"Corset," she said. "It's on the chair."
Kuri did not move. "Your maids are two doors down. You could have called them."
"My maids are asleep, and they would be no use if they were awake." Aurora turned from the mirror at last, her hands still on her hips. "They bow so low that I spend an hour talking to the tops of their heads. Every sentence begins with Your Highness and ends with Your Highness, and when I ask whether a colour suits me they say yes, whatever the colour is. You, at least, will tell me when something looks terrible."
"I haven't said anything."
"You were thinking it. Your whole face does it for you."
That was the entire reason Kuri was here, and she had given up arguing with it a long time ago.
In the palace, Princess Aurora was served by twelve maids in grey uniforms who stood in a straight line whenever she entered a room, kept their eyes on the floor, and breathed as quietly as they could.
