𝐀 𝐒𝐖𝐀𝐍'𝐒 𝐋𝐔𝐋𝐋𝐀𝐁𝐘 - Cinderella AU

XXVI - there's no release at all

xxvi.

ISADORA TREMAINE SAT SEATED IN ONE, FROM PERHAPS a dozen of living rooms in the Angrian royal palace, with the forms of her mother, her sister, her maid and her little boy.

Though it was only she, her son, her maid and Lucinda Tremaine who were amongst the seated party occupying the gleaming green satin sofas. Lady Tremaine was at present engaged in a series of hushed vicious ramblings, that were almost making the elder woman's aging form quake as she walked to and fro about the length of the room, talking in harsh undertones as she kept directing insults and lamentations at both Isadora and herself, for a change.

Archie nestled closer to Isa as she hugged him to her side, encouraging him to keep playing with his small wooden horsy in his lap lest he misdirect his unfortunate grandmama's breakdown as something to be concerned over.

"It is my fault," Lady Tremaine lamented then, her hard facial features scrunched up in distaste and misery alike. "It is my fault to even trust in the fact that you had a brain in that head of yours, Isadora."

Lucy, the maid, kept her attentions on Archie as she sat on the other side of him, asking him questions about the game he was playing on his lap to keep him distracted.

"What were you thinking? How could you be so reckless? This child was going to be your undoing, I knew it from the start! And now you've made a gamble and risked all of our futures for his sake! In any other scenario had you chosen the Duke, it would've been all that I wanted-"

"And I do live to please you, mother," Isa managed with a mock smile.

The woman's features hardened some more as she stopped pacing about and faced her eldest daughter, looking like a grim faced Victorian muse against the palace living room wallpaper that an old and seemingly drunk Russian lovestruck painter would've painted before his suicide.

Isadora tilted her head as she made the comparison, wondering if an old Russian painter could've indeed fallen in love with her mother were this a different timeline—or a different place.

Lady Tremaine was indeed a brutal woman, with hard edges and an even harder tongue. But was she not bathed in centuries old as well as modern ideas and beliefs of propriety and class? There was no distinct beauty in her mother, but there was a sleek refine-ness, there was this feeling of stumbling upon an old but well maintained attic in an estate a fortunate protagonist just inherited-and Isadora's harsh mother seemed to radiate just that.

"I try and fail to fathom what could've occurred," The woman tried again, pushing past her anger and molding her tone to welcome the confidence from her eldest daughter that she hoped for.

"Surely the King had the good sense to advise you to give the child away and stay with him? If so, why did you not listen to him? Mon Dieu, his attachment to you could be seen by even a blind person. There was.. love, from your end too, wasn't there?" She tried again, the skin around her grey eyes crinkling as she forced herself to speak of that foreign word.

Isadora's heart clenched at the word. Ever since last night, she had shut herself away from all that her heart had suffered in the duration of the moment she had broken her engagement. The heartache had been too much, so she had shut it out. She had numbed herself to it. She had become stone to it.

"Indeed," Isadora managed, running her fingers nonchalantly through Archie's curls, "A stark contrast to the love you and poor old papa had for each other, I believe."

Lady Tremaine's facial skin pinched red at the jab, her fists tightening at her sides as the veins in her neck jutted out.

"Look at you," She sneered. "You make foolish choices, jeopardize our futures, and instead of being responsible enough you pick at your mother's past. That is low for you, Isa."