I take my time brushing and braiding, doing everything slowly, as if moving at a crawling pace will prolong my fate somehow. I’m pretending that I’m not operating on borrowed time.
You can pretend a lot of things in life. You can pretend so well that you even start to believe your own deceit. We’re all actors; we’re all on pedestals with a spotlight shining on us, playing whatever part we need to in order to make it through the day—in order to help ourselves sleep at night.
Right now, I’m going through the motions, refusing to let my mind think of what’s going to happen tonight. But my body knows. It’s in the tightness of my chest, the labored inhales coming from constrictive breaths.
I try to distract myself and stay busy, but there’s only so much harp a girl can play, only so much sewing one can tolerate before she goes out of her mind with boredom.
At one point, I’m so jittery with nerves that I just start walking the circle of my cage, the bars probably making me seem like an agitated tiger pacing in its enclosure.
Bright side? The burn on my hand feels better. There’s only a small slash along the center of my palm, making my golden skin look more orange than its usual cool gleam. My stomach still hurts, but my scalp is fine…so long as I don’t touch it.
Looking out the single window in my room shows nothing but a rabid snowstorm blowing a confetti of white against the pane. It’s nearly nightfall. I wish I could string up the sun and keep it tied in the sky, but wishes are for stars, and I hardly get to see any of those anyway.
Fulke’s and Midas’s armies should’ve reached Fourth Kingdom’s borders by now. I could go into the library to find out for sure, but that’s the last place I want to be today.
I still think they’re crazy for attacking King Ravinger’s land. Not only is Midas breaking a centuries-old peace pact, but Ravinger isn’t exactly known for his magnanimous kindness. They call him King Rot for a reason, and it’s not just because of his power of decay and death. It’s said that his viciousness makes everyone near him cringe.
His land is one of withering corrosion, but it’s also a place where he lets wickedness flourish. His power allows him to deteriorate anything he wishes. Crops, animals, land, people…but I think his cruelty might be the worse evil.
I hope Midas knows what he’s doing, because making an enemy of someone like Ravinger is dangerous. If Midas fails, I’m not sure any amount of wealth could buy him out of the consequences, and that scares me. Sometimes I wish he wouldn’t be so confident in the ability to solve all his problems with gold.
Midas takes wealth for granted—and why wouldn’t he? One look around, every surface, every possession, it’s all gold. He knows that he’ll forever be as rich as he wishes.
Queen Malina believes that I’m garish and gaudy, but what about this entire castle and everything in it? The soles of her shoes are golden silk—for only her sweaty feet to ever appreciate. The structure of the dungeons beneath the palace—pure gold for the withering prisoners to die in. Even the toilets we piss in are gilded.
If there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s that this much wealth…it becomes meaningless after a while. Empty. You can have all the gold in the world and yet lack everything of real worth.
But maybe…maybe the underlying reason for Malina’s hatred of me isn’t that Midas keeps me here even though he’s married to her. Maybe the queen simply wishes that Midas had gold-touched her. Because of what it represents. Because of the way he calls me his Precious.
And just like that, I find myself feeling sorry for her. For her childless, loveless marriage. For losing the kingdom before she could even take it. For having to compete against a gilded orphan girl.
As I contemplate all of this, I lean against the gold bars to stare at the snowfall outside. That jealousy, if that’s what it is, has festered for years. There’s no way for me to do anything about it now. What’s done is done. The queen will never look at me with anything other than hatred. That’s simply the way it is.
But if she’s jealous that Midas hasn’t gold-touched her, she doesn’t understand at all. I won’t deny the fact that there are benefits of being gold-touched…but there are disadvantages too.
No one sees me for anything but the metallic glimmer of my skin. No one looks past the pure gold threads of my hair. Aside from the whites of my eyes and teeth, I’m just a golden statue to everyone. A fixture to be seen and not heard.
A commodity to be bought for a night.
My bedroom door opens suddenly, making me flinch away from the window. I turn to see a maid come inside and walk over to Digby where he’s still standing at attention at his spot near the wall. She delivers hushed words to him, while I stand by, watching warily.
As soon as she leaves, I walk over to the other end of my cage to face him. “What’s going on?”
Digby gestures up at the gown that’s still hanging up. “It’s time.”
My stomach breaks apart in cold, brittle pieces, falling down through my feet.
“Already?” I ask, and I barely recognize my voice. It’s timid and quiet like a skittish mouse, and I can’t afford to be a mouse tonight. I have to be strong.
Digby nods, and I blow out a breath, sending a tendril of hair to shift up and out of my face. I force myself to swallow hard, as if I can internalize my nerves and drink them down, bury them into a chasm inside of me.
Turning away, I pluck the sheer dress off its hanger with a pounding heart, and head into my dressing room with wooden steps. In front of my broken mirror, I take off the simple gown I dressed myself in and slip into the sheer one. My ribbons do all the work while my arms move robotically, my face expressionless.
When I have it all the way on, I take in the gauze drapery hanging over my body, and I will myself not to flinch. Just like I knew it would be, it’s so sheer that it shows every trace of my curves, even a veiled glimpse of the burnished tips of my nipples.
The dress has see-through sleeves of swirling gold lace, clasps at each shoulder holding it in place. It drapes over my breasts with a loose, plunging neckline that shows the edge of my bruised stomach in the front.
At the skirt, there are slits on each side that reach from my toes to my hips, so that no matter which direction someone is standing beside me, they’ll get an eyeful of flesh. The whole thing flows loosely over my curves, easy access for anyone to slip their hand in and touch an intimate part of me.
Midas has never dressed me like this before. Sure, I wear sensual dresses that accentuate my body, but nothing as provocative as this. My body, for the most part, is private. For him to enjoy. But for the first time in my life, I’m dressed like a true royal saddle, ready to be ridden.
I know the moment the last of daylight recedes, because a chill fills the air. I look up at my skylight, seeing darkness descending already. A dejected emptiness pulls at me, a shiver scattering goose bumps over my arms as night starts to rise.
Behave tonight.
A souvenir to show off.
Sit pretty.
Leave the men to speak.
Gritting my teeth, my spirit rebels. Midas wants me to wear this? Fine. But he never said I couldn’t embellish it.
My ribbons rise up alongside my resolve, and I get to work.
It takes a few minutes of wrapping and tucking and tying, but after some adjusting, I finally feel satisfied with the outcome. My golden ribbons are now wrapped around the bodice in elaborate braided designs, swooping over my breasts before cinching at my waist, the rest of the strips hanging down around the entire circumference of my skirt.
I’m still way more exposed than I’d like, but it’s much, much better, holding everything in and covering my most intimate parts. I’ll still have to be careful when I walk, because even with some of my ribbons wrapped around my waist, my sides are still somewhat exposed from the gaping fabric, but at least I don’t feel naked anymore.
My hair is already braided with a few pieces hanging down my back, so I leave my scalp alone. I hear voices carry in from my bedroom, and I know that more guards have arrived to escort me downstairs.
I should be starving by now since I haven’t eaten all day, but I wouldn’t be able to tolerate food right now even if I wanted to. When I hear Digby call my name, I slip my feet into satiny slippers and then straighten my spine.
Don’t be a mouse, Auren.
I walk into my bedroom, facing the group of guards standing on the other side of the bars who have come to escort me downstairs. I haven’t been let out of my rooms for months. It’s not often that Midas allows me to leave my cage, his possession over me so intense. When he does on those rare occasions, it’s usually just to have dinner with him because he misses my company or stand behind him in the throne room, showing off to visiting dignitaries.
A skeleton key is passed to Digby as I approach. Solid iron, as black as coal, is fitted into the lock. Ironic that the key is the one thing that isn’t made of gold.
The metal creak of the key turning is so loud that it infests my eardrums and hatches into a hundred fluttering fireflies zapping against my skull.
Digby pulls open the door and the other guards step aside, careful to keep their distance under my faithful guard’s watchful eye. They know that one overstep on their part will have Digby telling the king, and that’s not something any of them want.
I walk through, the cage door swung open wide, like a rigid rib cage peeled back on a hinge, allowing its heart to spill out.
My ribbons don’t trail behind me as usual, but I take comfort in the feel of them bound around my torso like an extra set of strengthening bones as I begin to make my way out of the bedroom, sandwiched by the guards on both sides.
My footsteps feel alone, despite the fact that four pairs of feet accompany me as I walk. The sound of dread is in the soft swipes of my slippers over the polished floors, in the suck of air that pulls my lip in between teeth.
You trust me, don’t you?
Shouldn’t I always?
Of course.
That answer is all that I have. I just have to trust him.
But I’m not going to be a mouse.
