Marmalade's Love Potion

Chapter 24 - Paths of Power - Part 1

Penelope wandered the gardens until her feet ached. With numb detachment, she turned to face the lights shining from the tall windows of the ballroom. As she approached, the sounds of strings and flutes, so pleasant earlier in the evening, grated at her, causing nerves along her neck to twitch. The bright glow spilling from the ballroom, which had earlier seemed so enticing, now seemed harsh and piercing. She blinked against the onslaught to her senses, breathing through the pain building behind her eyes.

Drifting back across the terrace arcade towards the nearest arch, Penelope stood once more on the precipice of the ballroom watching the revelry.

The whirl of dancers, once so enchanting in their glimmering finery, now seemed a gruesome carnival; laughter was shrill and mean, the rapid tread of feet discordant and threatening.

Penelope longed to leave. Circling the edge of the room, she raced towards the staircase, behind which she noticed a series of doors. Heart racing as the noise chased her through the room, Penelope flung open the nearest door and stumbled through, slamming it shut behind her.

The sound of falling water brought her back to herself. Peering around the room, Penelope found herself in a lavish washroom. The space was hexagonal in shape, with doors set along each wall save the one opposite the entrance, which bore a large, bronze-framed mirror. Set in each corner was a small potted tree. Thin trunks of knotted silver wood climbed upwards, branches twining overhead in a pavilion of delicate wisteria. The mass of flowers chimed with a sound like starlight striking crystal. In the centre of the room stood a circle of quartz wash basins. A delicate waterfall spilled into them, the constant flow of water fed from copper pipes set into the high ceiling.

Penelope found herself able to take a full breathe for the first time since speaking with her parents, and she sagged her weight against the door. Hearing voices approach from the other side, Penelope quickly enclosed herself in a stall. She spent long moments working to gather herself, her thoughts spiralling in painful disarray, as she listened to the muted chatter come and go.

When the voices were gone, Penelope emerged once more, rinsing her hands in the cool stream of clear water. Splashing her face and neck to alleviate the fever prickling across her skin, Penelope dried her hands on a plush towel with careful, deliberate motions. She drew her gloves back over her fingers, distracting herself from the torrent within her mind with the sparkle of diamonds.

She wondered idly where the Sisters were, and how she would find them. Penelope was desperate to return home. Home. She longed for the quiet of the forest, to wander amongst flowers that had yet to be named, to sit sequestered beneath the shaded branches of trees that knew her heart.

Penelope turned to lean back against the sink and raised her eyes to the large mirror. Her gown seemed bare without her flowers, rivers of beaded lace exposed in their absence. Ringlets framed her flushed cheeks, her skin still dewy with cosmetic butters and the shimmer of eye powder.

Gingerly, Penelope wiped at the charcoal smudges beneath her eyeline and scrubbed away the evidence of tear tracks. Save for the slight bleariness to her eyes, she appeared much the same as when she had arrived. Yet she felt she were now a wholly changed creature.

Penelope watched the tick in her jaw as she clenched her teeth, watched the lifeless fabric of her sparkling gown ripple as she raised her curled hands, stared into her own narrowed eyes as she brought her fists down against the mirror's surface in a great crunching of glass, her shriek of grief and rage muted in the unnatural hush of the room.

At that moment, the door behind her opened and Ivy tipped into the room sobbing into her gloved hands. She was followed by a tall man in a crisp suit with flowing tails, who was murmuring a litany of comfort to the distressed princess. He abruptly stopped speaking as they caught Penelope's eye in the mirror, both staring at her in shock.