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iridescentquill-blog · 6 years ago

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Short Story Sunday

I have never felt more nervous than when I try to publish my worksl; so I’m hoping if I do so more often, I will feel better about it. This short story uses the prompt “Things aren’t always as they seem.” This is using a character who is in my story Dear Me (who won’t actually appear in the cannon story for a while, but I love her anyways), which you should read if you like stories that don’t always follow the status quo. If you want to suggest a prompt in my ask, feel free to do so! Enjoy!

The Hiyal Ball is the event of the year. Everyone who is anyone attends the palace’s annual celebration, lest they find their names snubbed alongside others who dared to refuse the royal family’s invitation. And who would want to miss such a gilded event? From the fragrant rose-filled vases on every wall to the delicate hors d'oeuvres lining each table, everything about this place screamed luxury. Not to mention the guests, whose attire always spoke of the wealth of the wearers and who wore smiles fit for their stations.

Yes, the Hiyal Ball is the most luxurious place to find oneself each year.

And Reginald Halden has been one such attendee to find himself an invitation each year since his coming of age some five years ago. During the balls Reginald has wasted no time schmoozing up to each of his superiors, desperately clawing his way toward the top of the social ladder, and he usually finds himself better off each time. This year, however, he finds himself holding back. It is, after all, the last year he will be attending the ball alone; in a couple months he will be wed to his betrothed, a fair woman by the name of Cassandra Garter.

At the thought of her, Reginald scans the crowd; observing the wives of other well-to-do gentlemen. For, here, wives are like accessories that the gentry carry on their arms; the nicer they look the wealthier the husband appears to be. Reginald vows to make his Cassandra outshine them all, save the royal family of course.

Although, as he thinks this to himself, he notices a couple nearby and is surprised he has only just noticed them. The man, a round fellow with a pencil mustache, straightens his slightly undersized jacket, showing off dozens of glittering jewels and golden stiches as he does so. After he finds his attire to be catching the maximum amount of candlelight, he turns and offers an arm to the woman beside him. If his attire seemed garish, her dressing is outright ludicrous. Her gown is made of shimmering golden thread, and resting upon almost every bit of exposed skin is a piece of jewelry encrusted with diamonds.

Reginald takes a brief moment to pick up his jaw and quickly scan the room, only to find many of the lords and ladies also trying to break their stares at the outlandishly extravagant couple. Reginald shakes his head slightly, believing the man mad for daring to try and outdo the royal family. Surely the gown his wife is wearing is worth as much as all the food laid before them in the dining hall, and yet he still allowed her to wear it.

“A smart man knows when to stop,” Reginald mutters, turning on his heel to follow the crowd as they began to make their way from the dining hall to the throne room to receive the royal family.

The same events as previous years transpires, much to Reginald’s relief; he did not want to be at a ball where the crown princess, or worse the queen, was outshone by a subject. In fact, it seemed the extravagant gentleman had the sense to stay out of view of the royal family, as Reginald did not notice the couple in the throne room or the ballroom where the party travelled to next. It is not until Reginald decided to take a break from the warm interior by taking a stroll through the gardens that he catches the visage of a golden gown curving around a corner.

Merely curious, Reginald awkwardly breaks his current path to follow the couple. What he expected to find when he turned the corner, he could not say, but the sight that greets him is shocking, nonetheless. There, before his very eyes, is the couple standing before a young maid, each holding one of her small arms.

The maid, barely of age it would seem, is a beautiful thing. Her hair is as fair as the moon that shines upon the group, falling in soft curls past her shoulders and chest. Her fair skin is covered in a simple white frock, a standard for the maids assigned to the party to sing or dance for guests who leave the crowd inside the ballroom. But, and this Reginald stares at far too long, her most striking feature is her pair of glittering sapphire eyes, glancing worriedly toward the palace beyond the hedge. Reginald distantly has the idea that she would be a beautiful bride.

“This one darling? But she is so scrawny! She’ll pass of malnourishment before we even get to the manor,” the gentleman says as he uses his free hand to grip the girl’s small chin and turn it toward him. A small pained squeak escapes her lips as he does so.

“Yes, dearest, but do be careful. She is as fair as a dove, and can sing like one, too! I saw her the last time we came here, and I told myself I absolutely must have her next time I come. Please, purchase her for me? She can sing to me when you are away on business!”

The gilded woman gently removes her husband’s hand from the girl, but the dark coloring from where he gripped her is already noticeable even from the distance Reginald stands. Reginald feels the need to stop this, to not allow the man and woman to abscond with such a fair and beautiful maiden, when the girl makes a quick movement and breaks free of the other’s grasp.

However, when she runs away, she heads deeper into the maze of roses, rather than toward the palace. The couple immediately give chase, clearly not wanting to lose their prize, and Reginald follows right after; why he follows he cannot say.

The group manage to keep up with one another, and Reginald believes that he is going unnoticed in the couples focus on their own quarry and one another, as the gentleman has to practically drag his golden rose behind him. They get so deep into the maze that all sounds of the party begin to fall away until the chirping crickets and heavy footfalls overpower the sound completely. It is only when the couple begins to slow does Reginald notice another noise: water. Something softer than a waterfall yet louder than a pond fills the silence left between the chorus of insects the warm night brought. The beauty of it causes him to not notice the couple’s harsh whispers until he has only caught the tail end of the gentleman’s thought.

“…doesn’t need legs to sing, I think.”

Reginald’s heart skips a beat, and he looks just past the man’s shoulder. There, in the center of the maze is a large marble fountain. Crystal droplets shoot from the top in a glittering shower before falling into the intricately decorated basin below. On the lip of the pool stands the maiden, facing away from the couple and Reginald. The latter quickly finds a spot to hide, fearing the gentleman’s actions if he were to be discovered eavesdropping on his plan to harm a royal maid. From the spot he finds, Reginald can see only the maid, but can hear the couple easily over the sound of the fountain.

“Girl, what gall you have to run from Lord and Lady Rivera!” the gentleman, apparently Lord Rivera, shouts at the girl. The name clicks in Reginald’s memories as that of the largest slave traders in the south of the country. It is no wonder, then, how he can afford such riches.

The girl, for her part, does finally turn to face the couple, but not in the way they expected. Her chin is raised in defiance, and on her sweet lips is a menacing grin. Her sapphire eyes glint as she looks down upon the wealthiest couple in the land as if they were mere insects.

But rather than respond to the harsh words of Lord Rivera, she began to hum. A mesmerizing melody that she carried into a song;

A fair white flower grows in the gardens/ A bloom so rarely viewed/ A queen will walk among the blossoms/ A whispered wish to the moon/ A secret prayer to all the flowers/ A desire of her darkest heart

Her haunting melody moved throughout the now almost silent space, Reginald not noticing that even the fountain seemed to have stopped its torrent to listen. Indeed, where once water flowed from the top of the fountain, now only ice, frozen over the course of a few verses. Even the Riveras, who had been making sounds akin to fish out of water, had watched in silent horror as the girl began to move her body in time with her own eerie song.

A fair white flower grows in the garden/ A queen of darkness blooms/ A desire wished to the garden/ A wish heard by a flower/ A desire granted by a flower/ A flower with blood red roots.

She had moved closer to the Riveras, Reginald hadn’t even noticed, he had become so transfixed by the sound of the girl’s singing that it was only as her heard a horrified screech accompanying a sickening slurp that he could even be broken from the trance. He poked his head around the hedge he had been hiding behind, and watched as Lady Rivera ran toward the fountain, her golden dress wrapping around her legs and sending her to the ground in a heap of glinting material. From just out of Reginald’s view, the sickening sound of gulping and relived sighing stopped; followed by a loud wet thud as something fell to the ground in time with Lady Rivera.

In that instant a white blur streaked past Reginald, and he saw the horror that had been making such revolting noises. The fair maiden was standing on the lip of the fountain again, staring down at the heap of Lady Rivera, but she was no longer seemed so pure.

Her simple white frock was stained bright scarlet, as was her platinum hair and porcelain skin. But what was most striking was the way that once sweet smile was now stained with a dripping mess of crimson. A giggle no longer fitting the girl who uttered it escaped the lips of the monster as she watched Lady Rivera attempt to right herself and back away from the creature.

“Who are you?” the Lady’s terrified voice managed to utter, reflecting Reginald’s own thoughts.

The giggling girl hopped of the basin, and stepped before her prey. She spoke her reply quite clearly, before two elongated fangs sank into the neck of the golden woman.

“A fair white flower, answering the wish of a queen.”

#Short Story #Creative Writing #Things Aren't As They Seem #Vampire #Vampires #Horror #Creepy #Blood #Dear Me

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