Bloody Mary

Chapter One~Marianna

PART ONE

Chapter One~Marianna

A small girl, no older than the small age of six or seven (possibly even breaching eight) sat before a mirror on a mahogany dresser. The maid behind her with her delicate fingers tangled in the small girl’s hair, desperately tried to groom the rat’s nest into something presentable. It was obvious that the child’s wild chocolate hair was not cooperating.

“How is it that every morning your hair has become my hardest work?” The maid complained, managing to tug roughly through a single knot. The girl flinched in response.

“I don’t know.” She replied, almost breaching the barrier between apologetic and indifferent. Both of them had familiar accents, making it obvious that they both originated from Britain rather than the Caribbean, where they now lived. Kingston, if we’re to be exact.

“It doesn’t matter, I suppose.” Another rough tug, the girl flinched. The maid retrieved a brush from the dresser and began to pull it through the smaller, less violent of tangles. After a moment of tugging and wincing, the maid spoke again. “Are you excited, Miss Bennett?”

She must be referring to the meeting this after noon, the child thought.

“Of course."

“The Commodore is a wonderful man, and I hear his son shall be accompanying him as well. Perhaps you two can become acquainted with each other.”

“Perhaps.” The maid returned her brush to the dresser, and once again began threading through the girl’s hair with her fingers. She separated the curly locks into sections, forming them into braids, and then weaved them into intricate patterns atop her head.

The maid sighed, her thoughts turning envious of the girl’s hair. As if being the Governor’s daughter wasn’t enough, with all the wealth that ensured, this girl had the looks of a Goddess. Her hair wasn’t nearly as dull as the maid’s was, but instead shone with a hint of copper amongst the deep chestnut, especially in the sunlight. As for her face, well, that wasn’t much of a different story. Her heart shaped face with skin so fair, and lips lush. Even though she was only just a child at the moment and still retained a child’s plumpness, she expected this girl would be the beauty of the ball, once she became a woman. The men would be flocking for her hand once the time for it came.

“There,” her thoughts ceased as her handiwork came to it’s end. The child’s hair was now teased into perfect braids encircling a tight bun on the top of her head. Not a strand was out of place; save for that of the purposefully loose strands that framed her elegant face at the sides. “You are simply gorgeous, Miss Bennett.”

“Thank you, Amelia.” The child said, turning her eyes to her reflection in the mirror. Her pale eyes, blue as the sea and distant just as so, surveyed her appearance. She wasn’t ignorant, she was aware that she looked quite pleasing to the eye. After years of being told so, it was hard to get out of her head. She would never tell any one that, though. No, Marianna Bennett was, if anything, quiet. Her only few words were ever shared with her father, her mother, or one of the maids that tended to her family’s home. But as was said before, these words were few.

“Are you ready to meet with your father, Miss? I’m sure he eagerly awaits your arrival.”

“Of course,” Marianna said with a smile, content to leave the mirror and to have her (favorite) maid to lead her out of her room. The door in which they walked through opened into a lavish hall. The walls were decorated in elaborate paintings of past Governor’s of Kingston, at the very end of the hallway hung one of her very own father. It didn’t do him justice, Marianna had always thought.