Frostbite (The Dragonian, #3) - Adrienne Woods Page 0,47

get ready.

For the past two days, we weren’t allowed to go down to the Coliseum or Parthenon dome as Master Longwei had gotten a company to come and set up for tonight’s ball.

None of us had any idea of what it would look like tonight, as it was a huge surprise and guarded twenty-four-seven by people from the company.

At night the site was protected by an invisibility spell, so we couldn’t even peek.

In history class we had a break and everyone began talking about the balls King Albert’s mom used to hosts. It was why Dragonia Academy had a masked ball every year. We hung onto the Professor’s every word as she gave us a history lesson, one that wasn’t boring, but reminded me a lot of Cheng’s lessons.

I really missed him a lot.

I closed my eyes and pushed myself back into the story about the queen’s dances she’d held on a regular basis, which, I might add, King Albert hated. We all laughed at that part.

At two Sammy and I ran back to our room. The hallways were crowded with students trying to get to the lobby and down to Elm. I was grateful that we would get ready in our room.

We found Lucille with a table with snacks inside. Our dresses lay beautifully on each bed with the masks and shoes.

I cringed when I saw high heels.

“Elena, you have to get used to them, seriously.” Becky rolled her eyes.

“I’m going to break—”

“No you are not,” Lucille said. “They go beautifully with that dress and it’s a dress that doesn’t go well with pumps, now go get your butt into that shower.”

I did what she said and when I got out, Sammy slipped in after me.

Getting into the dress took up half an hour all by itself. Lucille put up a fight with the corset and I felt as if I was never going to breathe again. I just hoped my gills wouldn’t come out to help with breathing tonight. It would ruin the picture completely.

The frost dress with the ice blue skirt was an absolutely stunning picture. Lucille used plenty of whites on my eyes and used some sort of glue and applied small white stones at the side of my lids to make them stand out. My hair was taken up with curls hanging loose over my shoulders. When I was done, Becky was next. She bitched and complained when Lucille pulled the corset tight.

“It’s painful to be beautiful, suck it up,” Lucille said and pulled the strings tighter.

“Does it have to be this tight? I can hardly breathe,” she said as her mother tied the laces together. Sammy just shook her head and I giggled softly.

Becky’s dress was absolutely beautiful. It was green and went perfectly with her swan mask, as she’d dubbed it.

Her hair was taken up into a French roll and her mother did an amazing job with her eyes. They stood out and the picture was a mixture between fairy tale and Goth, which was so Becky.

Sammy had the yellow dress. She sucked it up like Lucille had told Becky and when her dress was on, Lucille took a small break. We had a couple of snacks and some champagne. Becky’s mom was the coolest ever.

After our break it was time for Sammy’s hair, and when she was done, Lucille helped us with our masks.

The picture in the mirror of three princess-like figures wearing masks was breathtakingly beautiful. Lucille took a couple of pictures and we jumped at a hard knock on the door.

Becky slipped into her high heels, pulled the dress slightly up and went to open the door for who I could only assume would be George and Dean.

“Wow!” George said and threw his arms around Becky.

“I’m in here too, mister,” Lucille said which made us laugh.

“Sorry, Lucille, thanks for the heads up.”

Lucille shook her head softly and gasped as George and Dean entered. They looked absolutely stunning in some sort of tuxedo, but the jackets weren’t traditional, they were something completely different, something that reminded me of fairy princes.

“No wings?” it slipped out, and Lucille and Sammy laughed.

Dean just gaped when he saw Sammy and she twirled. “You like?”

“You look absolutely breathtakingly beautiful.”

An ache tugged at my heart again, thinking how Lucian wasn’t here to see any of this.

“Wow, Elena. Ice Queen.”

I laughed. “I had to put something on that was going to fit me, don’t you think?”

He smiled gently and gave me a hug. “You are far from an