The King Trials.

~The Destiny Pool~

The time of the celebration has come.

Nude beneath a night robe, seated on a backless chair in front of the broad vanity set. The table is cluttered with cosmetics and a collection of accessories to choose from. Cassia and Lila are already outfitted in their ball gowns. Lila is garbed in a shiny emerald dress, off shoulders, that's tight at the waist, flaring out from her hips, bare skin ornamented with swirling golden armlets. Her dark green tresses are plaited up in a complex updo.

I watch Cassia through the mirror as she braids my hair into a crown-like style, her skilled fingers weaving through. Something about it reminds me of Seliah.

Cassia is dressed in a simple but elegant buttery yellow dress. Strapless and sleeveless, only held together by a cord around her neck like a collar, half of her back exposed. Both of their faces are decorated with crushed gemstones. But I requested something more natural. My skin is lathered with scented oils, pleasant-smelling, and gives my skin a glossy shine. My lips are coloured with cosmetics made from dyes containing Tyrian purple, crushed mulberries that make a luscious red.

"Can you go over the names again?" I request.

Cassia lets out her frustration with a long exhale.

"I thought you were from an intelligent Regnum?" she says without looking at me. "Thus, an absorbent mind. You are just anxious, and you needn't be."

"A summary would not hurt," Lila says in my stead.

"There's Green Earl, Moray. He owns the largest harvesting plots of earth globs. Green Earl, Phelixzica who holds the seeds to nutritious vegetables that are only found within Cistern. Nowhere else in Urium, so it will be quite a notch to get access to those," she says and looks at my reflection to gauge my response.

 I nod back at her.

"Then there is—"

"Traitors," Opal interposes with an enraged yell, "whores and liars!" She appears in the bedchamber and marches to us with a madden stride. She ducks once to pass the one cord of the net bed, and then another before she stands at Cassia's rear.

Her scorching glare nearly melts my reflection in the mirror. "You said that I should stay away from Vince, but that's only because you want him for yourself."

I nearly suffocate on laughter.

The tickling laugh bursts free. I try to turn my head, but Cassia's grip on my hair restricts free mobility. "Want him?" Another laugh escapes me. "You can have him; I was merely cautioning you against it."

Her face rots into a vicious look. She places her hands on the waist of her bright mauve dress, sleeveless with thick straps covered by a layer of lace over the skirt.

"Cautioning me against what?"

"That's just it...." I throw up my hands and they fall back to my lap. "I just don't know. He seems decent, and he's dashing and inarguably enthralling. But there's something ingenuine about his approach, what he does and what doesn't. I cannot call it by its name. But something's...off about him."

Still simmering, Opal glares back at me, but the fire in her eyes snuffs out. 

She squares her shoulders, her hair bejewelled with vivid gems. "Alright..." she trails off, half-dubious. "I believe that you believe that."

She takes a step forward; the thud of her heel almost sounds threatening. "But I have seen the way he looks at you...the way he cannot stop looking at you."

I meet her gaze in the mirror.

She smirks, and her eyes sparkle with malice. "Like how a predator looks at his prey." She glances at her sisters. "I'll see you all at the celebration." She sends me a cursory glance, scanning my torso with a filth-lathering look.