AllFreeNovel
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The video starts.
And I am instantly hooked.
It is the most beautiful thing I have ever seen.
The dancing. The dancers. The costumes. The stage. The music.
It’s all so...magical.
I absorb it all in, my mouth permanently hanging open in awe and delight as the performers sail and swoop across the stage to the heart-pounding classical music.
Sure, I’ve seen dancing before, but nothing like this. A daughter of a maid is never really usually exposed to anything likethis.
I stand up from the reclining chair and take a step closer to the screen as the music swells and the dancers spin.
I take another step.
And another.
And then I’m reaching out... reaching towards the screen... begging the universe to simply let me join those on stage...
“What are you doing?”
Someone’s at the door.
Someone’s caught me.
I spin around, and I realize I’m in deep, deep trouble.
5
EMMA
It is not justanyonewho’s caught me sneaking around in the movie room.
It’s the Penmayne matriarch. Alda. The queen of the palace herself.
The most terrifying woman on the planet.
And she’s busted my ass. And there’s no escaping it.
Seeing her standing by the soundproof door I squeak out a single, shocked word.
“Sorry.”
Alda Penmayne just stares at me. She seems like a refined woman far too composed to allow herself an uncivilized moment of yelling anger.
She merely asks me one simple question as she stands there in a tailored pantsuit made from silk. Her neck is wrapped in a beautiful silver necklace and there are diamond rings on her fingers. It’s like she’s wearing a special uniform to signal her wealth and her otherness to the rest of us, which only makes her even more intimidating to a scared little teenager in crappy hand-me-downs like me.
“And who are you?”
That’s it. That’s all she says. Her voice isn’t raised, there isn’t a touch of venom. And that’s the scariest thing about her tone: the neutrality, the calmness, the uncanny, uncaring nature.
It’s so unnerving that I can’t even answer back to her. My mouth bobs open and closes in fear like a dumb fish.
She’s not even angry... it’s like she’s disgusted...
“You’re the maid’s daughter, correct?” she asks me. “Natalie Tucker’s girl?”
