The Purple Eyed Girl

30. The reveal of the dead men

Brown water flushed through the drain as I rinsed myself off in my own shower. I had left a trail of mud around the whole castle, including Valerio's room to block his door which he wasn't going to be happy about. I changed into a comfy set of clothes and went over to my father's room. 

"Thank you for saving my life, kiddo." He exclaimed from inside his closet.

"No big deal." I shrugged while walking around the room, my eyes falling onto the case file on his desk. It had gotten a whole lot bigger since the first time I saw it. Tempted to open it, I stepped closer.

"You're not going to find the conclusion in there." I turned around and watched him emerge from his closet dressed in a suit.

"I know." I raised my eyebrows. "There are more important matters to solve. For example, why are you wearing a suit?"

He frowned. "You do know the choosing ceremony and its ball are happening today, right?"

"Yeah, in like three hours. So why are you dressed up already?"

"I'm not going to change again." He blurted out, nudging me to the door to get lunch.

All eyes fell on us when we entered the dining hall. Everyone probably thought we were a bunch of crazy people. 

To be fair, we were a bunch of crazy people.

We sat down at the same table where Foxglove, Haimon and Valerio were having lunch. Mr. Anders handed us our food with a huge grin, even though he was responsible for cleaning up my multiple messes in the end, he enjoyed doing it.

Sounds of cutlery scraping over plates echoed through the hall as absolutely no one said a thing. I discretely observed everyone, most of the men were already dressed up in suits with the exception of a few. I made the mistake of allowing myself to feel their feelings, nervosity and worry hitting me like a tsunami as I did so. There was an underlying tenseness in everyone's movements and I quickly blocked it all out again to ease the discomfort I was experiencing.

The choosing ceremony was at the front of everyone's mind. Men were going to be sentenced to their deaths on live tv in a couple of hours and mistakes could not be made. I still struggled to wrap my head around the fact that so many people had actually volunteered. It just seemed unreal to me.

My thoughts were interrupted when Miss Villin's soft voice broke the silence. "Miss Ashford, could you please come with me? Your team is ready."

"My team?" I wondered.

"To get you ready for the ceremony, Miss." She smiled.

"Please tell me the vampires didn't provide the team." I sighed, my father letting out a chuckle as Haimon glared at me while Valerio and Foxglove exchanged very confused looks.

She laughed at the scene. "Don't worry, they didn't." 

I followed her to my room where two other maids were waiting next to the door. I dismissed them since I wouldn't need a whole team, I just needed for Miss Villin to zip up my dress, if it had a zipper that was.

I grabbed the box from my closet, placing it on my bed, and stared at if for a little while. I had no idea what to expect from the dress, from the ceremony, and hell, from life in general at the moment. I pushed my mini existential crisis to the back of my mind as those worries were no use to me right now and opened the box.

Inside it laid a sweep train dress made of chiffon. It had a one shoulder strap which ran across the back down to the other side, leaving most of my back exposed. It was pitch black for the most part, except for the dark red ombre at the bottom. If I didn't know any better, I would have thought it was dipped in blood.