A
Moon Maiden in the castle
There
was a lot of work going on today in the castle of Lunaasia; Queen Luna was
holding a banquet in the main hall of the palace. It was her birthday today and
a big banquet and ball were prepared. Maids and butlers were bustling all over
the castle like crazy, making sure that everything was all neat and tidy. The
cooks in the kitchen were cooking nonstop and all the gardeners in the castle
gardens were working nonstop too. Everything always had to be perfect in the
castle.
Serena and her elder sister Diana were
in the castle library, studying about their royal duties. They were learning
about all the things that royalty needed to know about banquets, both royal
banquets and normal banquets. As Princess Diana was going to become the next
queen of Lunaasia this was important for her. It was also important for Princess
Serena to learn all this as she was also a princess. “Phew I find it hard
trying to remember all of this information that we need to learn” sighed
Serena. “I do too,” said Diana “but it is important for our future, so we need
to learn all of this”.
Just then the royal steward James
came into the library. “Please excuse me your highnesses,” he said “but Queen
Luna needs your presence Princess Diana. She said she had something to say to
you”. Diana left the library with James, leaving Serena with her studies. “Now
that they are gone, I can now search around this library” Serena whispered to
herself.
Truth is ever since Serena found out
the real truth of the moon beads by the Moon Fairy; she had been thinking that
maybe some statues that held any moon beads might be in the palace. The entire
castle had statues in almost every room of the castle. So far Serena hadn’t had
the chance to check all the statues for moon beads; her princess studies,
duties and going to places with her mother and sister got in the way. But since
everyone was concentrating on the banquet tonight, she thought that this may be
her chance to search for moon beads.
There were some statues in the
library; manly statues in shapes of humans. Serena had her silver bracelet on her
right wrist and checked all the statues to see if any of them held any moon
beads, but none of them did. Serena sighed. “Oh dear,” she said “since there
aren’t any moon beads here, I will need to search somewhere else for them”.
Just then James came back into the library, and Serena quickly opened a book
from a shelf to look like she was still studying. “Excuse me your highness,”
said James “but her majesty, your mother, wants you to go to your room and get
ready for the banquet tonight”. “All right James” replied Serena. She placed
the book back onto the shelf, gathered her notebooks and other things and left
the library.
Serena passed a lot of rooms on the
way to her room. ‘Trying to find the moon beads in this castle will be
difficult,’ she thought ‘there are a lot of rooms in this castle and I don’t
think I will have any time to search through all of them for the moon beads’.
When Serena got into her room, a castle maid was in there. “I was asked to help
you get ready for the banquet tonight” said the maid. Serena thanked her and
started to get ready at once.
While Serena got ready for the
banquet, she kept on sighing and felt fed up. The maid noticed. “Is something
wrong your highness?” she asked. “Yes there is,” replied Serena “there was
something that I wanted to do today, but with this banquet going on I don’t
have the time to do it. And I can’t do it tomorrow because I have to visit a
royal family in another kingdom, with my mother and sister”. “There is never
enough time during the day for anybody,” said the maid “whether you be a royal
family member or not. I have been a maid for a long time and I hardly have
enough time to relax”. Serena wished that she did have enough time to look for
a moon bead in the castle before the banquet; she wanted to fulfil her promise
to Celina of collecting all the moon beads soon.
At that moment, Princess Diana
entered Serena’s room. “Mother said that the banquet will start in another hour
Serena,” she said “so you can do what you want until then. But don’t go near
the banquet hall or any other rooms where the visitors will be going into. And
keep yourself neat and tidy too and make sure you are fully ready in an hour”.
“I understand Diana” replied Serena. After Diana left, Serena thought that maybe
this would be her chance to search for moon beads again before the banquet.
‘I’ll only have time to look at statues in one room,’ she thought ‘and I know
just the room, the art gallery room. There are lots of statues in there as well
as paintings.’ She told the maid that she was going to the art gallery room for
a bit. The maid asked if she could go with her, because she had never been in
there. Serena agreed and the maid tagged along with her to the art gallery
room.
The art gallery room was on the first
floor of the castle, five rooms away on the right from the stairs. There were
paintings, statues and sculptures in there, and they all looked magnificent. Serena
and the maid took a good look round the gallery as soon as they entered the
room. Serena hoped she would find a moon bead in this room, before the banquet
started. Just then her silver bracelet started to glow. ‘A moon bead is in
here’ she thought happily. While the maid wasn’t looking, she looked for the
moon bead under her silver bracelet’s guidance. At last she found a dull
looking bead in one of the statues. It was a statue of a young woman and the
bead was on the stone base. ‘I’ve found the bead,’ thought Serena ‘question is,
where’s the moon spirit of this moon bead?’
Suddenly the dull bead glowed and
then another glowing white light appeared in the room. The light came from the
maid. Serena gasped as the maid turned into a beautiful young woman with white
hair and was wearing a long white dress with a silver sash and white shoes. The
woman was the Moon Maiden. “I take it this is why you were eager to come to the
art gallery with me then?” asked Serena. “Yes, and I thank you for finding my
bead Serena” said the Moon Maiden. Serena and the Moon Maiden looked through
the art gallery again together to see if there were any more in the art
gallery, but they didn’t find any more. “I’m sorry that you couldn’t find any
more moon beads today Serena” said the Moon Maiden. “It’s all right Moon
Maiden; I’ll find them the next time that I have any spare time for myself”
said Serena. The Moon Maiden went back into her bead, which became a white
bead, with a picture of a maiden on the front.
After the Moon Maiden went back into
her bead, Serena left the art gallery room and quickly made her way back to her
room. She got back into her room just in time; Diana came into her room a
minute later to tell her that it was now time for the banquet. Serena placed
her silver, white beaded, bracelet back into her jewellery box for safe keeping
and went down to the banquet hall with her sister.
