The hall was of gold and the tiled floor with jewels at their feet. The stars and sun, and moon glittered with their diamonds and topaz. The statues seemed to be posed in states of sin. Terrible but beautiful ornamentation was decorating the stairs, the walls, the banisters and bowls of fire. Cherubs, flowers, gargoyles, demons, flame and creatures were wrought with masterwork metals. Beauty abounded with demons. Parades of colors flashed before her eyes in the midst of the swirling dances.
She must move on. There were the seven other rooms to explore.
Up the stairs she climbed dressed in her finest.
All around the guests that were chatting, dancing, parading drunkenly or kissing were staring after her. Their costumes were hues of all shades….except red. Red was banned. Red was the symbol of death. Only she chose to wear her dress.
Their eyes either averted away or blinked. They were glittering through the eyes of their masks. Whether as animals, birds, flowers or fey they were dressed they saw he costume as death.
The Lady Red Death.
Long dark red like drying blood and black ribbons tight and taut compiled her gown. She moved with elegance with her golden hair pulled back into a pony tail adorned with rubies and gold. Her hat was large…red…black and gold.
There was no need to place skull jewelry to emphasize her cursed life. Her face was already pale as bone.
She walked like a hollow shell. Like she was a ghost in fear. She knew that sometime soon he would come. He would come to claim her and destroy all the happiness in the world. All that was beautiful and uncorrupted was to die. And she could do nothing about that but live as long as possible and hope there will be happiness for her…in the future…someday…
Without thinking she passed by the bowl of blue fire. It swirled and lit the short dark hallways. She heard sweet music through the entranceway to the other side.
Softly she stepped into the blue light of the room.
The Blue Room, as it was called, was pale plastered walls of a sky blue. On a stand were harp players and flutests playing soft melodious music, simple and delicate. There were fountains and pools of water in the large room and women and men sat there, splashing the water and holding the blue lilies in their hands. There was soft giggling and warm smiles on the masquerader's faces as they glided through the room. Water and scented candles were lit, and small blue butterflies flitted through the room. The sound of cage blue birds rang out to accompany the harps and flutes. All was peaceful and melodious, soft and simple. All seemed good and honest.
However it was honest as the symbols tried to convey. She stood by the main fountain with the blue geese and floating candles, looking at the flickering faces. She saw lovers lie. She knew those counts and barons here had wives, or had something they stole. She heard them lie to each other, speaking in soft tones and deceit in their eyes. Here was the rule that one must be truthful in peace here. But their minds were embroiled with anger and deceit. This place of honesty was corrupted with lies. Eyes flashed with uncertainty. Words spoken untruthfully to each other. All in the quiet of blue peace.
Sickened, she moved on to the dark hallway straight ahead. This time, she came into purple room. The purple fire in the bowl created gloomy shadows.
The room was a royal purple. The walls and precipices were with gargoyles and ornate Amethyst jewels. A small fountain was in the corner, and in the middle of the tiled purple floor was a stage where magicians were performing their work. There were thrones and ornate chairs where the guests sat in pride and confidence. There were French hornists and brass playing waltzes, and wine and guests were covered with jewels. It was a place perfect for the nobles of the old courts to gather. A place where the guests were being pampered. The lady's nails were being done, shoes were shined and fruit was everywhere. Magicians preformed tricks and hats, doves and rabbits from their hats and illusions. Arrogance…glittering arrogance.
They glared back at her and raised their noses. Such filth! Such a low class woman, wearing red of all things, engaged to the king! Soon someday she will be married. When, they did not know. Only that Virginia wished that she was never here or even born. The way Prospero had his eye son her. They way he had already tried to lay her…
She shook hr head, getting sick of the arrogant masqueraders in this room.
She walked past the dancing guests and the arrogant snots, not wanting to be silently ridiculed. The hallway this time was lit by green sprightly fire.
She was dazzled by the brightness of the room. Green everywhere, with harlequin patterns and the sounds of tambourines and flutes playing jigs!
Jesters bounded around with their lutes and flutes. They threw confetti at the guests. Jokes and laughter were everywhere. The buffoons bounded and strode around her with their noisemakers and surprises. Virginia made her was to the fountain filled with frogs and water lilies. Here she saw the room filled with plants and foliage of green.
People were laughing at her. They sat lazy while they were entertained; they pointed their figures and said cruel things. She wished not to hear them as they ridiculed her. The jokers threw coins at her, and the guests. The hordes of them stooped, picking up the gold for their greed. All was not to share a laugh. All for greed…greed of wealth, greed of being the better of them all.
She felt sick at this room too. Here this room was to be a celebration of life, to share it. None was apparent.
Past the pot of emeralds, she moved into the hallway to the next room.
The hallway was brightly lit with the orange fire here. It was thick and heavy.
The room perfectly reflected the fire in the hall before the door.
The music was by bright and heavy brass. The loud blasting trumpet was over the din of conversation and drunken songs. The entire room was a long round table with the orange walls. Bright lamps and light lit the feast!
There was a feast. Wine and song, breads and cheeses, roasted fowl and stuffed pork and soups. There were all sorts of delicacies and rich food, the aromas making Virginia hunger. The room too had a fountain, but it was a fountain of beer. She sat in a chair, looking at the delicious meats and hearty food around her. Servants came and went filling glasses and putting out more platters of food.
But only the disturbed could eat and drink here.
The show was the bizarre, the mutilated. Hunchbacks and dwarves, tall and thin, the ugly and the fire breathers and the tricksters. The paraded around and stuck out their tongues and preformed other strange and disgusting talents. And they all in their revelry laughed and were entertained. The house of sin was further outraged with the vile people and creatures here. It was a sick circus, filled with evil clowns entertaining the even more evil residents.
She couldn't eat any of the food here. She had to leave to save her sanity of the Orange Room.
As she ran with her red gown the clowns and the freaks clung to her. Their claws and slimy fingers and paint dripped, she gasped and fought them off as the gluttonous feasters laughed and ate. What waste of food! Topaz's scattered at her feet, such waste and sin…
She made it to the hallways after her fight with the bizarre and the swine of the nobility.
There was some hope, she thought. The hallway was bright and white. The fire bowl here was hot and shit, thin and incensed.
The room was a dazzling white, pure and beautiful! Stone columns and white candles and sweet white flowers! The room spoke of simplicity and diamonds studded the walls. Here there were cellos, harps and strings and soft flutes playing simple and beautiful music. All was innocent.
Children here played and ran. The musicians wore simple white, there were Cherub and angel paintings on the ceiling. The ceiling itself was blue and with clouds, a painting of the sky. The center of the room was where the children played. Mothers and young men and women stood and watched, singing happy songs surrounded by white and simple beauty. All was good, all was innocent…
Or at least, the dancers here were portraying innocent happiness. There was nothing like that here. Here the bejeweled masqueraders were fighting in the light for jewels and glory. Here was covetness, deceit, and jealously. This room seemed to be masked with purity, covering the sinners in the billows of white angel gowns.
She stood surrounded by the singing children, the brats taunting her and pulling at the red dress. Virginia scowled down at them, kicking them off and running past to the next room.
I was innocent once…all I have left is my dignity and my virtue.
She felt threatened at every turn that she would be tainted by the sins here.
The next hallways provided some comfort from the macabre version of white in the last room. Here was a purplish blue flame, with rainbow smoke and the heavy scent of alluring incense. Her mind immediately started feeling fuzzy, her eyes seeming to feel…soft and the world…hazy…
What tricks are these the prince has done? This room must be filled with these vile intoxications…she thought. She wanted to get past this room as soon as possible, for she feared her mind would warp with the drugs staining the air.
She ran through the entryway to behold the illusionist's spectacle.
The room was the color of violet. The air was in a haze with colored smoke and incense burners of drugs and herbs. There were colored silks hanging like curtains, and people in the doldrums laying and breathing their fantasies. Acrobats and trapeze artists were on the ceiling swinging to and fro, and levitation tricks and illusions galore ensnaring the sense…trapping her sanity behind the mask of fog and the opal mist.
She could feel herself move past the center, the dancers playing with the silks and leaping around in the strange revelry. But she couldn't feel. Her eyes were filled with shadows of color, and her sense of sight, sound and smell were deceived. She only wished to get out of here as fast as possible to avoid any permanent affects of the drugs.
She stumbled through the dark hallway. Coughing, her mind was becoming clearer as she went past the blazing bowl of the red fire.
This must be the last room…She thought. She hoped so, for she wished after she explored this hellish fantasy to find the room to spend time in, whittling away the hours and days that she would spend in this masquerade. She was not allowed to go back into the inner castle.
All was shut and sealed. If she could escape into the halls, perhaps the Red Death would claim her there. She would be alone in the dark with nothing but the wind from the broken windows, and the ghastly tatters of the curtains stained and abandoned would be the only witness to her demise.
She stood in the gateway; she stood ready to open the black thin curtain into the final room of the colors.
The Room of Black.
Out the curtain she went, holding her breath as she beheld the sight of the final room.
Black. All black with tints of red, rubies glittering in the firelight. There were lounges and sofas around, littered with bodies convulsing and moaning.
She knew what this room was. It was a room that had no mask or seemed to be of good intentions. It was simply the symbol of evil and lust.
Sex and violence.
Blood and death.
She stood trembling, seeing things that she had forever been running away from. Things she feared in the black and red that lit the room. She heard the cries of passion as masqueraders in lust had cast aside their garments save the masks…and were in masses procreating in a symphony of forbidden sinful sex.
Everywhere. The floor. The wall. The furniture. And even Prince Prospero was doing it on the throne.
"You pig…" She hissed.
Victor Prospero himself didn't expect her to get through the rooms quickly and arrive here. He was too busy being serenaded by his lone violist in the room, and being ridden by the hordes of masked women that had come and wished to ride the lap of the prince himself.
Quickly he pushed the brunette off him, fastening his pants but not bothering to button up his tunic. Slowly he reached to the table and put his hat on.
"A pleasure to see you here…my virgin bride." He smirked and tried to remain his cool.
She glared, ignoring the sounds and the sweat around her.
"You have no sense of good, do you? You have created seven rooms that seemed to represent values of right…but in fact they are the tortured bizarre antics of evil! Sin and desolation! This room of blackness and red lust has gone to the madness of hell!" She pointed her finger at him, spitting the words.
"You always knew my love for the bizarre, Virginia. It is you who must change. You think that a life of normality…in a place so desolated…is the way. But the world has gone to madness, my love." He purred and leaned from his throne. "The bizarre will inherent the world in sin. Sin is what will make us survive."
He put his blue feathery mask on and hopped down from the black throne. She stepped back and was eyeing him warily, horrified at his lack of judgment.
"When the Red Death comes…he will smite you. I would rather be his wife than yours. I'd rather bed the gods of death than lay with you. You may torment me with the displays of evil and your strange entertainment, but I will prevail and live through this." She turned her back. He still smiled at her, loving to torture her with his 'disgusting' and 'strange' habits.
"The Red Death cannot come! The priests have blessed the doors, and we will all be safe here…and you…in my arms…" Enamored with the moment he wrapped his arms around her. She hissed and shrugged him off her back.
"You are no prince. You deserve nothing from me. And you deserve no mercy for the lies you have spun. All of them will die because you have lied. You have lied to yourself too and committed yourself to this blind death you have chosen. Tell me, will it be worth your efforts here when the plague makes you bleed to death? Nothing…can stop it…now."
Ignorance was not bliss for them. This strange feeling inside her made her queasy at the sight and feeling of these rooms. The atmosphere was perfect for breeding hostilities and lies. It was the most elegant mask of darkness she had ever seen and experienced. The whole castle was in the bizarre.
She knew she must leave. She must find some quiet corner to hide the day out and hope that this would all stop. The only one that could end this masquerade was believed to be locked out. The Red Death, she knew, would always find a way inside.
Breaking free of Prospero's grasp, she ran to the black clock at the end of the room. It was constructed of dark wood and metal adorned with candles and dark, hollow faces. It was macabre and dark, the clock face like cracked beige china and the ticking sound seemed loud, her body vibrating with each tick.
It struck the hour, 11 o'clock.
All the persons stopped their movements to listen. It was the wishes of the prince that as the clock chimed the hour; all would stop in homage of time.
She ran, ran past the stand still guests. Down the halls whence she came from, through the rooms of the colors she felt the strange feeling she was being watched, and going to be terrorized by a familiar face.
The guests stood. The children stopped their singing. The fountains were the only sounds. The music paused their melodies. All was quiet save for the dark chimes of the bells. The clock struck 11, so close to midnight when she felt…something was not right.
Tonight was the night. Tonight was when He would come…
A/N: I'll also be gone in a few days to my grandparents, where I will be writing more and more and you'll get plenty of updates on my stories when I get back. Isn't that great? So REVIEW and tell me about it!
Shoys.