TOWERS WERE MEANT TO BE PECULIAR. I have, of course, lived in a tower for seven years, which is precisely one-fourth of my lifetime. Towers have some inviting shape, especially your everyday grey tower, with vines entwined around the foundation of the steeple, with a rectangular window with stained glass windows and the song of the birds coming from a girl with hair the colour of gold and a singular luxuriant braid, and she sings, alive from her lips and dead at the bottom of the tower, where a curious villager might be standing.

This is not your everyday tower.

It was shocking to the eyes, with its unusual buttery yellow bricks, smooth as butter itself. There was a big flower on the front, exposing the oddities of the people who lived there. The curtains were about a mile long, cascading from the window-the left side has been shattered, so thieves could easily get it, perhaps a thief caused that accident-the curtains being a peculiar shade of navy blue, the colour seemed a bit too dull for the vibrant, rich in colour and entertainment, tower. More so, they were quite easy to catch a grip on and pull yourself up and kidnap a damsel in distress.

Not that I would do any of those foolish things, but I was a curious girl with unrealistic desires, and of course I grabbed the curtain with all my might, and placed my right foot onto the slippery brick, one by one until I was halfway up the curtain, the blue enveloping my fist and my feet planting themselves on a brick, before growing and going off to bury themselves in another rectangle of buttery sunshine.

My feet whispered to the colourful flower as they went to its heart, and stroked the petals softly before jumping off, with the presence of painted flowers and sunshine on the soles.

Whatever time you reach the tower-it might take a couple of minutes, or a couple of days-the tower seemed less inviting with the broken part of the window and no light shining from the room, perhaps all the damsels were in bed.

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MARTEL FAEBER GLARED AT HIS SISTERS. Not, sisters, but fellow orphans that turned out to reside with him in this dark, but wonderful, tower. And they were all women.

The living arrangements were not that bad, I must say. They had plenty of food-from the richest of pomegranates to the juiciest of figs-that most peasants don't get, or some might say, "don't deserve." They also have brilliant dances-that are not usually held at the unusual tower, but hosted by the Sheriff of Nottingham, and the orphans were always invited, for Madam Wilma was associated with the Sheriff's family. Martel always pondered on how a lady the size of a wardrobe and the kindest soul he had ever known, would be associated with the evil mastermind that everyone was forced to call "Sheriff." Madam Wilma always waved him off with her blue handkerchief dotted with little teacups and told him to do his work.

Work, that was not much of a big problem to Martel, because he didn't care much for chores and cleaning up the dusty towers, but he was constantly the one doing the work, and it annoyed him that he could be thinking up of inventions and freedom.

Freedom, that was also something he wanted. He was supposed to be cooped up in this tower for the remainder of his life, along with his friends-or, family if you prefer-and he wanted to explore.

Many of his friends have decided to be damsels in distress, waiting for a prince to come and save them, and to Martel, it sounded like complete rubbish.

It is rubbish.

Rachana Satros was the only one in the tower that had much sense, and he admired her very much for that. She was always trying to find innovative ideas, a spark or trying to fit the puzzle pieces together to create something completely genius. She was swept up in the world of science and mathematics, and her logical thinking was the perfect match to his mind filled with thoughts. He told her what he was thinking, and she calculated it until it turned out to be perfect. She never wanted to be a damsel in distress, because she didn't believe that waiting on a man would do anything for women because they can just run away themselves. Martel proposed to her that if she needed saving and she had thousands of books at her hand, she would be totally fine with it. Rachana gave him a, "Of course I would. But they have to be enjoyable books, not like the clichéd books that are about the maiden and the prince saving her, I want her to save herself."

Martel shook his head and continued to look at the stars as she scribbled ferociously on her parchment, thinking up names for stars that probably have already been discovered as Martel sketched them out, making every star different from the other. "We should name that one Horseradish."

Rachana arched an eyebrow at Martel and stopping writing. "What kind of name is that? Horseradish?"

"Well, now that you mention it," he tapped his chin, pretending to be thinking very hard. "We can name the star Nefertiti."

"How do you get from horseradish to Nefertiti?" she asked. If you ask me, it doesn't make much sense, but it's probably because of horseradish tasting completely, as he puts it "shit from a donkey in labor,"-which also earned him a slap that day-and when Martel was a young boy, he thought that all Egyptians used donkeys as transportation. Of course, I could be wrong, but it's a theory.

"There's something called imagination," he replied, and got up from the windowsill, trying to ignore the screams of Madam Wilma when she lectured-very loudly, I must say-his fellow orphan named Ruby when she forgot to clean up her chores, the one she left for three weeks.

It was one of his favourite days, even though it turned out that Rachana and Martel had to do Ruby's dishes, they ended up splashing water at each other from buckets, throwing sponges at each other and naming stars.

They tried to escape from the problem, but even Rachana couldn't explain why her robes were soaking wet and her black hair plastered unfashionably to her face, trying to account for the smell of herbal soap around her was hard enough.

It was a good thing Madam Wilma was kindhearted.

At the moment, Martel was trying to finish his drawings with his annoying girls around-he always referred to them as his girls, since he was the only boy in the tower-Ruby was prancing around with her arms around an imaginary gentleman, preparing for the ball. Liesel was knitting a scarf that was almost as long as the curtains, Adelheid was humming and hugging every breathing thing in existence-even though some object to that-Rachana was making quite a lot of noise from her muttering of equations that no one bothered to understand and the newest orphan-named Evangeline Herschel quietly sitting in the corner with her arms crossed over her knees, pursed lips and sad eyes.

I looked like that once, he thought.

Well, to be honest-since the boy was obviously lying to himself-he still does. He will always be a simple street rat with his eyes filled with false hope.