Wishing Stars Ch. 04

The woman wore a billowing white dress that hung from two tiny, intricately tied white ropes at her neck. Aside from her face and arms, the rest of her body was eaten up by the fabric. Although the sheer quality it took to cover the woman suggested that she was quite large. She had dishwater blonde hair twisted into a knot on the crown of her head, leaving the wrinkles in her neck on full display.

Noticing Thalia's stare, the woman reached down and smoothed the material of her dress. Not that it improved the picture she made.

"I am so sorry," She continued, obviously trying to get ahold of her enthusiasm, "Where are my manners? I am Elaine!" She threw her arms wide again, and the skin hanging from them went bouncing. "I am honored to be of service to you, Your Highness."

"Please," The younger woman begged, "Call me Thalia, this whole princess thing is completely--"

"Oh my, good Heavens, no!" Elaine threw her arms wide again, "That most certainly, well, it will just not do at all! But such a good, very nice name for you to have, Princess, and I am sure His Mightiness will take great pleasure, as he certainly should, in calling you by it. If that is, of course, what he desires to do!"

Thalia looked back at the gearmen, who were standing silently behind her. Surely, this woman was mad and they would rescue her from this situation.

"You must stay with Lady Elaine," One of them chirped. "We will stand guard while she prepares you."

"Oh!" Elaine squealed, "How fun! To have someone to dress and paint, like my own, my very own little doll!"

"A doll?" Thalia exclaimed. "I don't think—"

"Well of course not, never my doll, darling, dear!" Elaine gripped her wrist and pulled her forward into the room. The door snapped shut behind them.

"But of course we must have you looking presentable, not that you are anything but, and looking nice and put together, without appearing to have tried! No, no, it would not do at all for His Highness to think we had painted you up to be something that you are not, and by all accounts you are, such a beauty! If you don't mind me saying so, that is, my Princess."

She was led further into the smoky room as Elaine continued to chatter away. Foreign smells assaulted her nose. They were not all unpleasant, but they were definitely all very alien to her, and in combination the scent was nearly overwhelming. Thalia's eyes began to water as Elaine guided her to a large, plush chair in the middle of the room.

"Now, you stop that right now, if you don't mind, my lady," Elaine scolded, seeing her tears, "Heavens know I have a right ton of work to do without your tears drip dropping all my hard work away! Not that it will be overly so much work, you understand, seeing as you are so, so, very lovely. Yet I must stake my poor old reputation not on just your lovely, bright as it is, sweet face, but instead upon my powers to enhance and glorify what was already there! You comprehend, sweet princess, of course you do, how much must ride upon such an important task for an old woman like me!"

Thalia did not understand, but she managed to clear some of the smoke away from her face by waving a hand before it. After a few minutes, her nose seemed to adjust to the foreign smells. She gathered, by listening to Elaine's rambling, that they were exotic perfumes. They had been brought from all over the empire for her to present to the new princess. Each was made from a different flower from a different planet. When smelled one at a time, most actually smelled very nice.

"I have never smelled a flower before," Thalia commented absently, as she turned the bottle in her hands. The liquid within was a sharp yellow in color, and Thalia found the sight of it splashing against the inside of the amber bottle enchanting.

"Never smelled a flower!" Elaine exclaimed, and took the bottle from the girl's hands. Elaine picked up a brush and set to work untangling Thalia's waist length black hair. "But of course, you silly thing, to have smelled a flower on a Quarantine Ship or a Breeding Barge! Such a thought! But now, I dare say, Your Highness, you will look forward to smelling much finer things than such a normal, grotesquely simple, really, old weed like that! On a regular, daily basis I would be so inclined to reckon, as I am told, by those I hold in my own high regard, mind you, that His Mightiness the Prince enjoys only the finest things in all the galaxies, as he should, being who he is."

Thalia's mind mulled over what Elaine could have possibly meant by a 'breeding barge', but all of her questions were pushed aside. Elaine only concerned herself with her paints, her perfumes and her fabrics, she told Thalia, and would say no more on the subject.

It seemed the only subject that Elaine did not want to discuss, and at length. Although Thalia quickly realized that her input in the conversation was not required. She allowed herself to slip into a sort of half-trance as the large woman puttered about behind her.

When she had been thoroughly doused with perfume and her hair brushed to Elaine's satisfaction, the older woman brought forth a large pot of white paint. Humming with excitement, she cupped both hands and dipped them into the bucket. She then applied both handfuls to Thalia's hair.

The paint was sticky, and smelled sour. It was so thick that it completely obscured the black pigment of Thalia's hair. The girl watched the mirror in horror as any speck of black vanished. Elaine was left with a dripping, white sticky mess of hair between her hands.

"You know that he, being the prince, I mean, knows you are not of his kind. Imagine him mating with you if one of his own kind was to be had! That would be such a laugh, really, not that extinction is anything at all to laugh about. Only the worst among us, the least cultured, would find humor in such a thing! But we cannot think that His Mightiness will not be overly, thoroughly, pleased to see you all done up like those great ladies used to be! Not that I was there, my dear, no, no, even I am not so old! But we are left with their likenesses in murals, paintings and such. It is enough for this old woman to mimic! And so well I would bet my mighty prince might even doubt his highly self, if only a moment, thinking we had captured for him a true Arktzirax mate!"

With that, Elaine gave Thalia's hair a mighty twist, and brought it up over the top of her head so that it lay, curling slightly, on her cheek.

"Isn't that just the loveliest thing!" The large woman exclaimed and came around to the front of the chair. "Now don't go and touch it now, dearest one, the paste must set so that it will hold! Oh, if it were to come apart now, I would be undone! The end of me, to be sure, I would die here on the spot! That would be quite the shock, indeed it would, for you Princess, so I beseech you, please, not to go touch-touching with those dainty fingers of yours!"

Elaine turned her back to her for a moment and returned with more pastes, gels and powders. Thalia sat as still as possible as her hair dried atop her head, the sheer weight of it made her neck begin to ache.

The older woman worked carefully on Thalia's face as she chattered away. The girl had ceased listening.

White powder was applied to her face, neck and arms to make her skin look as opaque as the general's. Once that was accomplished, Elaine began adding spots of color back. Her chest and cheeks were given a bright pink flush, with yellow swirling through it. Three dots of purple were placed just below one eye. To complete the look, the woman painted Thalia's lips a glossy black.

Clearly pleased with her work, Elaine stood back and fell silent, simply admiring Thalia.

Thalia held her own gaze in the mirror, and could not believe what was reflected there.

"My hair..." She started, confused, "It looks like a tentacle coming over my head—"

"Yes, yes, indeed, dear one!" Elaine clapped her hands and bounced in place, "You perceive, then, my grand scheme? My plan to top all other works I have ever done, indeed, to top all works done anywhere! You see, child, how much you look Arktzirax!"

No words were forth coming. Thalia simply sat gaping at her bizarre reflection while Elaine disappeared behind her. The door snapped open, and a gearman entered, a large amount of white fabric draped over one arm.

They bid her stand, and Thalia complied without a fuss. Elaine swiftly undid the buttons of her nightgown and shoved it to the floor. The older woman shushed Thalia when she tried to protest, and finally she relented. She stood still as Elaine applied more white powder to every inch of her body.

Soon it was over, and the gearman stepped forward. With the fabric. Thalia was so relieved not to be naked that for once she did not protest the gearman dressing her. He worked efficiently, wrapping the sheer fabric about her in a complicated way that she knew she would never be able to duplicate. When he was finished, he twisted the two remaining ends until they resembled rope and secured them behind her neck. The sheer fabric had transformed into a halter-style dress before her eyes, and yet Thalia had no idea how it had happened.

Elaine was upon her before the gearman had moved completely out of the way. She slipped a dainty golden anklet around Thalia's right ankle before biding the girl to step into a pair of soft white slippers.

The older woman took a step back and sighed, surveying her work. "I do believe I have quite outdone myself, indeed, I do, my dear."

For the first time, she seemed to be waiting for Thalia to respond. All she could manage was a stiff nod. Inside, a small part of Thalia was screaming. She was terrified of the creature she saw in the mirror.