Liberty Lost

Chapter Two - Sophie

Sophie Durand was having tea in the dark. 

Not the True Dark, mind you. More of a musty, shadowed kind of dark that comes from an overuse of heavy gold satin window dressings. If her mother could read minds she would tell her eldest daughter to stop being so dramatic—it wasn’t dark, it was dimly lit. And perhaps she could read minds because right this second she was staring at Sophie; her eyes, heavy with makeup, were imperceptibly narrowed. Only immediate family and servants good enough to know what side their bread was buttered on could decipher the Empress’s many minute facial expressions.  

Never taking her eyes from Sophie, who was prolonging eye contact as long as possible, the Empress waved down a servant, her dainty, pale hand fluttering like a dehydrated leaf in the breeze. The young servant bowed down and Sophie focused on him as her mother whispered in his ear. His orange skin was smooth as the silk table-cloth that adorned their table, but free from the milk spots her younger sister was known to dribble between the saucer and her mouth. When her mother was finished, he gave a small nod before retreating back towards his station. A moment later the lights in the room brightened and Sophie had to squint until her eyes adjusted.

Unable to help herself, she sighed. That wasn’t what she wanted at all.

The fuel from the lights burned with an intensity that caused the temperature in the room to rise in only a few minutes. She could feel a thin line of sweat forming across the small of her back.

It was such a waste. 

Sophie knew that the palace wasn’t subject to the same fuel rations as Lunaire, but was that any reason to burn fuel?  She knew for a fact it was perfectly pleasant outside today. She had gone for a stroll that morning after breakfast and there wasn’t a cloud in the whole Etolian sky. All her mother had to do was open the curtains and they would have enough moonlight for afternoon tea, without lighting a single lamp. But that was wishful thinking. Her mother opening the curtains was like a Querian taking a post in the Assembly. It was never going to happen. Not when the moons hung in the sky. 

Which was exactly the problem. 

The moons.

If she opened the curtains the Empresses would be forced to look at the two of them, Lunaire and Tula, circling their home. It would be an assault on the pleasant aesthetic she had worked so hard to achieve. 

“Sophie,” her mother’s voice carried throughout the room. Her reprimand was to be witnessed by all it seemed. “Princesses do not sigh. Nor do they frown.” Her brow tightened, and she adjusted the loops of pale, glowing beads around her neck as she waited for her daughter’s response. 

The temptation to roll her eyes was great. If there was one thing her mother hated more than frowning princesses, more than the moons, it was direct scorn. Fortunately, the table was saved from civil war, by the youngest of the royal children, Marie. 

“I never frown mommy,” she beamed from the opposite side of the table, leaning forward on her elbows, her curls bouncing as she nearly knocked over her teacup in the process. “See.” A flash of pearly white teeth burst across Marie’s face, and Sophie couldn’t help but let her lips turn up as well, though she was careful to keep them tightly pressed together. Her sister meant well, unlike her mother. 

“Elbows off the table dear,” their mother replied. 

The moment for outright defiance had passed. To roll her eyes now would simply be childish, and though she may rebel against her mother’s extravagant whims, she was far past being immature. The weight of being next in line will do that. 

Taking a long sip of her milky tea, she turned to her second youngest sibling, her brother, Pierre, whose long, thin nose was buried deep within the dusty tome he had dragged along to the table with him. He shared the same springy curls as the rest of the family but his were cut close to the scalp. Even still, he periodically reached up and smoothed them down between page turns. “And what about you, Pierre? Surely you must be studying battle plans or political philosophy. Otherwise it would be terribly unprincely of you to be reading at the dining table.”