Our story begins on a bright starry night in a small orphanage outside the town of Grandeur. Inside this little orphanage all is quiet, except the silent rustle of bedsheets as a little 14 year old girl, sneaks out of bed as quiet as possible to catch a glimpse of the starry night as moonlight floods the silent room. Memories come flooding back, of her and her mother from long ago staring up at the night sky. Stargazing.
"Lily...Lily...LILAINE!" Lilaine slowly lifts her heavy eyelids, looking around at the dull cottage room lined with beds.
"Ugh...is it morning already?" Grumbles the beautiful girl with wavy long blonde hair, fair skin, and smooth gentle features that make her look like a princess.
"Yes, now come on get up, or Miss Isabelle will scold us for being late again." Says the girl before running off out the door and down the hall. Lilaine slowly gets out of bed, walking on the cold wood floor over to the wardrobe. She slowly gets dressed, on her way down to breakfast she quickly glances in the mirror, staring into her reflection, looking at her rather unusual eyes, Miss Isabelle says it's like looking into the starry sky. Lilaine doesn't always remember having such strange eyes, in fact she can recollect her mother commenting on her beautiful light blue eyes, of course those memories are from a time long past when she still had her parents and lived in a small cottage deep in the forest, before the incident.
Down at breakfast all the kids are running around and taking their seats at the long table down the center of the large room, starting to fill with light as the sun starts to peak over the top of the city. Lilaine spots Jessica, an african american with brown poofy hair, waving her down and goes to join her.
"Good morning." she says sitting down next to Jessica with a yawn.
"Lily, you really need to stop sneaking out of bed at night. How long do you stay up? You look exhausted." Jessica says with a worried tone.
"I can't help it, the sky is just so mesmerising, and I don't stay up that late." she says annoyed hearing this a zillion times before.
"I've known you long enough to know that that's a lie. You're going to pass out from exhaustion if you don't get sleep at night."
Just then the bell rings as Miss Isabelle comes in wearing a plain black dress with a white apron over it.
"Alright children settle down now, it's time to eat. Would anybody like to lead in saying the orphans code before we eat?" Lily quickly raises her hand offering to lead the orphans code as an excuse not to listen to Jessica nag her about staying up at night. The orphans code is a saying that they have at the orphanage that they say before every meal and before bed as a reminder to everyone that they will always have a place to call home.
"Home is not a place filled with fancy expensive things, it's filled with my brothers and sisters, laughter and smiles." After finishing, the other workers come in whealing platers in on a trolley and placing them around the table so everybody gets some. Lily immediately starts shoving her face with food.
"Lily are you even still listening?" "Sorry can't hear you, I'm too busy eating."
Later that day after breakfast everyone gathers behind the building on the large green lawn for story time, where Miss Isabelle reads everyone a story.
"Then the prince sets off to slay the great dragon and rescue the princess." before Miss Isabelle can finish the story one of the workers comes out and interrupts her.
"Miss Isabelle there's someone here to see you, they're waiting in your office."
"Alright, sorry children I'll finish the story later now why don't you all go and play in the field." She then turns to the worker and says
"Please stay here and watch them so they don't go too far or get hurt." she then goes inside and everybody starts playing tag while the worker sits with the toddlers playing with them.
Miss Isabelle walks into her office to find a young lady in her mid twenties to early thirties, wearing a long indigo dress with white lace around her neck and the bottom and around the cuffs of her sleeves, and wearing shiny black mary janes.
Miss Isabelle walks in ,"Hello, welcome to my orphanage. How may I help you?" she says as she sits down at her desk.
"Ah. Hello. Yes, I'm looking to adopt a child." Says the strange young lady.
"Oh, wonderful! I'm sure you'll fall in love with any one of the children here. They're all so delightful. If you would like I can take you out to meet them. They should be in the field playing." Miss Isabelle says excitedly.
"Oh, I would appreciate that. My name is Lucy by the way." says the strange woman.
They then head out back to take a look at all the children playing in the field. Miss Isabelle is showing Lucy all the children and Telling her about each one. Lucy then spots Lilaine and asks Miss Isabelle about her.
"Ah. Yes, that's Liliane a real jewel here among the orphanage. She's quite bright regarding her studies, great with the littles, and not to mention her beautiful looks. I think she will make it far in life. It's a real tragedy what happened to her though, she seems so lucky. But knowing her past, I don't know if you can call it that." She says with a hint of sorrow in her tone.
"How do you mean? What happened to her?" asks Lucy, curious.
"Well, as you know this is of course an orphanage, which means all the kids here don't have parents. Well her parents died in a forest fire. She lived in a cottage in the forest, and it caught fire one day. Her mother and her were in town and they were on their way back when they saw the fire. Her mother told her to stay on the edge of the forest and don't go inside, then her mother ran inside to find her father. A Few moments later her father came from along the edge of the forest. She told him that her mother ran inside, and he ran in after. Then a bunch of forest animals came running out and trampled her and knocked her unconscious. That's when I found her, when she came to almost the entire forest had burned. We had some knights go in and look for survivors… but all they found was ash."
"Oh that's so terribly awful. Well, would you look at the time! I really must be on my way to prior engagements. I will be sure to contact you within the week." as she says before hurrying off through the building and down the road toward the city.
A few moments later after Miss Isabelle calls all the children in for lunch and everyone is sitting down and eating, Lily goes up to Miss Isabelle and asks.
"Miss Isabelle? Who was that lady you were talking to earlier during story time? Was she the one who interrupted the story?"
"Oh hello Lily. Yes, she was the one who interrupted story time. She was here to look at you kids for possible adoption."
"Oh, well I hope not. I don't know what I'd do if someone were to leave. I love everyone here, their my family. My heart might just break in two if I had to say goodbye. Oh! But I'd be even worse if I had to leave. I want to stay here forever!" she exclaimed before heading back for the table and joining the little kids and helping clean up.
After hearing everything Lilaine just said Miss Isabelle thought it best not to tell her just yet. Not when anything is certain yet, and besides she just might decide to adopt someone else or not adopt at all. But she knew that was wishful thinking, she had seen that look many times before, Lucy had made up her mind.