Chapter 73 Dressed As His Doll

Chapter 73 Dressed As His Doll
Beatris

Mrs. Elara was already gone.

She had brought the women to the room where the coffin was, and stood long enough to see them lift me out, then turned and walked away without a word. Without pity. Without bothering to check whether I could stand. I could not stand.

My legs buckled the moment they tried to set me down, so they held me upright between them and walked me back through the corridors toward the west wing.

It was only when we passed through the main hallway that I noticed.

Morning light.

Spilling through the tall windows in pale gold strips across the floor. Servants moving through the entrance hall with baskets and trays as though the day had barely begun.

I had been in that coffin since morning. Almost a full day.
Alexander had left me in the dark for almost a full day.

They brought me into my room and sat me on the edge of the bed. The door closed behind us.

None of them spoke to me.

The one nearest to me, the older woman with steady hands. I recognized her. She had been here before. Months ago. The first time Alexander had ordered someone to dress me up in this same room.

She did not meet my gaze now.

They worked in silence. Efficient. Careful. The kind of quiet that came from women who had been paid to do a job and knew better than to ask questions about it.

One of them brought a basin of warm water and began cleaning the dried blood from my chin and palms. The cut on my cheek stung when the cloth passed over it, and I sucked air through my teeth but did not pull away.

Another began untangling my hair with slow, patient fingers.

The third laid a dress on the bed. Deep ivory. Embroidered with silver thread along the sleeves and bodice.

I stared at it without expression.

They dressed me. Tightened the corset laces at the back. Smoothed the fabric down over my hips. Buttoned the sleeves to my wrists.

Then they sat me in front of the mirror.

The face staring back barely looked like mine.

Pale. Drawn. A bruise darkening one cheekbone. A cut still healing at its edge. Eyes swollen and red from crying. Lips dry and cracked. Hair limp and tangled despite the woman's efforts.

Tears rolled down my cheeks.

The older woman paused, then continued brushing. Another applied something cool beneath my eyes, pressing it in with careful fingers. She softened the bruise on my cheekbone with powder and hid the cut beneath a light layer that caught the lamp just enough to make it vanish.

When they finally stepped back, I looked at the mirror again.

I looked beautiful. Painfully, impossibly beautiful.
My hair had been gathered and pinned back in soft, elegant waves. The ivory dress hugged my waist and fell in clean lines to the floor. The silver thread caught the light along the sleeves.

But the woman in the mirror was not Beatris.

It was Eudora.

Every detail, the hair, the dress, the way the silver sat against the ivory was hers. The same style I had seen in the portraits lining the forbidden room. The same look Alexander had been shaping me toward since the day he brought me to Crimson Hill.

He had ordered this. I was certain of it. The older woman stepped closer, her hands clasped in front of her.

"You look so beautiful, ma'am," she said quietly.

She looked at me with Pity. The kind that came from someone who understood what was happening and could not stop it.

I said nothing.

They packed their things in silence and left through the door without another word. The lock turned behind them.

I sat there for a long time, staring at myself in the mirror.

My eyes were still swollen. Still red. Still carrying the weight of every tear I had shed inside that coffin.

But the rest of me looked like someone I was not. Like someone I had never agreed to become. Slowly, I stood.

My legs ached. My knees throbbed beneath the ivory dress. I crossed to the door and tried the handle.

It was Locked. I was not surprised. I stared at the wood for a long moment, then turned back toward the room.

They had come to dress me up like this. Made me look like Eudora. Painted my face and pinned my hair and tightened the corset until everything sat exactly where he would want it.

Only to lock me inside again. I nearly laughed.

They had come to prepare me for something some gathering, some event, some performance Alexander had arranged and then left me here as though the preparation itself was the punishment.

Dressed like a doll. Locked like a prisoner.
Beautiful for no one.
I crossed back to the bed and sat down heavily, the ivory skirts pooling around my feet.

I did not know what was coming. I did not know what Alexander wanted me to look like this for.

That frightened me more than the coffin had. Because the coffin had been punishment.

This was preparation.

And whatever he was preparing me for, I understood with a cold, sinking certainty that it had nothing to do with me.

It had to do with her.