2. Overnight With The Book Part 1

"Two Sisters of Acanthus!" whispered she, while throwing herself on bed carrying the book heavy as metal box. Sally was back at home. It was the first day of successful duty and she even got her hands on an ancient treasury.

The clock was ticking around past eight. She arrived later after missing the last bus to her block. And to make it worse, subway was not the place to get a sigh of relief. After the tiring journey, the best thing she can give herself as relaxing compensation was the book.

'Is it romance? Or tragedy? Or Reverse harem? Or horror? Or mystery? There's no book which had get past my ultra sense of scanning it's content but what kind of genre you would guess with this vulgar title, 'Two Sisters of Acanthus' huh!'

She wanted to prepare her mind for the type of genre she was about to read.

'Is it LGBTQ? Are both sisters... together?' her thinking made a flip when she suddenly shook her head in disbelief added with a loud snorting leaving her nostrils.

"I'm such a lewd minded person! Why would a sister would date her own sister haha!"

She laughed crazily for a second and on the next, she had already flipped the first page of the book.

'This is the legend of the beautiful princesses awaiting very different fate from each other. It's the story of a beautiful empire Acanthus.'

"Of course they are beautiful huh! Typical ancient beauties! Why the writer make us commoners feel belittle lord? Whatever, let's focus on the story!"

Sitting on her laps, the book read as follows, ' The most handsome and worthy Duke of Acanthus, Aristides de Striver, blessed with remarkable red flamed eyes and crimson violet head certifying the true lineage of their pure bloodline, had two daughters. The eldest one possessing the eyes brighter than the flames of dreaded fire and that crimson-violet locks darker than the darkest sunset similar to her father. An epitome of unparalleled beauty, the first child and the true holder of dukedom's lineage named Belladonna.'

"Wow! Just the name fitting her description. What a beauty! She must be the female lead! I bet!"

'The second and youngest princess doesn't had the same charms comparable to Belladonna, but the green eyes sparkling with joy, welcomed with a smile with the soft breeze brushing her light blue strands on her head made her unique in her own kind. Abatina wasn't someone worthy of being called a beauty epitome but just as her name describes, she was rather fickle.

People say her appearance may not match with her name but her actions must. Always being compared to Belladonna, not only for better looks but for better sense of action.

When she was eight, she tried to steal Belladonna's favourite doll covered with expensive silk and with finest cotton hiding it inside the Horse Stable, but got caught by a maid. When Belladonna heard, she never made a fuss about it rather happily gave up on that silly toy and calmed the maid.

But Abatina complained it to her mother accusing the poor maid for abusing and defaming the princess in name of stealing. When the matter brought upon the Duke, she blatantly refused the accusation of stealing the doll but showed a bruise on her hand given by the maid during the abuse, that was absolutely fake.

Poor maid cried for her life, and may be she won't be able to see the next sunrise of her life if it wasn't for Belladonna requesting her father to forgive her. She didn't bring any evidence of stealing nor mentioned Abatina but simply asked for forgiveness since she was her maid.

Although Abatina cried and her mother also supported the execution of the maid, she was forgiven for the sake of Belladonna. Duke Striver was known for favouring her eldest daughter, and this incident only fanned the rumour.

People never knew what happened behind the walls of Striver dukedom twelve years ago, but it definitely made Belladonna look favoured as well as powerful.

When some people were also favouring her for her power and knowledge, some were just licking her toes knowing she was the most probable candidate for the Crown Princess's position and spreading hate behind her back.

Same theory applied on Abatina where majority of people thought she is as useless as a fancy wall flower, only capable of hanging on the wall.

But there were some who pitied her for the injustice happening to her. Not only the Duke never seemed to care for her, Belladonna never let her do anything worthy for which she can be praised.

This is the story of pitiable Abatina, who finally got to see the bright side of the world when she found Lilac Vese de Edelweiss, the second prince of Empire Acanthus.

"WHAT?" Sally screamed in intense disbelief when she found out that she had lost the bet.

"How is this even? I mean..okay... I'm not saying she can't be a female lead, but what's wrong with people who are pitying her! And for what? For being selfish and acting like a dumb-a*s!"

Although it was the story of Abatina and she was supposed to be someone who's worth of being called the female lead, but as Sally was going through every page, her thoughts were rebelling with author's.

The incidents where Abatina was the one to make mistakes but crying and lying for the sake to prove she's innocent. Trying to steal Duke's attention by blaming Belladonna for harming her, she made an image of herself where anyone would be willing to pity her.

An abominate daughter with no major contribution to Acanthus's prosperity, compared to her elder sister at every aspect and being neglected by her own father for unknown reason.

Who would not pity such a weak and helpless girl, served with injustice not only by looks but by affection.

Belladonna was always the one to take away the blessings she never deserved. Not only her looks were no less than a goddess, her nature seemed sweeter than honey.

It made people change their opinion of dukedom slowly. They thought Belladonna was over blessed.

But it was not same with the poor Abatina who had regular blue hair with green eyes which wasn't remarkable nor even mentioned in dukedom's any previous history of lineages. People say that God did impartiality while making these two.

One got the sure shot marks of lineage and another got the regular ones. People of kingdom Acanthus pitied the Abatina more than ever and assumed that she was being harrassed by her older sister for being superior to her in looks as well as in favourism.

"Have they all lost their morale or what? I can understand that she's really pitiable and God did injustice to her but why would you hate someone else for her misfortunes. What kind of justice is this in their eyes?"

Sally felt weird emotions while reading the book. She wasn't able to understand what's the point behind judging someone so recklessly.