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The gleaming ballrooms of Lumiose City sparkled like the very stars themselves.[break][break]

In these golden corridors draped with the trappings of wealth and fortune, a veritable sea of nobility and new money brushed past one another with a swish of skirts and the clacking of heels against marble floors. Beneath dazzling chandeliers, orchestral music swelled in a romantic waltz, coaxing paired silhouettes to the centre of the ballroom. Murmured voices layered over one another, pretty lies whispered on breath sweet with wine, only to occasionally burst into peals of delighted, self-satisfied laughter.[break][break]

Here, an eighteen-year-old Elisabeth Fiorelli timidly made her entrance among this higher echelon of Kalos; the cornflower blue of her silk gown was by no means of poor construction, but it paled in comparison to the intricacy of the other fashions present. Although her ensemble did not lack for elegance, Camphrier Town did not possess the same skilled seamstresses as the capital of Kalos, and the delicate flowers that adorned her neckline seemed banal compared to so much glittering jewellery and refinement.[break][break]

Various eyes briefly fell upon her, only to find themselves either amused or disinterested by her visible unbelonging. The sensation unnerved Elisabeth, slightly, and a painful shyness took hold of her.[break][break]

Hesitant green eyes searched for her parents among the crowd, only for her mother to shake her head with kind disapproval. Go, the baroness conveyed to her daughter silently, urging her with a slight motion of her hand. Take your place here. You are one of them, now.[break][break]

As if it were that simple. As if blood alone could make you belong.[break][break]

Elisabeth inhaled deeply and then exhaled, choosing to approach a throng of nearby women who appeared to be of similar age. Her arrival abruptly ended whatever giddy gossip had been whispered between gloved hands, and Elisabeth attempted an awkward smile at these strangers who regarded her with the icy indifference of a statue.[break][break]

"Hello," she began, only to become mortified at the way her voice seemed to squeak out of her. "Um. May I join you?"[break][break]

Startled laughter bubbled up from one woman's throat, the wine glass in her hands sloshing with the movement. Another answered with a tight-lipped smile.[break][break]

The acceptance they offered was that of a Seviper's den, eager to see what bird had ventured close into their nest.[break][break]

In this place and time, Elisabeth lacked their venom entirely.

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