"Excuse me," I mumble. I walk slowly towards the princess, who is receiving flirts from six different men at one time. Devon stops talking and faces me. It's an awkward moment. Neither of us talk. I'm debating on whether to call her 'Your Majesty' or not when she pulls me into a hug. "Cil. What. . . How?" We both laugh nervously. People are staring at us for sure. The crown prince's first chosen dance partner hugging their princess.
But I ignore them. Devon leads me away from the dance, through a room and into the gold lined halls. We take an elevator to the highest floor. She opens a door and steps inside, dragging me along with her. The room his huge, with beautiful tapestries and rugs lining the walls and floor.
Devon turns to me and says, "All right, Cil. What are you doing here?" I tell her absolutely everything, although I know I shouldn't. Fortunately, Devon doesn't call for me to get arrested. Instead, she just frowns. "Yeah, Zarina- er, the Dark Lady's reign isn't much appreciated by the others either. But Elytheia refused her during her first reign, and it didn't turn out so well. I think dad- the king- is just trying to protect all of us. But I wouldn't hate it if your plan succeeded."
Then, she tells me her story.
Apparently the woman from seven years ago had brought her to this new country. She had been adopted by the former king and queen, otherwise known as the grandparents of the crown prince. The former king and queen were lonely, with nothing to do. Their son was ruling the country, and they felt depressed. Their daughter in law, the present queen, had this great idea to bring them a kid they could happily adopt and raise together. The child would lift their feelings for a while.
Unfortunately, none of the Elytheian children were cut out for this, since they were treated as adults from the moment they were old enough to walk and talk, as part of tradition. So, they visited many countries' orphanages, including on in a small town in Crystalline. Twenty children were chosen, and each spent a week with the former king and queen. This was supposed to be temporary, but the couple loved three children so much that they decided to permanently adopt them. The youngest of the three was Devon. The other two left for their own countries after two years. Devon stayed one more year. By then, she was fourteen years old. Then the former king and queen passed away, leaving Devon with no guardians and no home.
Since she had been good friends with one of the princes anyway, the present king and queen adopted her. But this caused problems. The king and queen already had two sons. Now that Devon was part of the royal family, the Elytheian crown would go to her, since she was the eldest Elytheian child. The Elytheians didn't want a foreigner ruling their country. Luckily, Princess Devona had no intention of becoming queen, so she stepped aside, letting the oldest prince take the throne. Thanks to this, problems were fixed up pretty quickly after that.
We cried, we bonded, and after an hour, we were back to being inseparable friends again. "But Cil, we really should get back to the ballroom. They're going to be announcing the top 100 soon, and you're number one on that list."
So we head downstairs, and receive several confused looks from the guests. The plump announcer walks back into the ballroom and says, "The choosing of the one hundred eligible maidens for the prince's bride will commence now. These one hundred maidens will stay in the castle, and participate in the competition for the place in the royal family for six months. Now, for the first elimination process. . ." Everybody stops what they are doing and listen to the plump man. While they're doing this, I keep wondering if this whole thing is a televised reality show. "First, the crown prince Benjamin Rosemire the second's first chosen partner, Miss Locusta Array!"
Lights shine down on me. Or should I say, lights shine down on Locusta Array. That's my new ID. We had to make sure we got an actual person who wasn't coming to the ball. Locusta Array is a teenage girl living in the outskirts of the capital city of Rosemire. She didn't want to come to the ball, but as an extra precaution we sent some Dynatos kids to threaten her to keep her mouth shut if her name mysteriously appeared on the top 100 nominees for the royal family. Somebody pushes me forward, and I carefully walk onto a platform.
"Second, King Benjamin's fifteen choices!" The king chooses fifteen girls, the queen chooses fifteen girls, the younger prince chooses fifteen girls, Devon chooses fifteen girls, and the crown prince, Benjamin Rosemire, chooses the rest. Most of these girls' ages range from seventeen to twenty something.
Lorria is chosen by the queen. The prince chooses Ayla and another Sophixian. Devon chooses the remaining nine from our mission group, and I smile at her in thanks. The younger prince chooses some mysterious looking women with tattoos on their arms.
"The one hundred maidens have been picked!" The announcer yells. "Unfortunately, the ones who didn't get picked must go home-" A lot of shrieks and wails follow these words. "Yes, yes, I'm sorry, people! Our guards will help you all out."
In this case, 'help you all out' means prying crazy hysterical women off the castle walls. The castle is filled with sobs from the girls who have not been chosen.
The one hundred are led to a new part of the castle that had been under construction from the moment the crown prince was born. The beautiful building has seventeen floors- signifying the seventeen years the crown prince has been born- surrounded by glass panes. The one hundred girls each get a room. All together, we take up five floors. I get the one on the seventeenth floor, meaning I get a penthouse.
The room is more like a large apartment flat. It has a living room with intricately designed rugs, and a velvet couch. There's a mini chandelier giving light. I find three TVs, one in the living room, one in the bathroom, and one in the bedroom. There's one bathroom for showering, and another with only a toilet inside. The sinks' countertops are made of marble. A walk-in closet the size of my old bedroom is Sophix is full of huge gowns and silky dresses. But the real beauty lies within the bedroom. A king-size bed with silky sheets face a huge window. The window faces the castle lake, allowing me to stare into the peaceful blue waters. I plop down on the bed, and think that maybe this won't be too bad after all.
I thought that too soon. For the course of the next two weeks, we're faced with ridiculous and dumb challenges, each created by the members of the royal family, inspired by Elytheian tradition. At the end of the week, thirty of us have been eliminated from the group of one hundred girls. The castle is having a feast to celebrate and to mark the end of the first two weeks of the three month long event.
The feast will be tomorrow, where we'll get our first chance to give the royals our potion. Devon agrees to help. I've told the other girls all about her, and they trust her warily.
Our plan is ruined because of the fact that the royals all have poison tasters. But Devon tells us that there's always a challenge round where contestants- no, the 'eligible maidens' have to cook something for the royal family. We can get a chance to slip the mind controlling potion then. Until that time comes, though, we need to make sure we don't get eliminated.
That's when the first disaster strikes. The Fulcans enter the castle. Ayla and I quickly hide, as they will recognize us. We hear them tell the king of imposters. The king looks extremely uneasy, but agrees to the Fulcan's terms of searching the castle.
The Fulcans declare a Sophixian is found amongst our midst. Lorria is brought out. The king weakly calls out for her to be arrested, but Lorria quickly disarms the guards. She then flees the castle. Nine young men- our Dynatos and Sophixian companions- are also discovered on the outskirts of the castle, in five flying cars.