Elora massaged her head, trying to focus on the words on the page before her.
Was she too harsh on the girl?
No.
She was just as bad as the other girls, perhaps even worse.
Atleast the other girls had sent a 'take care' note to their maids after they saw the fake video they had recorded.
But Aurora - nothing.
She'd simply whiled away her time before appearing in the solar.
That doesn't explain why she looked so disheveled, a small voice in her head seemed to say.
She didn't listen to that voice.
She wasn't oblivious to the steady glares Katherine sent her way either.
She tried ignoring them, but those looks seemed to pierce her soul, making her feel guilty, when she kept telling herself that there was no need to feel so.
She had been hoping for Aurora's company. She had waited for many minutes before resigning herself to the fact that she wouldn't be coming. The swooning and gossiping of the other Selected girls made her want to scream in frustration.
That made her headache even worse, and maybe that's why she had been so mean to Aurora.
But those tears that welled in Aurora's eyes...
Why did they affect her so much?
No, they didn't, she told herself.
She had been cruel simply because she felt betrayed and disappointed in the girl.
And in herself.
That she had been fooled so easily by a chit of a girl.
Elora was shook from her thoughts by a young pregnant woman serving her tea.
"Millie," she said, recognizing her old maid's daughter. "How are you doing?".
"Quite well, Your Majesty," Millie replied.
Millie's mother had died a few days before Eric was born, after delivering a stillborn child.
"I thought you were only supposed to grow horizontally when you were pregnant. Not vertically," Elora joked, when she noticed that the young woman appeared taller than usual.
She could see the other tittering girls glance at her in surprise - she almost never smiled in their presence, but she had known Millie for a long time.
Infact, Millie was the first child Elora had held in her arms, much before she became a mother herself.
Millie laughed before she answered. "A young Lady who was rushing here saw me struggling with my ankles and bare feet, and gave me her slippers".
Elora felt the color in her face drain as she heard Millie speak and point to her toes.
"She said she was coming here... In fact, I was hoping to see her here, but... well I don't think she's reached yet," Millie said, craning her neck hopefully.
"How did she look?" Elora managed to ask in a steady voice.
"Black hair, a blue shirt. She seemed to be in quite a hurry," Millie said thoughtfully, handing the Queen her cup of tea carefully.
"Thank you," Elora said dismissively.
She was sure that Millie had described Aurora - she was one of the only people who still dressed in shirts, most probably to hide her bruises.
"Your Majesty?" she heard a woman say.
Elora turned to see the Head Coordinator, Roberta, waiting for her, a square device in her hands.
"What is it?" she asked, shutting the book.
"You may want to see this... It's quite interesting, actually," Roberta said.
Elora gestured for her to go on, and Roberta waved her hand. A holographic screen appeared, playing security tapes of Aurora rushing to the kitchen.
"Why is she going to the kitchens?" Elora asked, voicing out her thoughts.
"You'll understand once we finish watching the videos, Your Majesty," Roberta said.
The video switched to that of a scene inside the kitchens - Aurora made a tureen full of soup, and with the help of a few others, took it and walked to the servant quarters. She then spent time with the servants and asked them to take the soup.
After the video ended, there was a minute of pin drop silence.
She was sure that the other competitors had seen the video and heard Aurora's words as well.
While they, scared of being infected had simply sent a message to their maids, Aurora had gone a few steps further to make sure her maids, no, her friends were alright.
Elora stood up shakily.
"Good Lord. What have I done?".
***
Elora had quickly went to her chambers and changed into the maid's outfit she was now donning very often. She walked around in the corridors, asking around for Aurora, until she finally got a piece of information from a guard - he had supposedly seen her run towards the music room.
Elora walked into the open music room, and heard a very sad Chopin's Nocturne being played on the violin, the sound originating from a dark corner.
Aurora.
The room was dark - the windows were covered by the thick curtains, and the lights hadn't been turned on.
Elora walked closer, and saw tears streaming down Aurora's cheeks, could see her hands trembling as her slender fingers played the instrument.
Pain.
Elora lost herself in the music, in the sorrow and heart wrenching pain it expressed.
Suddenly, Aurora began playing less gentle notes, the bow pressing hard on the strings, almost as if she were angry. The sound became more and more unpleasant, and a string finally broke.
Aurora dropped the violin, and fell to the ground, breaking into loud, ugly sobs.
Elora couldn't stay silent any longer.
"Are you alright?" she asked, kneeling near the girl, who looked as young as an infant in her eyes.
Aurora scooted away before Elora's hand could touch her, and looked at her with wide brown eyes, before relaxing and saying, "Oh. I thought you were her".
Her meaning Queen Elora.
Not the strange maid she had met a few times.
The hatred in her voice shocked Elora.
"Please leave," she said in a small voice, looking ready to begin crying again.
Elora didn't move.
"How did you find me this time? I didn't leave any trail," Aurora said, wiping her tears.
"A guard told me that a young miss had almost toppled him as she rushed towards the music room," Elora said, attempting to lighten the mood.
Aurora didn't speak for a while, and buried her head between her knees.
"I heard what happened," Elora said hesitantly. "I'm sure she didn't mean it".
Aurora raised her head. "It doesn't matter now, does it? Once uttered, a word cannot be taken back".
Elora was taken aback at the coldness in Aurora's voice. She had always seen the girl quietly joke, murmur shyly, but never talk back like this.
"I'm sure she didn't mean to hurt you," Elora said slowly, for some reason not wanting the girl to remain angry at her.
"Hurt me?" Aurora said, laughing bitterly. "All my life, there has only been one constant - hurt".
She pulled her sleeve up, ripping the silk in the process to show her the bruises on it.
Elora balled her fist, a habit of hers whenever she was angry, as she saw the angry welts and bruises on the slender limbs of the girl sitting besides her.
"She didn't physically hurt you," Elora said, finding it odd to speak about herself in third person.
"Sometimes beating up a person is better than subjecting them to cruel words," Aurora said, her head leaned on the wall. "My father, sorry, adoptive father, beat me for over eight years, every day, neglecting to give me food and water. But all of that pain, didn't even amount to a fraction of that I underwent when I saw my adoptive mother floating on the swimming pool, dead, when I was ten".
Elora's eyes widened as she heard the young girl break down.
"I'm not one to cry like this," Aurora said, her voice breaking. "But somehow, just somehow, the fact that the Queen spoke to me like that hurts me. She's no one to me - she's not my mother, nor is she my friend. I probably took too much liberty with her. She wasn't very nice to me, but for some reason, I always viewed her as the mother I never had. As my role model. But I should have probably expected it - I thought that even though she was sharp with people, she was a good person. How wrong I was".
"She's not a bad person," Elora said, doing her best to keep her voice steady, her mind focusing on Aurora's words - like the mother I never had.
Aurora laughed humorlessly. "When you first spoke, I thought it was her. Your voices sound quite alike, you know. It was only a minute later that I realized - even if she did know the truth about why I was late, she wouldn't apologize. She has this thing called ego".
Elora bit back her tongue.
"She's your Queen," she reminded her.
"A Queen," Aurora scoffed. "Even that title does not give her the right to hurt people so inhumanly".
"She probably didn't mean to," Elora countered.
Aurora continued as though she hadn't heard her. "It takes a lot to truly hurt me. But once the deed is done, I do not forget, nor do I forgive".
"She's your Queen," Elora said again, sharply.
"She is, you're right. She's just like any other Queen I've read about in my lessons. Cruel, calculating, sadistic," Aurora said, before smiling at her and saying, "You should leave. I'm sure there are cameras and audio recorders here as well. The last thing I need is for you to be sacked".
"Aurora-".
"Go," Aurora commanded before saying in a more softer, childish tone, "I want to be alone".
Elora left, stumbling out of the music room, feeling as though she had been stabbed in the heart.
She had thought that the girl's tears would unravel her, but no.
It was her anger.