The warm evening air floated in through the open window, fluttering the flimsy curtains as I sat on my bed with Kala, and couldn’t help but marvel at her beauty. Kala was the definition of beautiful; on the tall slide and slim with blonde ringlets that fell past her shoulders, and her eyes were deep blue and set on a flawless face.
“Hold still Nyla, please,” she sighed in an ardent tone.
I sighed. “Sorry Kala,”
“It’s fine, now, don’t move...!”
I felt the bed dip and rise as she climbed off it gracefully and danced away, keeping her eyes on me to make sure I didn’t move, and I made her smile as I made myself a statue, hardly daring to breathe. Kala could be a fierce friend when she was on the beauty warpath.
“Now, just the finishing touches...” she grinned, appearing in front of me.
“Do you have to do that?” I half scowled.
“Yes,”
I rolled my eyes and kept still as Kala started to apply a dusting of glitter to my face, and then a thin layer of green eye-shadow to my eyelids and a thick layer of back kohl around my eyes that she then dragged away from my eye and into a pattern that I couldn’t quite make out. Then, with a triumphant look that only Kala could pull off, she stepped away and I stood up, biting my lip.
“Nyla don’t do that,” she scolded, smiling. “You’ll chap your lips.”
“Yeah, sorry,” I mumbled.
“Now, come and look at yourself!”
I took a deep breath and let Kala lead me over to the full length mirror that stood proudly in my room, and she pulled the velvet cover down, and my eyes trailed after it as it fell to the floor in one fluid moment and landed in a perfect heap on my crème coloured carpet. Only then did I raise my eyes to see what Kala had turned me in to. It took my breath away to see what she had me of me; my slim body was covered in a floor length deep green silk dress that hugged my figure in all the right places, and it was strapless, showing off the curves of my shoulders and my dark red hair fell poker straight over my shoulders and to my waist and woven into strands of it were green and silver Faerie Silk, and it was held off my face by a string of diamonds that glittered when I tilted my head. And then there was my face, Kala was amazing. She had added rouge to my cheeks, flushing them gently and the whole of my face was dusted with glitter, and my eyes... the pale green coated eyelids made my natural evergreen eyes stand out, and the black kohl was curled around the corner of each of my eyes and flicked out in various places, and I felt my mouth hang open in wonder.
“Kala...” I started to say, but she placed a hand over my lips.
“Hush, it’s all in a day’s work, now Nyla, come, put on your party shoes and let’s go!” Kala grinned.
I nodded and slipped on the black court heels with a T-bar strap, and Kala and I hurried out of the room, walking down the corridor towards the Great Hall of Avalon Castle, my home. Tonight, I would not have to care about anything, just as long as Abassi was there. My Abassi, he was like my night knight in shining armour. Well, my antidote to the world.
“Come on Nyla, you know Stacia will be worrying!” Kala said, breaking through my train of thought.
“Oh, right, yes, of course,”
I smiled as we half ran down towards the Great Hall, and I could see my mother pacing outside the doors, worry lines indented on her skin. Stacia was beautiful even when she was worried, and when she looked up at the sound of our approach, her face broke into a relieved smile.
