Cinderellion (bxb)

Chapter 4: Damn Him

I spent the whole week thinking of a way I could talk to Dr. Aubert. I had thought of following him, or finding out the places he frequents most, but I drew the line at stalking the man, so I was back to stage one. Two hours before the ball started, and I was helping Dru into his clothes. Which I'm sure he thought was a taunt to me, but my brain was too busy with thoughts about how to get to Dr. Aubert that I couldn't care less.

I stepped back from tying Dru's cravat so he could look at himself in the mirror. He analyzed it for a good ten seconds before frowning. "I don't like this one," he said, then pulled it off and tossed it at me.

I opened his wardrobe and put the navy cravat back before pulling out an ash coloured one, I was about to close the door when an idea hit me full force. I stared at all of Dru's coats and trousers. I could still go to the ball, the Tremaines' don't have to know, there was going to be hundreds of people there, surely I wouldn't be the only blond, blue-eyed man in the room.

I closed the door and turned back to Dru. He went through three more cravats before he finally decided on a bottle green bowtie. The two of us headed downstairs to where Lord Tremaine and Anastasia sat in the parlour, both already in their ballroom attire. Anastasia's bright-violet dress had such a large hoop skirt that Lord Tremaine had sacrificed his spot on the opposite end of the couch, where there's a perfect view out the window, to keep the proper distance from his daughter. He sat on the couch opposite her. Dru and I in our usual chairs.

The conversation, as usual during family-bonding-time, was truly captivating. I spent the thirty minutes fiddling with my fingers and thinking over every aspect of my plan. It was eight o-clock when they got up to leave. I stayed where I was, and when they were out of the room I snuck as close as I could get to the front hall without them seeing and listen. Most of it was useless conversation except for when Lord Tremaine said, "...work to do early tomorrow. So, we are going to leave at midnight on the dot..." Then their voices disappeared as the front door closed behind them.

Midnight, I repeated in my head. I'd have to be home before them. When I peered out a window and found that the carriage —luckily, I was not their driver,

they'd hired someone to do that— was off the laneway and on the road to the city, I turned and run back upstairs to Dru's chamber. I threw open his wardrobe and pulled out a whole, high-society-worthy outfit. And yes, I even pulled out a cravat.

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I made it to the palace almost an hour later. The line of carriages was almost gone completely, so I only a had to wait ten minutes. When I finally got up to the palace, a servant rushed forward to take my horse, I gave him instructions to have her brought back to the front at eleven-thirty and then walked up the front steps and through the amazingly large doors that are opened by guards. I gave my full name to a man standing in the antechamber, hoping that my name was in fact on the list. I am a Tremaine, so it must've been. I refrained from wringing my hands while the man searched the list, he gave me a nod and I swallowed my sigh of relief.

The ballroom was crowded with women in colourful dresses and men in tall hats. That's one thing I didn't get, a hat. But I did change my hair from its usually mess of blond locks to a middle part that, admittedly, looked amazing on me. And the blue cravat matched my eyes and brought them out perfectly. I had to cuff the sleeves of my coat and ends of my pant legs, otherwise I would be accidentally hitting people with my too long sleeves and tripping over the extra fabric around my ankles. Gods, Dru was so lanky.

I scanned for the Tremaines' but the ballroom was huge, and I didn't see them anywhere. As fortunate as that was, it also meant I'd have a hell of a time trying to find Dr. Aubert. I remembered the man just barely, only the details that my child brain picked out; big belly, big ears, white hair, and dark eyes that reminded me too much of the eyes of the bugs I had caught outside the day before he first came.