Love In The Palace

Torn

"Oh... N-no... Let sister choose what she wants to watch. I do not know much about operas." Jade passes the list of operas to Shana, who hesitates for few moments before taking it and passing it on to Chisa.

"It is better that you choose, Sister, since you are the host of this small gathering." Shana's tone is cold and she never bats an eye at Jade. Perhaps she has never been good with provocation, yet being the highest-ranking woman present makes her to have to uphold her virtue, to never be petty for she is the Crown Princess.

"Oh? Okay. Then I will have the honour for myself." Chisa replies with a faked high-pitched tone to show her joy. She indeed is overjoyed, for she is sure that her words have worked wonders.

Throughout the whole opera, the three have their time talking casually while sipping their tea and enjoying their snacks. For some reason, however, Shana is seek to have been avoiding conversation with Jade as much as possible, as though she does not want to talk to Jade. Jade does not know what she has done wrong. In fact she has done nothing wrong. But she just is not able to understand, how her pregnancy has indirectly done many people wrong, how the baby in her womb is hated by many.

She keeps looking towards Shana's direction, who seems to have noticed it but chooses to ignore it. Sighing is all she can do, for she does not want to cause unwanted quarrel in front of Chisa. Once again she looks towards Shana's direction, only to find a familiar glimpse of a woman passing the pavilion into another path.

Autumn. She is very sure that she is Autumn.

Immediately Jade excuses herself from her sisters and leaves the pavilion with Rowena.

They take the quickest steps they can, adjusting to Jade's for she still is carrying a weight on her stomach for the first time. Careful, that is what Crown Prince has been telling her the whole time.

"Autumn!" Jade whispers, trying to call out to Autumn when she is finally in her sight.

"Autumn!" Again she whispers, and Autumn finally turns around, her face dull at first but immediately shoots up a beam.

"Jade!" Autumn runs towards her, her eyes are set several times on the bulge on her stomach.

"Rowena, please help me watch out." Jade says, while taking Autumn to another place well-hidden by trees and bushes.

"How have you been? I have not seen you for months. I am so sorry, I should have gone to find you, but I cannot." Jade wipes off her tears of happiness, her smile cannot be hidden as she talks away on her own, never noticing the changing colours of Autumn's face.

If she really thinks of you as a friend, she would have come to find you. No one will ever say anything about it. She cannot forget those words that have been drilled into her mind that have clouded her thinkings. Her heart beats rapidly but still she smiles.

"I am very good. Prince's Consort has been very kind to me."

"If only I can take you with me, but I cannot. Both of us would have been very happy."

She can easily ask Crown Prince to take you to her palace, if she really has the heart to, if she really thinks of you as a friend. Even if she says she wants to, she is just trying to boast her life to you. Look at you, both of you entered the palace at the same time yet she is now a Mistress while you are still a low-ranking servant.

"I-it is okay. You do not have to." She smiles while biting her inner cheek, so hard that she feels a slight taste of blood, so she stops. The pain is not enough to overwhelm the pain of her heart.

"I will try to think of reasons to visit Third Prince's palace so that I can go to see you sometimes."

Have you seen how she has never visited you? Stop dreaming about how she will come and take you with her. Even if she does, all she will do is only to show off her status to you. You will forever be under her. She is after-all a woman who is only after wealth and status using her schemes, while you are her way of relieving her stress.