After minutes of running around, Oris finally ordered the girls to stop. It was not that she wanted to cut the fun short, but there were other things left for her to do. Already, she was tired of laughing and panting, and as much as she valued exercise, she was still tired.

If she had to face the Empress Dowager again, she'd need her strength. Already, she has been cheated of a good night's sleep. It was time to start planning.

"We still have the selection to prepare for," she told her maids and pushed her body into the nearest piece of furniture, which just happened to be the chair in front of the dresser.

"Andrea, Seline, you two prepare what the mistress will wear," Mayree told the two girls and smoothed stray strands of hair back into her bun. "I and Keziah will stay here and get her ready."

Andrea nodded and grabbed Seline by the hand before walking out of the room with her.

"Mistress, let me apply medicine to your wound," Mayree said softly, holding up a porcelain bottle the size of her hand. "It was poor of me to forget about it till now."

Oris shifted her attention from her reflection to the red cloth-stopper sealing the bottle. "Where did you get it?"

"Don't worry Mistress," the maid said. "It was prescribed by the royal physician but I bought it outside the palace."

"You can leave the palace?" Oris asked, surprised, then returned her gaze to the bronze mirror in front of her. She inched her head to the right and examined her wound, watching it gape slightly as her skin was stretched.

It was inflamed, an angry red against the rest of her pale skin; hot to the touch and painful. It would undoubtedly leave a scar and that fact nearly made a sigh pass Oris' lips.

"If we're crafty enough, us maids can squeeze through the cracks of any entrance," Mayree answered, her voice filled with pride. "We can go anywhere."

Keziah scoffed from the other end of the room where she stood at the foot of a bathtub. "You," she said as she filled the tub with the buckets of hot water she had left out in the hallway, "make it sound so righteous."

But her voice didn't carry far, so no one heard her.

"How many bottles did you buy?" Oris asked and stood up, the sheer robe she wore tickling her skin as she did. While running, she had somehow lost her gown and was now left in the nearly transparent underwear.

She found it a convenient method of undressing.

"Twelve, to be applied thrice a day for half a month according to the physician's prescription," Mayree said.

"Pour six of them into that potted plant over there," Oris instructed as she walked over to the tub. "I will not be using any medicine for the next three days."

Mayree was about to protest but Keziah held her gaze and shook her head, stopping the words before they left her mouth.

"It is only a precaution," Oris said to reassure her. "If nothing happens to the plant, I'll apply the medicine to this wound. As it is, I just need to prevent it from getting infected and it will slowly heal with time. Don't worry."

"Okay, Mistress," Mayree said, her shoulders falling as walked to the decorative plant and turned the medicine into the soil that fed its roots.

Keziah took her mistress' hand and helped her up the wooden steps into the steaming water, careful to not let any of it splash to the floor.

Oris shut her eyes as she descended into the bathtub, the temperature was just hot enough to be uncomfortable, as she had ordered.

She let out a breath, feeling the robe cling to her skin as the water engulfed her body. She could feel sweat already beginning to form at the bridge of her nose.

"Was there a specific time given for the selection?" she asked, her expression slack and her tone relaxed.

Keziah was the one who replied her. "No, Mistress."

"And what is the time now?"

"Some minutes after noon."

Oris made a sound but didn't say anything, slipping out of her wet robe and raising it out of the water. It was promptly taken from her, leaving her hand empty.

She opened her eyes and watched Keziah squeeze a wet cloth in the water then walk over to her.

"We have no rose petals," the girl said, dabbing the cloth along the edges of the cut that stretched from the middle of her mistress' collar bone to nearly the back of her neck. "The only cosmetics available are the ones I keep on my person."

Oris processed her maid's words slowly. Because Keziah rarely spoke, when she did, the meaning was often deeper than she let on.

"Our luggage was seized?"

Keziah said nothing, confirming Oris' thoughts with her silence. She lowered her hand and began to wipe Oris' shoulders.

"You seem to have grown more freckles overnight," she couldn't help but comment.

"I can't help it," Oris said as the girl took the cloth down the skin of her back. "I can only hope that one day I don't wake up to all my skin dotted with them."

"Hn," Keziah nodded and started cleaning her mistress' right arm.

Oris enjoyed the movement of the soft cloth against her skin. The urge to sleep overpowered her senses as she felt Keziah lift her other hand with a gentle touch and wipe it down as well.

"Let me take out the pins in your hair," the maid said, her hands reaching into Oris' updo.

Oris closed her eyes again, tingles pouring from her scalp into her limbs then her fingers and toes as Keziah's careful fingers undid the tiresome hairstyle.

She leaned into her maid's palms as a comb was run through her hair, and slowly drifted into sleep, not realizing how unrested she truly was.

But Oris wasn't too far gone. She was still able to hear the faintly voices of her maids floating around her. By the time she had fully woken up the water in the bath had already turned cold.

She shivered and snapped open her eyelids in mild, misplaced annoyance. "Keziah," she called, barely able to keep her teeth from chattering.

"Oh, Mistress," the girl darted to her side immediately, a fluffy towel draped over both her arms.

"What were you four arguing about?" Oris shook her head to gather her thoughts as Keziah helped her out of the tub and wrapped the towel around her.

"No jewels or dresses," Keziah explained curtly, leading Oris back to the dresser while detangling her wet hair with her fingers.

The moment Oris was seated, Mayree took over from Keziah, a wide-toothed comb in her hand.

"Seline and Andrea were not allowed to get any jewelry or gowns when they went to the Royal Distribution Bureau." Mayree said softly, parting Oris' hair into five sections then combing through it. "They were told that their mistress was of the lowest rank of bride candidate and wasn't entitled to anything."

"If the royal family is so intent of making me drop out of the selection, why not imprison me straight away?" Oris asked, already tired of the scheming going on around her.

"Is there nothing we can do?" Andrea asked dejectedly and fell on the bed. "We've suffered too much to be kicked out so soon."

"Stop your whining, Andrea," Mayree told her sternly. "It doesn't help."

"I want my hair braided," Oris said, the makings of a plan already being cooked up.

Since the royals wanted to see her so impoverished, then she would play her part like a good little subject.

"Can you still remember the kind the Emperor had on?" she asked.

"Yes," Mayree answered automatically before her hands fell to her sides and she shook her head. "But Mistress, you're a nun. Nuns are the only ones other than nobles permitted to let their hair grow freely; your hair mustn't be tangled."

"You hope for me to be favored," Oris said lightly, taking some of her hair in her hand, "yet you still refer to me as a nun."

She stood up and turned to her maids, clasping her hands behind her back. The habit had been beaten into her for months on end and her body hadn't yet forgotten.

"Know this now," she began, "today the nun in me has died. Nuns do not marry, but in order to survive I must. Do not regard me as such again."

"Yes Mistress," they said obediently and Oris took her seat once more.

"Seline, Andrea, what exactly are we allowed to have?" she cleared her throat and asked, trying to help them forget her sudden change in demeanor. She hadn't meant to slip back into her other persona so soon, but the situation had called for it.

Making mistakes at this point would get them all killed.

"Only. . . the dress uniforms for maids," Andrea said quietly.

"And why didn't you get them?"

"Mistress—"

"Get ten white dresses," Oris said, then added, "Three should be close enough to white, but not enough to be confused for mourning clothes."

"Yes Mistress," Andrea didn't dare to argue, heading for the door before another word was said.

"Bring along needle and thread for embroidery."

"What color of thread?"

"Any would serve. It would be best if you got them all though."

"Okay," the girl nodded as she disappeared down the corridor.

"Mistress, you have another plan," Keziah stated while arranging her cosmetics on the dresser.

"My last plan nearly got us killed," Oris said with a faint smile and touched her wound again. "Are you so eager for a new one?"

"Mistress' plan worked in the end," Seline said, straightening up the mattress whose sheets Andrea had rumpled. "We got into the palace in less than a day. It could have taken weeks if things hadn't gone the way they did."

"Mistress, let me start braiding your hair," Mayree said, changing the topic with such ease that Oris was impressed. "Hopefully we can make it in time for the selection."

"We won't," Oris said firmly. The fact that no one had come to inform them about the time for the selection meant that they were being set up to miss it completely.

"So," she continued, picking up a small container from the table and examining its contents, "it's best to take our time and make everything perfect for our debut."

~