Chapter 3

The next morning, Master Thomas called another meeting.

This time, Serena stood beside him, draped in a silk dress the color of a chemical spill.

It was a violent splash of fuchsia in our world of grey stone, brown clay, and white plaster.

She wore impossibly high heels that clicked nervously on the stone floor, a sound as alien as her presence.

On her wrist, a diamond bracelet caught the morning light, sending distracting flecks of rainbow across the dusty air.

As I looked at her, another of Lily's thoughts sliced through my own.

She looks like a flamingo that got lost and wandered into a quarry. She'll break an ankle in those shoes before the week is out.

A small, involuntary smile touched my lips before I suppressed it.

It was a dark, secret humor, a tiny spark of rebellion I now shared with Lily, even if she didn't know it.

"Everyone," Master Thomas began, his voice taking on a formal, commanding tone he rarely used with us. "From this day forward, things will be different. Serena is not just my fiancée; she is the mistress of this house and this studio."

He paused, looking each of us in the eye.

"You will no longer refer to her as Serena. You will address her as 'Mistress Serena'."

He held Serena's hand, and she performed a little gesture of humility, lowering her eyes and giving a slight shake of her head as if to say, Oh, you shouldn't.

It was a practiced, false modesty that was more infuriating than open arrogance.

She looked up at us through her long eyelashes, a picture of shy, undeserving grace.

I felt a wave of nausea.

A collective shock went through the apprentices.

We just stared.

The demand was absurd.

We were artists, not servants in some historical drama.

Calling this woman "Mistress" felt like a deep and profound insult, not just to us, but to Lily.

It was a formal declaration that Lily's unofficial, hard-earned status as the studio's matriarch was officially and completely revoked.

We looked at each other, our faces a mixture of disbelief and defiance.

One of the younger boys, Daniel, opened his mouth to speak, but a sharp look from Lily silenced him.