Chapter 7

✧ Eliana rocked Flavia shocked ✧

The garden was dead silent, with only the noise of the fastidious wind blowing and echoes of the classical music coming from inside where the ballroom was. The girls didn’t move an inch, and were glued to their positions as they gazed upon each other. This strange feeling of closeness and familiarity wouldn’t disappear from Eliana and Flavia’s hearts. They wanted answers, but didn’t know how to receive them. After a moment or two, Flavia broke the silence by averting her gaze in some other direction and apologizing,

“M-My apologies for disturbing you. I heard some whispering coming from here and my curiosity just…urged me to follow the whispers…” Her hand awkwardly reached her arm and she rubbed it, while she still failed to make eye contact with Eliana.

“No no! It’s alright. I was just…talking to myself! I have a weird habit of saying my thoughts out aloud. You don’t have to apologize, I’d be curious too if I heard whispering in an empty garden..” Eliana nervously chuckled, trying to lift up the tense mood.

“Oh…um…I don’t think talking to yourself is weird…” Flavia’s amethyst pupils slowly reached up to Eliana’s face, and she shook her head in disapproval of Eliana’s words.

“You’re the first then. Say…If you don’t mind, may I ask for your name Miss?”

“O-Oh its-”

“LADY FLAVIA!!” A maid came rushing towards Flavia in a fast pace, waving her hands in the air to possibly gain her attention.

Flavia abruptly turned her head around for the maid, and inquired after her running. “What’s wrong Judie? Why are you in such a hurry?”

“The- The crown prince! He- He requested your presence in the ballroom!” Replied the maid, who was still panting heavily due to all that running.

Eliana’s ears perked up at the mention of Flavia’s name, and her pupils dilated immediately. THIS was Lady Flavia she was conversing with??? The girl furrowed her eyebrows, looking as if she had never felt so astonished in her life and she watched Flavia calm the maid down, with a dumbfounded face. Eliana could’ve sworn that her soul left her body the moment she realized the young woman she was talking to was Flavia De Luca, THE FLAVIA DE LUCA.

“Did I hear that right…? Did that maid just say LADY FLAVIA?” Eliana thought, as she stared at Flavia with immense shock. Her lips were slightly parted from the surprise, and she couldn’t utter a single syllable to the girl. After all, this was Eliana’s main rival in the novel. Her most despised enemy, the girl whose family would be more than happy to see the Eliana dead.

Flavia once again returned back to Eliana but this time she looked in a bit of a hurry herself. Without saying another word, she performed a polite bow before heading out of the garden with the maid by her side. As they were exiting the garden, the maid snuck a glance back at Eliana, only to make a highly disgusted face at her. Eliana, who had yet to return to her senses from the shock, blinked nonchalantly at the maid’s rude gesture, without making a sound. Finally after some minutes, recovering from the shock and regaining her ability to talk, the young female exclaimed.

“W-What the hell just HAPPENED? Did I just meet Lady Flavia in the flesh?? I wasn’t expecting to meet her so early…honestly speaking, I didn’t even wish to meet her at all due to the whole “blood sworn enemies” thing…but something doesn’t make sense…she’s different from what I imagined her to be…WAY different! I mean, of course I didn’t know who SHE was, but she definitely knew who I was right? Then why did she act so politely…..or was this all a trap?? Maybe she was mocking the way I was talking to myself inside her head, all this time!” Eliana scoffed out of frustration and crossed her arms around her chest. “Nobles…they think they can get away with acting fake. Well, they can’t fool THIS girl! I know for sure that she was doing this purposely to seem like a good person, I just know it!” Suddenly, the girl snapped out of her enraged commentary and took a look around her surroundings. “Dang it! I’m talking to myself again!”

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While the infuriated Eliana sulked over her “weird” habit, Flavia continued to make her way inside the ballroom, where the prince was seemingly waiting for her. The maid who was accompanying her the whole time, noticed that her lady seemed more tensed than usual. The timid young girl poked her Lady’s arm gently, to receive a reaction from her.

“Um…Milday…if you don’t mind…can I ask you something?” Her wavering gaze placed itself upon Flavia’s stressed face as she asked her the question.

“Huh? Oh yes, go ahead Judie!” Flavia said, coming back to reality.

“Why were you together with Lady…I don’t know if I should even say her name…” The nervous maid dropped her gaze to the ground and fidgeted with her fingers.

“Hm? I was with whom?” Flavia tilted her head a bit to the side and her black hair brushed against her shoulder as she did so.

“Lady…Eliana…”

As soon as Flavia heard that name, she immediately stopped in her tracks and a soft gasp escaped her lips. Her face appeared to be extremely startled by the maid’s words and she took a brief glance behind her.

“Y-You mean…that was Lady Eliana over there?..” The astounded Flavia asked, as she kept sneaking short glances at the garden entrance.

“Yes…were you not aware of that?...”

“Yes, I didn’t know at all! It may be that I haven’t seen her for so long that I forgot how she looked like…” Flavia forced a small smile and shifted her eyes from the garden entrance to the maid’s face. “Silly old me! Forgetting things so easily haha…” She then begun walking in the prince’s direction again, and let out a soft sigh. Luckily, the maid didn’t hear it and escorted her through the hallways. “What a close call…” Flavia mumbled under her breath.

The maid paused her walking in front of the prince and performed a deep obeisance before moving out of the way. Flavia still couldn’t get Eliana and her strange encounter with her out of her mind, so she seemed to disregard the fact that she was meeting the infamous prince at last. The prince, who was busy conversing with a noble, averted his attention to Flavia once she arrived and greeted her politely.

“Good evening, Your Highness. It’s an honor to be requested by you... How may I help you?” Flavia smiled naturally at him, which wasn’t so hard due to the fact that he was so handsome. Who can even resist smiling at such a heart throb after all?

“Good evening, Lady Flavia. I wanted to request a dance with you when I heard you had finally arrived. Please, may I have this dance?” He reached out his hand towards her in a gallant way. However, his face bore no smile at all, just a gentle expression that’s it.

“Of course.. How can I possibly even deny a dance from you?...” Flavia placed her hand on his palm graciously, after his request to dance. The girl caught something bizarre in his expression though. It held no interest, nor did it hold disinterest. She couldn’t quite make out what he was thinking at that time, but she was certain he wasn’t taking pleasure in asking this dance, even in the slightest.

Kieran then very swiftly entangled Flavia’s fair fingers with his and led her to the middle of the ballroom. Every noble in the room who was busy engaging in some activity or other, paused suddenly. All the eyes were on them, and heads were turned in their direction. The music spun them around as they both danced together, with their eyes fixated on each other’s faces. Flavia’s heels clicked over the ballroom floor, and she could feel the pressure of his warm hand behind her back as their bodies swayed together to the rhythm of the euphoric music. They kept dancing from one place to another, and Flavia’s hair kept flowing behind her in layers as they spun round and round…

“Oh my…he is so beautiful…I’m scared that I might drool…!” Flavia thought, as Kieran twirled her around with his hand. “Don’t drool Flavia, don’t drool!” It was as if she was mesmerized completely by his beauty and charms.

As Flavia fought this battle inside her head, her eyes accidentally landed upon a sight that made her shiver terribly. It was Lady Eliana focusing in their direction. Flavia’s eyes flew up in shock and her mind went blank by this. She thought about how Lady Eliana must’ve murdered her at least five times in her head, due to her dancing with the prince. However, the girl didn’t blame her. Prince Kieran might’ve been a suitable choice for her but with Eliana in the picture, she didn’t wish to steal her from him. She was a girl who had just reincarnated into Flavia’s body so there is no justification for her to marry him.

“Oh no… What am I doing? I can’t do this with Lady Eliana! I can’t steal him away from her! I’m just an innocent bystander who was brought into all of this mess! Please don’t hate me more than you already do, Lady Eliana!!” Thought Flavia, who was by this time, feeling extremely dizzy from all this dancing. Thinking and dancing were both tiresome things to do at the same time for the poor young woman and it was clear by her nauseated expression.

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Flavia’s observation was indeed correct, Eliana was really staring in their direction, however, not for the purpose she thought. What was going in Eliana’s mind was this:

“O M G! They look sooo cute together! I definitely ship it! 100%! See, this is why I shouldn’t meddle in their relationship. You can clearly tell that they are MADE for each other! And they really look like they came out of a shoujo manga right now~”

As Eliana was fangirling over the couple, her mother just so happened to be right around the corner, and seizing the perfect opportunity, she grabbed Eliana by the shoulder, pulling her aside from the crowd.

“Eliana! What is the meaning of all of this? I told you, I wanted to see YOU dancing with him, not Flavia!” The woman whispered in a sharp tone, sounding as if she will explode any moment.

Eliana let out an exasperated sigh, and shook her head. “Yes, I did do as you told me to. I asked him to dance but it didn’t work out! That’s all..”

“What do you mean, ‘it didn’t work out’ You probably messed it up, you foolish girl!” Her other hand reached for her forehead and she placed it over there.

“He REFUSED to dance with me. How can I mess it up when he wasn’t even agreeing to it in the first place?” Eliana’s arm escaped her mother’s grasp, and she rubbed it lightly.

This left the mother speechless and she stared at Eliana with a look of mild shock on her face. Refused? She couldn’t possibly comprehend all of this in her head. But why would he refuse Eliana and dance with Flavia, the woman couldn’t register this at all. Seeing this reaction of hers, Eliana felt that she had to let her mother know something.

“Mother...perhaps you should be wary of other’s feelings instead of your own, sometimes…” The girl patted her mother’s shoulder, and a gentle smile captured her lips. “Now, if you don’t mind~ I would like to leave early, since these heels are literally killing me..(I swear I’ll die by the time I reach the house)”

With saying that, Eliana left her mother to her thoughts and blissfully limped her way towards the entrance where the carriage was already waiting for her.

By the time Flavia took a glance in her direction once again, Eliana had already vanished from that area and was nowhere to be found! This made the panic mode activate in Flavia’s head and the girl now struggled to even dance properly. She kept squishing the prince’s feet under her own several times until he stopped and inquired after her health.

“Are you feeling fine, Lady Flavia? You don’t…look too well..”

“Huh- Oh no! I’m not fine! All this dancing has made me-“ Just then, Flavia felt a terrible pain shoot up in her stomach and she felt awful. It was due to all the dancing and stressing out, that she forgot that she ate a heavy meal before this. The girl badly had to vomit and so, without thinking twice, she placed her hand over her mouth. The prince who noticed all of this, ordered a servant to take her to a restroom and thus, the dancing stopped. The nobles were once again back to the chitter chatter, especially the members of the De Luca family.

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Inside the restroom, where Flavia was taken by a servant, it was silent with only the sounds of Flavia’s muffled whining echoing in it.

“What have I done…? Lady Eliana will kill me! How could I be so stupid enough to dance with him? How hurt she must’ve felt I can’t even begin to imagine! I promised myself that I wouldn’t do anything to fuel the hatred between these families but I just made things worse! Even though Lady Eliana was quite nice to me in the garden….I ruined everything…! Goodbye, novel world. I’ll miss all the pretty dresses and the pampering…after this its surely my last day in this world…since the Gentileschis... especially Lady Eliana, won’t spare me at all!..” Flavia then buried her face in the palm of her hands, whining like a little girl who had something snatched from her.

The long night was finally settling down, with one of our heroines grieving over her last day in this world, and the other rejoicing over her newly made ship…