"Lucette, are you okay?" Miranda asked, and Lucette nodded her head while walking to their respective room.
"You're clearly not. Did something happen when you served Madam Sophie? Did she tell you something that upset you? You were behaving strangely since then," Miranda told her. Lucette usually talked to her about everything that happened to her even the small details, sometimes her head would ache just from her blabbering, but she let her talk to her heart's content. But now she was quiet and seemed disturbed.
Besides Madame Sophie didn't like Lucette. Whenever she made a mistake, the vampiress would be in charge of the punishment. But the little girl beside her attracted problems wherever they were. Miranda shook her head helplessly.
"She didn't do or say anything. I am fine. I was thinking about something. You know, whenever I think about something, it would carry me to the land of imagination," Lucette responded.
Miranda sighed. She worried herself for nothing, thinking that the vampiress punished her again. "Go to sleep, I have some work to do." As the head maid, she had to work late and woke up earlier than them.
Lucette went to her room, changed into a loose robe and lay in her small bed. The other maids chatted and laughed with each other. Lucette turned to look at the dark sky from the window, playing with her light brown hair.
"Did you hear about the latest news?" a maid whispered.
"About what?" another maid said.
"Werewolves killed a vampire, and the king has a meeting with the werewolf's king. The matter spread over the kingdom, they said a war would begin..."
Lucette's ear picked the latest gossip the maids talked. They were close to her, and her hearing sense was good. Lucette sat on her bed. The others continued to chat and didn't look at her.
"Another war is going to start?" one maid with curly black hair asked, as she looked terrified.
'A war?' Lucette's body trembled, she was a child in the last war. Although her memory was hazy, she would never forget these feelings: fear, despair, and anguish.
"No, the king took action, saying that both the vampire and the werewolves will join hands in marriage to stop the dispute between the two races," the maid with red hair said while the other two winded their eyes.
"Marriage?" Lucette walked towards them and asked, "Is what you said true?"
"Of course, it's true." The maid with red hair sneered and talked to the others, ignoring her.
"Who is going to marry?"
"The princess for sure."
"Oh!"
"Why? Do you want to marry instead?"
"It would be great if I could. Won't be like the novels..."
The maids continued talking. Lucette turned to her bed and jumped on it, bumping her head into the wall, she groaned and rubbed the aching zone.
'So the vampiress was talking about the princess' marriage? If it's true, then she could meet her again.' she smiled and closed her eyes.
Her memories went to the first days they moved to the palace.
"Lucy, stay here and don't wander around. I will check on you later," her mother said. Her mother got the job, and she was happy. The little Lucette nodded and her mother kissed her cheek.
The time went by and her mother didn't come. In a strange place, Lucette felt lonely and scared. She went out. Her short size didn't help as she saw the walls extending higher, she walked by the side looking for her mother. Whenever she heard footsteps, Lucette would hide.
Till someone caught her and carried her. "Little mouse, what are you doing here?"
Lucette struggled in the woman's embrace, and tears formed in her eyes. She faced the stranger who gazed at her with gentle red eyes. The woman had red eyes like hers.
"Are you lost? From which family are you?" The tall woman asked.
"My mother is a maid here," Lucy said, and the woman smiled at her.
"My name is Celeste. What's your name?" she asked the little girl.
"Lucette," she whispered, and Celeste complimented about how beautiful her name was.
A woman wearing the same outfit as her mother rushed over and said, "Princess, the king summoned you to his office room."
Lucette put her small hand over her open mouth, "Are you a princess?" she exclaimed, The kind woman chuckled and nodded, she put her down patted her head and went away after ordering the maid to take her to her mother.
So that's what a princess looks like? Can she be a princess? She had red eyes too!
Since that time, Lucette would sneak out hoping to meet Celeste who would take her to play together, and sometimes the princess would teach her the alphabet. Lucy's attachment to the princess grew with every passing day, but the happiness didn't stay in the palace as she left to study outside.
"Lucy, continue studying. When I visit you in the future, make sure it will be in a better place and a better condition, and you will achieve what you want. Dream of something better and try hard to get it," Lucette nodded, although she didn't understand what the princess said. She believed the princess' words.
Before leaving, Celeste requested her tutor to allow Lucette to study with her cousin, Kim. In the beginning, Lucette talked with the little girl her age and thought she would be her friend, but that never happened because of the bad woman, Kim's mother.
That woman would never allow her to sit beside her daughter, talk to her or even get near Kim. The disgust in her eyes and the way Kim's mother talked hurt her. Lucette ignored all this and focused on studying to fulfil her promise to the princess.
Till That day, Kim's mother accused her of stealing her precious ring. Lucette got punished as the vampiress gripped her hand hard nearly breaking it. It pained her she cried a lot in her mother's embrace. That night, she lost her warm embrace and her passion for studying as she never held a pen or a book again till today.
The feeling was still vivid. Lucette rubbed her hand and closed her eyes. That woman became her nightmare whenever she visited the palace. She looked down on her because she was the maid's daughter.
Just because she was related to the king, she could do whatever she wanted.
If the princess came back and she got the chance to meet her again, she would feel ashamed. Now, everything differed from before, she wasn't a little girl anymore and she achieved nothing.
'I worked hard day and night.'
She hadn't the courage to face the princess.
A tear dropped from her eye, but she wiped it.