East and West

She was wincing. Her brows were already becoming one. With the consecutive tugs on her hair as they pull it to a bun on top of her head, she cringed while summoning the powers not to cry. 

"Your Majesty, please bear with it." The worried faces of the servants reflected in the life-sized mirror in front of Yllana. She had been grunting and mumbling curses all morning. And when we say all morning, we refer to four in the morning when they woke her up just to prepare for the morning rituals of an empress before a celebration. 

She glanced at Larika who was silently laughing at the corner of the room. "I don't know how you got through all of these for years." She groaned. Scented baths, oil massages, facials, and hair styling many girls would just die for these. Yllana thought, 'I have lived my life too simply that all these are just a nuisance to me now.'