Thread: Kaminoyama {Zella and Alan23}

Empress Momoko Aizawa The morning ritual was always the same. It began when one of Momoko's three handmaidens woke up her up. With a gentle voice and a gentle shake. Her other two handmaidens would soon join them both and together the three woman would begin preparing Momoko for the day. She was first washed, then dressed. After that one girl would work on Momoko's hair, the other her make up and the third would leave once more to fetch Momoko her breakfast. The whole ordeal took upwards of an hour and a half, on the worst of days it took two. By the time breakfast came each morning and she was dressed, her stomach rumbled with an angry hunger. As usual her breakfast was a small bowl of rice, salmon, Tamagoyaki with a serving of Tamagoyaki and grated radish on the side. It was a meager meal, its purpose being to keep Momoko small, delicate and appealing to the eye. It was not her favorite meal... not by far. But being in the public eye as Empress, goddess, had forced Momoko to give up many things that she liked or enjoyed, in the face of duty. Once breakfast was eaten she was escorted out and into one of the many sitting rooms in the palace. This was part of her morning that was subject to change. During this time she could take meetings, of a more casual manner which sometimes required one sitting room over another. Today though it was the one located closest to her bedroom that was most usually used as 'hers' and while it was not private, it was a haven of sorts. After all nothing was private in Momoko's life anymore. It was a simple and tasteful room with brilliant paintings and designs on the Shji that surrounded it. Here in the sitting room she had to watch an hour of news, it was essential after all that she be aware of events around Kioto. This bored her terribly and more often then not Momoko left, having not truely remembered anything she had watched. From there her day was often ever changing, but always felt the same, as if she was reliving the same events, just in a different way. She was carted from meeting to meeting, event to event and appearance to appearance. Tasked always to remember to be as beautiful and poised as possible. It was not always the hardest of tasks. Momoko was a well taken care of woman, wearing the finest clothes and make up and of course coming from the finest breeding. She was often radiating the beauty that was expected of her, at least physically. It was the other things that she struggled with, the constant, charming conversation. The eyes that were always on her life and the many, many people who hung off of every one of her words, when she felt like she had so very little to say. Her day was consumed by these things and by the time she was 'free' once more it was already early evening. She was in the sitting room once more, too tired to do much else with herself. Before bed each night she was expected to watch another hour of news and she was doing this now, to get it out of the way. On either side of her sat two of her handmaidens, each working on filing, cleaning and painting the well maintained nails at the ends of Momoko's delicate fingers. Behind her was her third handmaiden who had slowly picked the jewels and clips out of Momoko's hair and was now brushing it straight. This was perhaps Momoko's favorite part of her days. Her handmaidens had grown up alongside Momoko, assisting her and so it was no surprise that the four girls were close. While the mornings were agonizing. Momoko adored these moments when she could sit with the three girls, listening to them talk about their days, their fantasies and dreams and of course the giggled mention of men. Her handmaidens lived a life that Momoko had deemed much more exciting then her own, albeit much less lavish and healthy. She could not help but listen to them and live vicariously through them, laughing at their stories and giving them her opinions when they looked to her so adoringly, wishing to hear them. What she was not listening to however was the news...