Painted Roses

Luka Rose

"Now," Rosalia said that evening, spreading out eight miniature paintings on her bed beside The Frog and kneeling down, straightening them and setting the first one in front of him.

They were paintings of her family. The Frog had asked for a proper explanation of everyone so he could remember all the members that were continually popping up.

"This is my father," Rosalia started, presenting the painting of a handsome older gentleman, with a straight back, kind face but with piercing eyes. His brown hair had a streak of grey through it and he looked out of the painting like he was examining you. "Here, we have the eldest son and child, Valentine and his twin sister, Antoinette."

Both siblings were tall, with auburn hair and sharp blue eyes.

"Next, we have Constantine."

The third child and second son was also tall, with dark red hair tied at the base of his neck and a smirk on his face, green eyes glittering with amusement.

"Then there is Marie-Fey."

The fourth child was a brunette, smiling with something akin to arrogance in the upturn of her attractive lips, marring her beauty – but only if you looked at it from the right angle.

"Then there is me, who you know," Rosalia continued, placing her own portrait down. She smiled out of the painting with her blonde hair curling around her neck, and The Frog noted there was something dismissive in her green eyes that he had yet to see in the real thing.

"And of course, Beldon," she finished, placing down Beldon's portrait, his face not displaying any particular emotion but he was as striking as ever with golden hair and electric blue eyes that watched the artist (or viewer). "Father's favourite, or at least, he was," Rosalia said, frowning at the portrait.

"Was?" The Frog asked, but Rosalia didn't answer, he wasn't even sure she'd heard so he returned to the portraits. "And the last?" he asked, looking to the final miniature that sat separate from the rest.

Rosalia picked it up, smiling at the painting before turning it to him. "This is my mother," she replied, revealing the same beautiful woman from the entrance hall, with golden hair like Rosalia's and blue eyes like Beldon's.

"All her portraits are very young," The Frog said, his tone wary – after all, he had glimpsed all the other members of Rosalia's family, apart from her.

"Yes well, my father only knew her when she looked like this," Rosalia said, smiling at the portrait again, "He hasn't chanced letting some artist depict her older self. Sadly she passed away when we were young so her portraits remind young."

"Your father never thought to remarry?"

"Oh no, never," Rosalia said, gathering up the miniature, "friends and family did try and pressure other marriages onto him, highly advantageous marriages in some cases, others were simply good for companionship, but he refused them all. Married for love and he won't go through it again." She stood up and put the portraits on a side table to be returned to the gallery at some point. "Valentine says Father is haunted by her but what can one do?" she smiled as she turned towards him. "Do you have any siblings?"

The Frog seemed to start at the question, then fussed about smoothing the patch of quilt he sat on. "Yes, I do, well as a frog, one would expect me to have a few," he said.

Rosalia opened her mouth to ask after them when a knock at the door sent The Frog bounding under the pillows of her bed just as Marie-Fey walked in.

"Rosa, dear, who are you speaking to?" she asked, looking around the empty room as Rosalia busied herself with the portraits.

"Oh, no one, Mother, I suppose," she said, holding up the portrait.