Mondo Pastello | girlxgirl | Comple... - Chapter 13: Chapter 13

"So, when you said home..?" Sarina asked curiously as they rode in the midnight car. Bartholomew nodded, taking off his hoodie and sweatpants in the car to reveal rather formal trousers and a button up shirt. Cornelius did the same. Sarina felt self-conscious, since she was wearing nothing but a leotard. Luckily Cornelius grabbed her things before they left.
"The palace, obviously," Bartholomew said with an eye roll, tossing her bag over to her. "Might want to pull some clothes on over," Sarina nodded, grabbing her track pants and T-shirt and pulled them over her leotard along with sneakers. Looking down at her clothes, she felt incredibly anxious. This wasn't just casual, this was extensively casual.
She stared out the window as they rode, and later she spotted it immediately. It was undeniably beautiful and made her nervous. The walls surrounding the castle stood so high with fences on top of it. The Royal Guards stood all around the wall, and more near the gate. The palace itself was a golden cream colour and the roof was black, the designs around the building making it all the more elegant. The gardens that she could see through the gate was already to die for and clearly well kept. Her heart began to speed up. She wasn't dressed correctly even in the slightest for this. What if she ran into the Majesties like that? She grew even more anxious.
The gates opened automatically when they approached and the gardens revealed themselves. There were so many exotic flower species that she felt like she walked straight into a nature reserve.
"Alright, so, the plan," Cornelius began, looking towards Bartholomew, who just groaned.
"We can wing it," now Sarina felt even more like she was going to be thrown into the pit of a beast. The car stopped after taking the circle driveway, right in front of the stairs leading to the biggest doors she has ever seen in her life. She had never felt so intimidated in her life. The car doors was opened from outside, revealing Royal Guards. The twins got out on their side and Sarina followed in example on her side. The Royal Guard was the most unemotional and unresponsive person she had ever seen, offering to take her bag with only gestures. She shook her head and jogged around the car to get to the twins. They nodded at her and indicated for her to follow.
They lead her up the cream marble steps towards the front doors which automatically opened when they were nearing by the Royal Guards. The twins did not acknowledge them, but Sarina felt as if she had to at least nod her head in thanks to them as she passed. Her immediate reaction to the entrance of the palace was to screech like a baby squirrel. Already just the entrance was bigger than her apartment and had five large chandeliers hanging from the ceiling and carpet that look like they deserve to be in a museum behind a glass wall, surrounded by fifty guards.
Then again, as her eyes roamed around she saw that next to each chivalrous knight statue stood a Royal Guard, unmoving. Was there no privacy in a place like this?
"This way," Cornelius called, leading Sarina up the imperial staircase, a type of stair that divides off midway to two different parts of the palace. The stairs were made of marble with maroon carpet running down the middle with gold lining. If she didn't know any better, it might as well have been real gold.
They headed towards to the eastern side of the palace on the third floor, more to the far end. Each hallway had at least one priceless statue or centrepiece which they warned her about not touching. She kept her hands close to her chest and made sure her bag was unmoving. The last thing she wanted was to break anything. Eventually they came to a long corridor that was ore silent but held more guards.
"This is the eastern wing's sleeping chambers," Bartholomew explained as they headed down the corridor. "Like this is our room," he said, pointing to one of the large bocate wood door. Sarina sucked in her breath just at the sight of how many golden engravings was on the door. If she saw anything more she felt as if she would pass out. They continued down the corridor and stopped at a door about three down form theirs, but just the distance between each felt like a marathon. Which meant their rooms were just as big. She shook her head at the though.
They came to another door and Bartholomew headed to open it but the two Royal Guards at the side of the door moved their weapons so that it made a cross in front of the door, their eyes still unmoving from their position.
"Really? Well think about this: my sister is clearly still out of her mind and in less than two hours she has to face the man who broke her heart. Her mentality is nowhere near correction to deal with something like that. If we do not attempt to assist her wellbeing now, then in a few hours you might as well have to remove a corpse from this palace," Bartholomew reasoned, looking between he two guards who remained unmoved. After two seconds of consideration, the weapons moved out of the way.
"Thank you," Cornelius bowed at them slightly, but in response the guards got onto their knees and bowed before their princes. Seeing how calm the twins were at being bowed at by grown men made Sarina feel uncomfortable. The guards rose again and turned to their sides, pushing open the door for them to enter. The twins headed inside like they owned the place and Sarina followed being, hesitantly because of her nervousness. She wanted to be an armadillo so badly.
The doors were closed behind them, and just the interior of the room had Sarina clutch at her heart. Red silky fabrics with gold engravings on beautiful laminated wood with walls with so much detail that you would mistake it for an opera house. A chandelier hung from the roof and the entire bed was on a raised platform that you had to take two steps to get up to. The bed was like a centrepiece, had it not been as messy as it was. Large bundles of white, gold and red blankets were sprawled around like a cocoon.
While Sarina was still admiring the room, her bag falling on the ground in shock, the twins climbed the platform and made their way towards the bed. Sarina could only watch as they pull away at the blankets, revealing the purple hair Sarina had loved from the very beginning. She heard a grumpy groan emitting from the girl. The twins sat on either side of Melanie on the bed.
"Go away," Melanie groaned, turning onto her stomach and covering her head with a pillow.
"Look, I know that you have no desire to see us, but that does not mean that we will not make attempts to better your wellbeing," Cornelius explained.
"I know we messed up: badly. There was so many different ways we could have handled it than just giving you the folder and leaving. We should have stayed and helped. Maybe then all of this bloody mess would not have happened," Bartholomew said sadly. Melanie said nothing except clutch the pillow tighter. The twins sighed, hopelessly.
"But we understand that we cannot help you now, so we brought someone who can," Cornelius signalled for Sarina to come over and she did so hesitantly. She headed to the side of the bed and sat on her knees, gently taking Melanie's recovered hand which tensed at the interaction. Melanie turned her head to the side, revealing her dark eyes from under the pillow. As soon as she spotted Sarina's gentle face, her jaw opened. Bartholomew nodded satisfyingly at this.
"We will take our leave," the twins silently slipped away, leaving the two girls to stare into each other with question. Melanie quickly pulled her hand from Sarina's and used it to help her sit up, her other hand still in the eternal brace.
♕♥ ♕♥ ♕
She was here. She was actually here. After days of feeling guilty and debating whether or not I should call Sarina or not, here she was. She came to me. My mind was racing and instinctively I brought my hands to my heart which had started to beat loudly because of the shock.
"Sarina, you're here. How?" I asked, my brows furrowing as I regarded the tense looking girl in front of me.
"Uhm, your brothers kind of kidnapped me," I couldn't help but laugh at this, but she only looked down with an embarrassed blush.
"That sounds so like them," I admitted, pulling myself into a crossed sit. Sarina stood up and sat down in front of me on my bed. She cast her eyes down to my brace.
"So how's the injuries?" she decided to ask, slowly letting go of all the nervousness. I smiled slightly and looked down.
"Could be better. I still can't walk or really do anything with my hands. For the last few days I have done nothing but just lie around. It's super boring," I admitted, shaking my head slightly.
"So tell me," Sarina began, looking at my brace. I nodded at her to continue. "Did you really punch Caleb?" I laughed at her bluntness and nodded.
"Yeah!" I said excitedly, and a smile grew widely onto her face.
"That's wonderful," she admitted, shaking her head. I smiled at her amusement before I took a deep breath and nodded my head.
"Sarina, I need to apologize to you," I said, slowly nodding my head. She looked utterly confused.
"For what?" she asked with a head tilt.
"For not believing you and running out. You tried to warn me about him but I didn't believe you because I was just... I fell for him and I couldn't believe that he would ever do something to hurt me. I believed that we were perfect together. I intended to marry him. I wanted to make him King! But really... for him to do all this and I didn't expect a single thing... I was ignorant and blinded. I should have listened to you, and I'm really sorry. And I'm also sorry about running out on you because I couldn't believe it. I was... the biggest idiot in the world," I said, shaking my head at my own stupidity. I heard her chuckle a little, which was surprising. I had suspected her to be angry at me.
The next moment I felt her weave her arms through mine, bringing me closer to her body. I blushed at the action, feeling the heat from her figure flushed against mine. I smiled at the action and hugged her back.
"There's no reason for you to be sorry. There's no way you could have known. You were only protecting the one you loved," Sarina said softly, her breath fanning my ear. I smiled and hugged her closer, appreciating the comfort that I am finally given. No 'why did you sneak off' or 'why did you not tell us' or 'do you not trust us' from my parents. Just pure comfort.
"I hate him. I really hate him," I muttered into her shoulder, trying not to get emotional. I had already had my fair share of tears over the few days and any tears I had left, were not for Caleb. It was for myself.
"I hated him from the very beginning," Sarina admitted to me, and I had to swallow my nervousness.
"And now he's coming back here," at this Sarina pushed me away at arms' length, looking me straight in the eyes.
"Who the nugget what now?" she asked, tilting her head in question. I nodded.
"Yeah. He and his family have been invited for dinner to sort out the whole media thing. They'll be here in about an hour," I shook my head sadly, too terrified to even think about it.
"Well I guess we'll just have to handle it, right?" I looked up at her in question. "What? Do you really think I'll abandon you at such an important time? Aren't I your friend?" hearing her admit it, my jaw fell. I slowly nodded, a smile blooming on my face.
"Yeah," I smiled brightly and she returned it.
"So you say an hour right? Then I think maybe we need to sort out all of.... This," she said, indicating to my entire appearance. I peered down and grimaced.
"Yeah maybe," I agreed.
"So is that the bathroom?" Sarina asked, pointing towards a door connected in my room. I nodded in affirmation. "Then I'm going to draw you a bath, because a shower won't work," Sarina nodded, thinking about my feet.
"Yeah, thank you. But you really don't have to. I can get my handmaiden-" she cut me.
"Handmaiden? What seriously? Nah, I want to do this but I kind of have to ask you something..." Sarina said nervously, shaking her head. "Uhm, if I'm going to help you then I don't think my clothes is going to be sufficient," she said tensely, looking down at her clothes. I laughed at her expression.
"Of course! You can use some of my clothes and take a shower. So my closet," I indicated towards it. She nodded and went to open the door, but froze when she did.
"Oh my chicken nuggets your closet is brighter than my future," I knew it was bad, but I couldn't help but laugh. "What the hell are all of these dresses? They look as if they belong to a princess!" she called out, walking through the closet.
"I am a princess!" I called back, amusement coursing through me. I wish I could see her expression but there was no way I'm going to stand on my feet at this time.
"Shit right! I forgot!" I began to laugh hysterically at her response. "So wait? I can pick one?" she asked, popping her head out of the closet. Her face grew brighter.
"This is going to be amazing!" Sarina grew more excited, her childhood princess dreams coming back to haunt her. All the while I began to feel like my old self again, glad to be able to put such a smile on my friend's face. With Sarina by my side, I know that I will be able to handle anything Caleb throws at me because now, I had someone even more important by my side.