Chapter 1: Chapter One: Content
"I'm perfectly...content." Wendy whispered to herself as she sat and watched her young sister's dance.
Clarissa and Penelope, twins just turned seventeen and set out for the Capital to be judged on their grace and beauty in their first season. She felt much like she imagined a proud mother would, being herself, ten years their senior she had played a heavy hand in raising them and she was thankful for it. She unconsciously gripped the skirts of her dress as she watched them twirl around the public ballroom, men also looked on enthralled by the ethereal looks.
Being quite alike in appearance it was often difficult for others to tell them apart, both slim with beautiful waiflike figures, taller than most of the young ladies they lined up with in the dances, they stood out. Silky blonde hair fell to their waists with crowns of pearls adorning their heads, shining hazel eyes and rosebud pouts completed faces that would be best suited for paintings they were so pleasant to gaze upon. Though Wendy could always tell them apart seeing the fire inside of Penelope's eyes and her extroverted attitude often left her more subdued and introverted twin, Clarissa, chasing after Penelope and cleaning up her messes.
She worried at her bottom lip and sent a prayer above that Penelope found a bit more sense before it was too late, and their mother taught her the kind of lesson only Bianca was capable of giving. Her shoulders curled forward at the thought of the switch biting into her back and as if thinking of her had summoned her Wendy heard her sharp whisper "Sit up straight, Wendy!" The words were hissed through her teeth as she feigned a stunning smile at a passing couple and fluttered her fan around her face, her blonde hair fluttered in wisps as the rest was piled on top of her head in an intricate updo. "This is your last season, and we cannot have it being such a waste as you've allowed all the others to be." Bianca warned with a scathing look shot towards her eldest daughter.
A shuttering breath heaved from Wendy as she tried to compose herself, her cheeks flamed red, and she kept her gaze pinned to the dance floor "I think we may safely assume that bad posture is not the reason I am unwed in my tenth season, mother" Wendy spoke quietly as she felt Bianca's sharp eyes picking apart her appearance "Even you have not deigned to spare my feelings in the truth of my looks, mother, so why begin lying to yourself and believe it is anything other than the fact that I lack the beauty to secure a husband that leaves me destined for spinsterhood?" Feeling brave by the surrounding crowd Wendy dared to meet her eyes, clashing like iron on iron.
Another hiss escaped Bianca's lips as she muttered something about Wendy being a waste of her time as she moved away and fluttered around the dance floor her sisters currently occupied.
She was far too used to the ugly words to react outwardly though she had to admit to herself that they still tore at her heart, her chest suddenly feeling too tight as her fan slipped from her lap to clatter against the floor at her feet.
Just as she moved to pick it up a masculine gloved hand grabbed it, she looked up and found a tall, blonde, gentleman smiling at her as he kneeled slightly in front of her to retrieve it "Yours I believe, madam." He stated more than he asked as he placed the fan in her outstretched hand.
Unable to help herself, Wendy could feel the color flooding her cheeks as she accepted the fan "Thank you." She murmured dipping her head in gratitude.
"It is not even yet halfway through the evening; do you not care for dancing?" His overtly friendly voice asked, and she was slightly surprised he was still standing there, a sudden unease she had been taught through consequences not to ignore rolled down her spine as his eyes swept along the couples dancing.
"Indeed, I do." She spoke clearer this time; she felt the eyes of the Capital's peers as some of the older ladies leaned in with interest to listen. "I am watching my younger sisters dance though and I find to it being as entertaining to me as though I were dancing myself" another lie she told herself, to sooth the sting of never being asked to dance.
"Ah, a true philosopher at heart than" he chuckled, and she found herself pleased to have a normal conversation with someone outside of her family, though she wasn't ignoring the bored look behind his eyes, as if she was better than nothing when it came to passing his time, but she did not quite meet his standards. "Forgive me, madam, for I have failed to introduce myself, Lord Henry Alton, a pleasure I'm certain." He proclaimed with all the airs of a Lord as he bent slightly at the waist in a bow to her.
"The Earl of Pennington, I myself had not pictured you to be so young, my name is Wendy Garren, My Lord." She stood to curtsy her deep blue gown spread across the floor around her. Surely, he was young to be an Earl, most nearly the same age as her at seven and twenty.
"It is with regret that I carry this title at my age, Miss Garren. My father recently fell ill and was unable to recover." There was no emotion to his voice, his eyes going cold before they suddenly sparked in thought. "You must be Lord Folly's eldest daughter; it is a pleasure to be acquainted." He seemed to know or at least know of her father and she felt further unease spread through her chest, though he wasn't looking at her in a way that made her believe he wanted anything more than an interesting conversation to pass the time at this ball and she found herself displeased with her morality that she was enjoying it more than she had any other ball where she had been met only with whispered disapproval for looks she could not control or stares of pity at being unmarried by her age.
Almost lost to her thoughts, she saw the Earl straighten his posture and bow slightly towards her right elbow. Her stomach dropped upon seeing Bianca's return, the countess Folly fluttering her fan around her face and Wendy knew with certain dread that whatever words she said next would ruin the rest of the evening for her.
"Lord Pennington, what a pleasant surprise" Her mother tittered, and the pitch of her voice grated against Wendy's nerves "Were you coming to ask Wendy to dance?" She suddenly threw her head back gracefully with another tinkling laugh "But of course a young and sought after Earl such as yourself will only want the finest, My Lord." Bianca's voice was suddenly smooth like warm oil dripping, and she slipped her thin arm though his, linking them together. "I do have two daughters who have just come into the season and would make lovely dancing partners."
The Earl stammered slightly and Wendy felt the quick scan of her person with his eyes, humiliation flaming her face and her chin dipping into her chest as she tried to blink back the tears that burned her eyes, it wasn't that Bianca had insulted her so easily in front of a stranger, for truly she did not want to dance with him as a possible partner, there was something shifting underneath the surface of who he was presenting himself to be that made Wendy want to stay away from him, instead, the humiliation stemmed solely from what she knew the Earl would see when he truly looked at her.
She was quite short, nowhere near the tall and willowy figures Countess Folly and her younger daughters cut, and she knew her waist and hips dipped in curves far more dramatically than most of the young women of the Capital. Though she tried hard to skip meals and adhere to Bianca's orders she still had heard her whole life, as Countess Folly desperately struggled to decrease the size of her daughter's waist, how no man wanted a large wife. Her skin was pale but not in the way that was fashionable with dark circles under her eyes and her cheeks and nose being littered with a scattering of freckles that years of Bianca squeezing lemons on hadn't faded. Too bright of blue eyes and thick, frizzy, dark curls made her quite the contrast to their sleek locks and hazel eyes.
All in all, she knew she was no one's standard of beauty, not even her own mothers and ten seasons of trying to find a husband had submitted her heart and self-esteem to more pain and rejection than even she could handle at times.
"Mother, please" She whispered as the heat crawled down her neck and she suddenly felt sick "I do not wish to dance," She spoke louder now as she bowed to the Earl "You must excuse me, Lord Pennington, for I am feeling unwell." She heard Bianca's all too familiar hiss of disapproval as she lifted her skirts, and her eyes frantically searched for an exit.
Her breath came in short pants by the time she managed to make it outside and the cool night nipped at her exposed arms, the cold making the skin on her face feel tight and she focused on it as she closed her eyes, breathing deeply as she greedily filled her lungs with the frigid air. The shock did a wonderful job of pulling her from the spirals of panic she often found herself slipping into lately. She knew what was waiting for her at the end of this season and she was ready to not have to bear the judgement of her peers any longer.
Too many times she had felt the disapproval of gentlemen as their eyes scanned her and found her lacking in the normal beauty the ladies of the Capital were renowned for. For did not every gentleman's daughter hold grace, wit, and beauty beyond that of others. Did they not all shine well and above the rest, always beheld as the best of society? Creatures of elegance and diplomacy in all matters?
Her lips parted on a gasping laugh as she realized, no, not all were, she certainly was not. Shaking her head and squaring her shoulders she pinched her cheeks and smiled as she made her way back inside, she had promised the girls she would watch them dance and point out who the best suitors seemed to be. She would do whatever she could for them this season, she wasn't sure where Bianca would send her, the threats had been many different places over the years, but Wendy knew she was unlikely to see her sisters again.
"I am... content." She choked on the whisper.
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