1711, Aethiel Palace, Kestramore City

It has been over two weeks. It is still raining. The city of Beaummiers in particular was affected the worst. The crops were absolutely destroyed, and the livestock had all drowned to death.

Although the people of Beaummiers had a prince governing them, they were far better off without him.

The late Queen Celestine had three sons, the prod and noble Guillaume, the quiet and erudite Anatole, and the disappointment of the family, John the drunk lecher.

Prince John spent his days completely intoxicated while bedding multiple women at a time, and although he was blessed with remarkably good looks, his debauched lifestyle left him looking ugly and demented.

Everyone knew that Prince John never had the intention to marry, and though they showed disappointment on the surface as was expected of them, deep down they all thought that the Prince's disinterest was a blessing in disguise.

The lady that married him would become very, very miserable indeed.

When Prince John suddenly showed up at the palace, they all thought that the cowardly prince was simply running away from his duties, not wanting to deal with the aftermath of the flood. But when a young woman exited the carriage after him, everyone was stunned.

    She was visibly very young, around the ages of the ladies in the Choosing Ceremony, one of whom would one day marry the Prince's nephew. Her sleek, shiny light brown hair was padded with horsehair to create a magnificently tall hairdo, and her dark green eyes had a glint of greed as she looked up at the brilliant Aethiel Palace that lay before her.

          "Come, sweet Eufemia," Prince John said, holding out his hand for the young lady to grasp on to.

She glanced at the Prince and nodded curtly. Unbeknownst to him, she felt disdain and disgust every time she looked at his milky blue eyes, rotten teeth and bloated stomach. But he was her ticket to wealth and riches, so she had to tolerate him whether she liked it or not.

           "Of course, Lord Husband."

          "I heard the maids say that someone important will be joining us for dinner tonight," Cosmina giggled as they descended down the stairs and pranced towards the dining hall.

          "Important? I wonder who that might be," Jessamine added thoughtfully. They were at the palace after all, the heart of the kingdom. So how important could this person be?

They all took their seats at the dining table, silently waiting for the royal family members to arrive. The four friends sat on one end, while the other three sat on the opposite end.

Marguerite glared bitterly as she watched her lifelong enemy, Catarina de Fontaine, fool around and have fun with her newly found friends while she was stuck with the insufferable Lavinia Olivier.

           "I don't understand why he doesn't like me," the Olivier girl began. "Look, I've done my hair exactly the way you told me to. You said that he liked girls who wore lots of pink satin ribbons, but he never compliments me or says that he likes it!"

The blonde-haired girl rolled her eyes in annoyance. While it was fun to watch Lavinia making an absolute fool out of herself, it would always be followed by hours of endless whining.

That night at the opera, Lavinia had donned a bright apple green silk gown with dark pink lace details. Her dark, limp hair was piled up in a pitiful bun, which was decorated with an outrageous amount of satin pink ribbons, and a single dyed pink feather to complete the whole ensemble. Not only did the Prince not fall in love with her on sight, she even caught him sneaking a laugh with his sister, Princess Demitria.

Needless to say, Lavinia was heartbroken.

           "Lady le Prince, why doesn't he like me? I tried so hard to become his ideal type... You said that he'd like me if I dressed like this, but he doesn't even look at me.. Lady le Prince, I don't-"

Marguerite had had enough at this point, and she abruptly turned to glare at Lavinia, her once warm and amiable face now stiff and intimidating. The poor girl immediately went silent.

She would rather listen to bleating goats for hours than listen to another sentence that came out of Lavinia's mouth.

And quite frankly, she did not have to. Initially, she pretended to befriend the naïve Lady Olivier so that she could keep her eyes on her. The House of Olivier was one of the wealthiest noble houses in all of Ravaeryn, only falling short to House de Fontaine.

They had expansive lands and estates, as well as thousands of cargo ships that sailed to various neighbouring kingdoms. Lavinia Olivier was filthy rich, and despite being relatively plain and undesirable, Marguerite knew that she was a serious threat to her own success.

Her gaze travelled towards the quiet Lady Blanchard who sat beside her. Indeed, Lady Ingrid Blanchard was as beautiful as the rumours dictated, but they failed to inform that she also had the personality of a washing board.

Besides, the Blanchards were not far better off than Marguerite's family anyway, so she never considered Ingrid to be a threat to her. After all, Ingrid was just a pretty face with a simple mind. There is nothing to be fearful about.

Marguerite pried her gaze away from Ingrid's beautiful face and stared forward, wanting to appear presentable when the royals arrived. Beside her, Lavinia was sobbing softly into her hands.

That was just how she was. Lavinia was always either whining or crying, and there is no in-between. Marguerite's flawless smiling expression cracked slightly.

She could still remember those glorious, golden days back at the academy, when she and her dearest friend Eufemia would run around in the corridors in their finest dresses, pretending that they were Cinderella, and the handsome prince was chasing after them.

Eufemia always played the prince, allowing for Marguerite to feed her fantasies even further.

During tea time, they would toss cubes of sugar into the tea and pretended as if they were royal princesses, delicately sipping on the tea with their pinky fingers extended out.

And at night, they would take turns in torturing and humiliating the younger students, and after years of experience, the two girls have mastered the art of injuring someone without leaving behind a mark.

To tell the truth, the beatings that Catarina received were nothing compared to the atrocious acts they performed on one particular student, Jacquetta Palin, who hailed from a merchant family that recently became wealthy. Nouveau riche, people would say.

Marguerite abhorred people like Jacquetta. In her twisted little head, it is people like her who stole House le Prince's wealth, and Marguerite wholeheartedly believed that a mere commoner like Jacquetta had no business at the esteemed Breckenridge Academy.

It began with seemingly harmless backhanded comments, but Marguerite gradually became more and more aggressive. When she was first dropped off here, Jacquetta Palin was a bright and cheerful young girl, but as the days went by, her smile gradually faded. It was as if she had become a husk of her former self.

At the end of her second year, Jacquetta suddenly disappeared without a trace. The Palins scoured the entire kingdom in search of their daughter, but they never did find her.

As to what really happened to Jacquetta Palin, only Marguerite and Eufemia knew.

            "His Majesty, the King, and Her Majesty, the Queen!" a butler announced, and Marguerite simultaneously averted her gaze towards the direction of the doorway.

King Guillaume and Queen Isabel sauntered inside, followed by their three children, Julian, Demitria and Marcus. But that was not all.

             "His Royal Highness, Prince John, and Her Royal Highness, Princess Consort Eufemia!"

Marguerite's blood ran cold. No, no, it can't be. It can't be.

Eufemia is sick and is sent away to recuperate. How could she suddenly become Prince John's consort? Impossible!

It must be another Eufemia, Marguerite thought. But Eufemia was a fairly rare name, and what are the odds of another Eufemia suddenly marrying Prince John, especially one that they never heard of?

Sure enough, as the royal children sat down in their respective seats, Marguerite could finally get a clear view of the person that she had not seen in such a long while.

         Princess Consort Eufemia Dubois strutted into the hall with grace, and she seemed to exude a rich noble air around her, making everyone else look like a filthy peasant in comparison.

It is her, Marguerite thought. She is not ill at all, it seems. She lied to me.