"Thank you." Luciana bowed towards the servants who dressed her shortly. 

They curtsied far deeper, but didn't say a word. It had been the same the night before, when they had prepared a bath for her and put on her sleeping gown. Not a sound had come out from them, at all. 

One of them opened the door for her, and she walked back into her room. The male servant who had woken her up was standing near the main door waiting for her. She wondered if he really hadn't sat down in the whole half hour that she had been getting ready, but quickly pushed her thoughts to the back of her head. Vuelve a la Tierra. Vuelve a la Tierra. 

She stopped the chant just as it was about to accomplish the opposite of its purpose and turn her musings towards Yvette and her progress. 

"Your Highness, the Princes are waiting for you near the Palace's main entrance." He bowed, opening the door for her. 

She nodded curtly, then waited for him to lead the way. 

Despite the walk taking almost fifteen minutes, the directions weren't complicated. Yet, Lux's attention was far to consumed in observing the luxurious decor to remember them. Each section of the halls was arranged differently. Some were beautifully wallpapered, adorned in gold, while others maintained their immaculate simplicity. Ten minutes in, they entered a stretch that threw Luca off completely.

The white stone walls were carved in every few metres to cradle life-sized busts of men and women. They would have been unremarkable to her had they merely taken after the Greeks, but, while the Greeks obsessed over beauty and symmetry, these were their opposite. Their aim, it seemed to her, must have been to disturb. 

A man with antler portruding grusomely from his forehead, the marble raised up around them as if it were real skin, pierced through. Red drops, a splatter, across his face. Blood. 

An open-mouthed woman. A battalion of thumb-sized ants crawling out of it, across her face, her eyes.

And, at last, an ear-less, eye-less creature. The concavities where they should have been pressing into its skull deformedly. Its furry head tilted to the side, snout agape, baring its fangs in suffering. 

"We're here." The attendant announced. "After you, Princess." He bowed, holding open a door. 

She nodded and went through it, trying to shake off the impression of the busts, only to find herself in what she was sure was the largest indoor space she'd ever been in. Thankfully, the door she had entered through was near the palace entrance, next to which the twelve princes stood, grouped together. 

"She's here." One said, his voice rather highly pitched. At his announcement, they all turned.

She stopped just about two feet short of the nearest one and bowed. "Your Highness cal