There was only one thing that Aurora had of her mother’s: a small handkerchief that she’d embroidered with lavender blooms that Tristan had given her. She had been denied the countess’ jewels, her clothes, her trinkets. Aurora wasn’t allowed to touch them. The Count had ordered everything away. Dresses destroyed, jewels were held on to, but remade so that they never resembled anything that her mother once worn. Nothing that had touched the sanctified Countess could be given to the daughter that had murdered her. Sometimes Aurora wondered if perhaps she had emerged from the womb with a knife in her hand and slit her mother open, given the way that her father talked about it.
Her birthday was the Count’s favorite way to torture his daughter. Lesser lords were made to bring her gifts, and when she was younger, she was forced to surrender them to her father. Now she was forced to wear them. Forced to sit and say thank you, all while everyone told her how much she resembled her late mother, and what a tragedy it was that the countess had been lost. Her father made a point of telling her that she was only allowed to keep the gifts at this point because it would be noticed if she didn’t. Aurora was to smile, and thank the lords, for their generous gifts, because, well, as much as the Count might have detested his daughter’s existence, if any one were to slight her, whether he liked it or not, it was a slight against the Count.
Because it was her sixteenth birthday, the Count added a new layer of torment to his daughter. A parade of suitors all carrying gifts, each one from a farther away place than the last, and through it all, Aurora had to smile and charm. When it was all over, Aurora was finally alone. She left her chambers, primarily to avoid running into Tristan, and returned to the great hall, where, at this time of night, she’d be left alone.
Aurora curled her knees into her chest and finally let herself cry. it felt so good to simply let it out. Everything that she’d been forced to bottle up all day and simply let the tears take her. It was a huge relief, like letting go of the tears that had wanted to fall all day. She’d smiled, she’d curtsied, she’d received all the gifts that her father told her that she didn’t deserve but was only given because of him. Everything she had was because of him. It was times like this that sadness got the better of her and she simply let herself cry.
@firstprogeny