Scorched

22

There was either a rotating skylight above her or she was full-out  hallucinating.

Everything was spinning around her — the skylight ceiling, the walls lined with guards, everyone's faces had at least four eyes; eight for the most, as well as two Landons.

Cleo brings her head down and looks to her red dressed lap,  she brings her hands before her and had to squint to make sure that she really did have ten fingers or was it eleven? Someone told her it was eleven once. Wait yes that was Jezio.

She throws her head back again and takes deep breathes as she flittingly glances at the spinning ceiling.

She was high. So so so high.

If there was something Cleo could say that Mabel excelled in and she approved of it; it had to be this. The incense is deeply wafted with lavender but the majority of it was opium. Cleo doesn't think anyone realized that it was opium— firstly, because it's not to be used unless it's for medicinal purposes, and secondly each and every person including all the guards; which were heavily guarded tonight was just as entranced as her. So there was no way anybody knew what was happening to them right this moment. Only the experienced, like her, would know.

She giggles softly and falls back onto the pillows beneath her with a loud plop. She laughs again because she fell down so hard, she could hear it. But how? These cushions are silk. It's soft.

She shakes her head lightly and gazes around the room with her cheek against the soft pillows. Everyone wasn't stable. Their eyes are all half-closed, drooping and Landon looked so tired, his knees were flailing and his tongue was sticking out.

Cleo reaches out with her hand to him, but after realizing that he wasn't just a few steps away from her, she pulls it back in.

She should of said something to Mabel. But she didn't. She craved this so bloody much that she just couldn't bring it up to her. And also, she didn't want to hurt poor Mabel's feelings, even though she used way too much opium and too little lavender herbs in her smoking incense chalices all over the ballroom.

But Cleo appreciated it, to hell with the consequences by this second part of Mabels therapy. She was going to savour in every minute of this. And then she will sleep soundly for the first time in years. So screw what anyone else will say, not that they could in their current state anyway. But whoever was not high right now.

Mabel stands in the middle of the room, waving the incense stick around them all; uttering things like, "Blessings upon us all. Good things are coming, I use my spirits to cleanse us all from evil!"

After that Cleo got bored and took the nearby chalice, and actually took out a raw herb of opium and chewed it along with the sweet blood red wine they offered. The embers from it hasn't even burned her fingertips, and she thinks she has swallowed a piece of lavender by accident. She chugged so much wine down after that, but she could still taste the strong scent at the back of her throat.

Cleo has then summoned one of the completely naked servants whose nipples  were circled with golden paint, and the curls below their belly buttons the same, for more wine. Cleo wrinkles her nose when she saw how they had to be clad tonight. How was one possibly supposed to wash that paint off, especially from the hair?

But excluding that, she thought they looked nice. With hair done up intricately with golden ribbons and glitter, and so many bracelets of gold and chains wrapped in them all, the girls looked like gorgeous rich gems.

When they had the time for this she didn't know.

Cleo knows this was all for her ceremony which was coming up. And all these therapies and shit was for her own well-being which were preparations for her to lead. If she survived at least. But she appreciated it, well this one to be specific.