You Got The Look

It’s been weeks, friends!

I know, I know. SLACKER Jen, right? But I have excuses. Decent ones.

1) I moved

and 2) I started a new, full-time job.

Anyway, to business. Several weeks ago one of my CPs (and, we just found out, sorority sisters– how cool!), Alex, tagged me in the ‘You Got the Look’ meme.

Basically, search out the word ‘look’ in your current Work in Progress and copy and paste some of the passage.

This is a passage from Act 2, which hasn’t been seen by anyone but me yet, so it’s fairly uneven and will definitely change when I go through edit rounds. Don’t judge too harshly! 😉

—————————————————

Bree’s ladies nodded at her encouragingly and she knelt beside the princess. “Good day to you, your highness,” she said.

“Good day,” Aleta said without moving her eyes from her roses. She examined the roots critically and pawed through the fresh dirt with her trowel.

Clearly, this was a different situation from Bree’s herbs. She tentatively reached her trowel into the dirt and sifted through it.

“It’s a lovely day, isn’t it?” She tried to start a dialogue.

Aleta only trimmed a few leaves from the bushes in response.

“Bit warm, I suppose. I’m from the north, you know. It’s very likely snowing there now. I don’t know how it’s so warm here.” She felt as though she was chattering on , but no one had stopped her.

“It’s likely you passed the Makers Margin on your trek. It accounts for the barriers in seasons,” Aleta said shortly.

“Oh. Yes, I guess that’s it.”

Aleta turned back to her roses and Bree racked her mind for something else to bring up. If she could make a friend out of anyone, it would probably be Aleta. She didn’t seem like she wanted to be under the king’s thumb any more than Bree did. “I thought that roses were red,” she said, a half-question. The flowers that Da had middle-named her for looked pale and unassuming without the scarlet color to them.

“These are white,” Aleta snapped.

Irritation stabbed at Bree. “Yes, I can see that,” she said waspishly. The princess didn’t have to be quite so unaccomodating. “I wondered why.”

“And had you asked I would have answered you.”

Bree tossed her trowel aside. Enough beating about the proverbial, and in this case, quite literal, bush. The princess was carefully toeing the line of rude and polite, slipping ever closer to rude. “Have I done something to offend you, your highness?”

“Your very presence offends me.”

Well, Bree had wanted honesty. And here she had found it in the form of a girl who glared at her, the sun shining into her eyes so brightly that they seemed yellow.

“You wonder why there is a lack of red in my rose garden. Look around you. Do you see red blossoms anywhere in the king’s gardens? Have you seen it anywhere in the palace decor in the time that you have been here?”

Bree opened her mouth, but closed it again, a fish tossed onto dry land. No, she realized.

The look on her face must have answered for her. “There are two colors to which specific meanings are assigned here in the capital. Violet– all shades of it, are reserved for the royal family. But red means death. Someone who has taken another life.”

Aleta pushed herself to her feet and nodded to her attendant, who hurried to her side with the parasol. She was ready to go. Bree stood as well, absorbing the new information about her surroundings.

“But you must know that, surely,” Aleta said lightly. Her contemplative tone was reminiscent of Lady Kat, Bree thought.

———————————–

As for tagging… idk, Lindsey, are you up for this? I think it’s kind of fun!