Chapter 97 - The Real Enemy

I held my breath, waiting for Mama to decide. 

"So?" I asked. She was taking too long to answer. She pursed her lip and sat there, her eyes looking into mine. I smiled, oblivious. "Mama?"

Then she sighed. "You asked if I'm sure..."

"Yes." I nodded. Please say no..

"My answer is..."

I gulped.

"She sighed again. "My answer is no."

I nodded, relieved. Thank God.

"B-But why do you say that?" I asked, tilting my head innocently to the side.

She held her face in her hands and rubbed her eyes. "I don't know."

I put a hand on her knee and patted gently. "Come on, Mama, there must be a reason. Why do you want me to stay?"

Mama stopped rubbing her eyes and held her face in her hands for a long moment. Silently, I slid my hand away from her knee and put it limply in my lap. She was thinking about something. Was she actually thinking about how to tell me nicely to leave? Had she changed her mind about me? 

"I didn't want to admit this to anybody," she said suddenly, her face still behind her hands. "But you really do remind me of my daughter."

I blinked. I reminded her of Lissy?

"You are the same age as her when she, you know, died. You're similar to her in so many ways… For a while, it felt like she had been sent back to me. I cried nights before you appeared at my door, but afterwards, I've been feeling so much better."

I blinked again, trying to absorb her words. 

"But then suddenly, I remember that you're so, so different from her in so many other ways, too. You walk differently, you talk differently, you look different. And when I notice you being your own self, reality hits me like a bulldozer. So like I said, I don't know. Just- No, I don't want you to leave. You're like a daughter to me, and it would break my heart to see you go."

I sniffed, bringing in the sharp stench of blood with me, but I couldn't care less. This was the first time I had been regarded as a daughter. Not even my own mother liked for me to be called her daughter. I was always a lowly piece of scum to her. Nothing but that.

My sniff made Mama look up. 

"Are you crying?" she asked, her face a picture of worry.

I hadn't even felt the tears flow down my cheeks. I wiped a hand under my eye and blinked at the sight of my wet palm. Slowly, my vision began getting blurry until I couldn't keep my sorrows in, and that's when I really realized how much Mama's words had meant to me. 

Mama reached out and put her arms around me. Gratefully, I let her embrace me, my own arms hanging limply by my sides. That night, I cried myself to sleep. And the whole time, I knew perfectly well that I trusted Mama with all my heart. Even at her age, she had been the mother I never had.

✿

[The Imperial Palace]

The day was cold and the light breeze wafted in through the bedroom window.

A bed-headed Yvonne sat up in bed and stretched her arms into the air, yawning elegantly.

"Ahh, ," she sighed as her eyes turned to her balcony. She could see the early sky through the large, floor-to-ceiling glass doors, and today it was a light shade of blue, almost white. 

Taking her sweet time, she slipped on her slippers and trotted against her grand red carpet she had selected specifically for her chambers. It was gorgeous, with golden embroidery on the edges and patterns all over.

Yvonne went over to her large mirror and looked at her reflection in it, frowning at a small, almost invisible spot on her cheek. Then she turned to go to the connected bathroom where two maids were already preparing for her early morning bath. 

"Good morning, Your Highness," the maids recited in unison and curtsied in her presence. "Shall we arrange a herbal bath for today or would you like a rose petal bath instead?"

"A rose petal bath would be sufficient, Wessey, Tmara," she replied decisively, kindly nodding in each of their directions.

"Yes, Your Highness." The maids curtsied once more and hastily ran off to get the rose petals for her bath. It was a lovely morning routine, really, especially now that the weather had gotten so chilly. A warm bath was all she yearned for as she stood in the white marble bathroom, donning only a soft bathrobe.

"Stace!" Yvonne called for her head maid, her singsong voice echoing in the grand bathroom. "Stace!"

"G-Good morning, Your Highness!" Stace burst into the bathroom with a tall stack of papers in her arms. She placed them with a 'thump' on the long bathroom counter and tried to catch her breath. "Goodness."

"Where were you?" Yvonne asked good-humoredly as she approached her head maid who seemed to be in a lot of distress at the moment. 

Stace bent over and groaned. "Ah, I had work, Your Highness. I'm terribly sorry. The Emperor gathered all the ladies' head maids in the hall."

"What for?" Yvonne asked as she slipped off a paper from the top of the stack and scanned her eyes over it.

Stace was ready to launch into her story. "Would you believe it! He's assigned the ladies a task! It's the first time this has happened in years."

"Task?" Yvonne muttered as she took another paper off the stack and started reading it, too. "What kind?"

Stace waved an annoyed hand in the air, her eyes on a bottle of lotion on the shelves. "Some assemblage. This is all the information he gave each of us, though everyone got a different stack of knowledge. Separate tasks, I assume, or at least that's what Dorothy told me. Anyways," Stace slapped a hand on the top of the pile of papers she just brought in, "we have some work to do. Shall we get to it? Are you done with your morning routine?"

Just then, Wessey and Tmara emerged into the bathroom with a bag of rose petals in their hands. Stace frowned.

"You still haven't bathed?" she asked, going to take a look at the pristine, waterless bath tub. "But it's almost breakfast time! You're running awfully late today."

But Yvonne wasn't listening. She was much more interested in what the paper in her hand was saying.

'Duty assigned hereby to Lady Yvonne Sumner, mistress to the glorious Imperial Emperor of Wisteria: Prepare an adequate guest list for the event, satisfying all the requirements below....'

Yvonne stopped reading. A guest list? She had to write up a guest list for the event?

"Your Highness! We've drawn up your bath," Wessey said patiently for the third time, since the lady wasn't at all listening. "Your Highness!"

"Yes?" Yvonne shook awake from her daze. By God! She'd be the one in charge of who and who did not attend the event! Oh, what joy! She wondered how she could exploit this task to her needs, for it was certainly something she needed to make good use of. 

With her maids' guidance, Yvonne slipped off her robes and stepped into the warm water bath, letting the stray rose petals tickle against her skin. She leaned her head against a neck rest attached to the bathtub edge and felt her body being enveloped by warmth. 

"Ahh, how relaxing," Yvonne mumbled as she sniffed the aroma of fresh matched with the clean marble smells. "Okay, so. Stace. Tell me more about this event whilst I finish my bath."

Efficiently, Stace brought back a few pages from the stack of papers and began scanning them.

"Alright, so it says here… This is going to be a small tea party just for the ladies."

Yvonne raised her eyebrows. "Oh?" Was the Emperor doing this so that the ladies could regain their selves after the princess's funeral ceremony?

"Yes." Stace nodded, her brown hair hanging loosely in a bun behind her head. "And it also says here that every mistress has been assigned with a different task regarding the small assemblage. As far as I know, Lady Chamillet has been charged with the task of decor, Lady Atraxil has been assigned the duty of selecting the types of teas to be served, whereas Lady Rovan will draw up a snack menu. Lady Virak has been assigned to manage the entertainment, Lady Obsilia will be choosing the dressing theme and finally, Lady Neredras will be- I heard she'll be excused from the event altogether."

"What?" Yvonne frowned, puzzled. "Why?"

Stace shrugged, her expression relaying that she was clearly hiding something.

"Stace, tell me."

Her maid struggled to keep the secret in, and her gossiping nature finally showed through. "Okay, fine." Then she lowered her voice to a whisper, making sure nobody heard her voice but her lady. "Lady Neredras has been just recently admitted to the infirmary under suspicious circumstances. We all believe it's Lady Obsilia's doing." 

Yvonne chuckled bitterly. "What has that snake done now?"

Stace scoffed. "Believe me, Your Highness. You don't wanna know. But I'll tell you still." Stace looked both ways before leaning in and whispering, "Lady Neredras ate a fruit brought allegedly to her by Lady Neredras and instantly fell sick. She's been in bed ever since, throwing up every few minutes, I've seen her myself, Your Highness, and let me tell you, that looks exactly like food poisoning."

"And you think Elora poisoned her on purpose?"

Stace nodded, her eyes wide. "How else could she fall sick after eating an apple? It's actual poison, I'm telling you."

Yvonne chuckled to herself, no humor in the little laugh. "But whatever does she have against poor Enya?" That's when it hit her. It had been Enya who had spilled about Elora being a horrible, vile person. Had the news reached her so soon? Did she try to poison Enya to eliminate any threats for her future?

"Like I said, we all think it's Lady Obsilia. I mean, who else would do such a thing?" Stace cried, flailing her arms in the air. "I don't know what the Emperor sees in that witch, but if I see any more of my coworkers emerge bruised from her room, I'm gonna-"

"Wait, you've seen it, too?" Yvonne asked, surprised. 

Stace scoffed. "Of course! We have this little union, the maids. We tell each other everything. And whenever I see some of my companions get fired because of how 'incapable' they are according to Lady Obsilia, I can't help but send letters of consolation to them. And then they send back outraged replies, blaming Lady Obsilia for such vile acts and how they were really just fired because the lady didn't want anything to know about the bruises. Really, I could just spit!"

Yvonne gazed into the water for a long time, thinking it all over. There was a huge possibility that Elora was just eliminating threats that could hinder her path to the throne. Did she really think Enya would give her a hard time becoming Empress? How foolish. 

She was yet to realize who her real enemy was.