The Anima [completed]

10.

(Huge chapter ahead- lots of information to take in)

10.

I had yet to see the outside world and yet the workers that rushed around me showed me more than could be seen in the light. In the dark, the world of the Fae came alive. Their obscure and fantastical features highlighted by makeup, extravagant dresses, and revealing clothing showed every inch of their peculiar bodies. Their prying hands had ripped me from the performance studio in the late afternoon to beat my face with makeup and pull my hair into a variety of curls and twists, leaving half my hair down.

Vanessa was no where to be seen, but I could hear her annoyed cries from the next room over, yelling at the "elves" as they pulled at her own hair. I scratched my palms anxiously as I waited to see the finished product of my face. Nothing could have prepared me. As a Faerie shoved an oval mirror into my hands, I could not recognise the woman who stared back at me.

Flawless skin and contoured cheekbones made me look like one of them with their sharp chins and angular faces. My thick eyebrows framed elegant smoked eyes with sharp cat eyeliner and gold glitter upon the lids. The front of my hair was pulled back in a series of elegant and extravagant braids while the rest of my hair was left in its normal mess of curls. If it weren't for my amber irises, I wouldn't have recognised myself.

"LYRA!" Vanessa's scream could be heard from down the hall, where in their own private rooms, the rest of the team were being prepared.

The vine doors curled open and she stormed in, paper held high in her hand. The Fae girls were quick to disappear out the same door, not saying a word. She was almost as unrecognisable as myself; hair pulled into an elegant bun atop a angular face with purple lids and blinding highlight. Even more incredible was her dress; a waterfall of blue and purple skirts which fell loose from beneath her swollen breasts. It was the one thing I was missing as the blue skinned ladies refused to remove me from my white clothes.

"Pixies..." She muttered under her breath before turning her gaze upon me. "You betta be ready to give one hell of a performance, because we are the closing number." She slammed the piece of paper on the table in front of me, biting her fingernails as soon as it was from her grip.

My breath hitched as I saw that we were indeed last on the list of performers. That meant that not only did we have more time to build the internal skyscrapers of anxiety, but it also meant that we had to make a lasting impression. Whoever closed the show always got either the least attention or the most in my own experience of performing, and I got the feeling we were about to have every Fae eye in the kingdom upon us. There was no room for mistakes, only elite and professional success.

"We will be fine." I said more to myself than to Vanessa, stopping myself from raking my hands through my delicately made hair.

"You are right." She nodded and clasped her hands together dramatically; "We just have to pretend like its practice... although the cello guy keeps stuffing it on the bridge... Yeah! We will be fine." She was muttering as she finally stopped and took in my appearance.

"Okay but why are you not dressed?" She cried out and ran over to the closet in the corner of the room.

"I don't know." I shrugged and clutched the necklace I had refused to give over to the Faeries. "I think they want me in this. They haven't told me about any dress."

"That's ridiculous! They match everyone's makeup and hair to their dress!" She threw her hands up in the air and began to rifle through the clothes locked away in the closet.

"Not me." I muttered, staring at my hands in my lap. I didn't understand why they would embarrass me like this. Everyone else would look so beautiful in their dresses and tuxedoes, while I'd be performing lead in the 'human pyjamas' I had worn for a day and a half.