The maids had followed all the necessary routine to make the princess comfortable, yet she was in her bed, her eyes wide open while the constant feeling of threat on her head felt heavier and heavier.

She couldn't stop thinking about the queen. She was trying  to analyze the true meaning behind her protective action without getting to any conclusion.

Amantine sure knew history and she knew for sure that a royal castle was a hell of a place to live in.

All the intrigues, politics,economic interests intertwined to create a monster called "a King's court".

There could be also "accidental" murders, perhaps?

She shivered at the thought of being taken care off for political interests.

She wanted to fight but she knew herself very well. She wasn't the type to was to be succesful with her own words as she was with her actions.There was no way she could survive the drama and understand dialogues full of adulation and implications. For a straightforward person like her, there was a lot to be learned and she didn't even know if she had the patience nor the time to do so.

Her mind was overworking so much that she got a headache.

She got up and opened the drawer of the bedside table. She knew there was a matchbox in there that she needed to light her candle. As she did, her ears captured a peculiar sound. It was something oscillating briefly and it stopped some seconds after she opened the wooden drawer. However she couldn't identify the object of that sound. There was nothing else in the drawer, apart from the matchbox, a hairpin and a spare candle.

She was curious, so she searched well inside with her touch until she felt a small, almost inexistent lever at the deep end. With a click the bottom of the drawer revealed a hidden compartment. Only then the golden key shined warmly under the candlelight.

" A passepartout..." she murmured calmly.

There she had a key but no door.

She let out a brief sigh.

She started looking for the door behind every corner, on every surface. 

At the beginning she had no luck whatsoever. She checked thoroughly every inch of the walls that didnt have any doors or windows.

There was nothing beyond the decorative curtains, no trapdoors under the carpet, not any secret door inside the closet.

After a couple of hours her enthusiasm had surrendered . Suddently she started thinking that she had imagined it from the beginning. Maybe that key meand something else. Maybe it was a symbolic thing, or a present that had to remain secret. 

Annoyed, she looked at the fine painting that stood of the opposite wall of where her bed was.

There was a beautiful woman smiling graciously why holding a child on her lap. The painter had successfully grasped the volatile essence of a fresh,fragrant,flowery day of spring.

Amantine observed atentively the woman's face and sighed. Half jokingly , she started an unidirectional conversation with that blonde, smiling woman.

"I guess I was imagining things , ain't so , blondie?"

While looking at the painting she had an intuition.

She realized that till then she had ignored the painting completely. 

She started to search again one more time.

Luckily enough her fingers detected a hole at the side of its frame. It was small, but it fitted the key perfectly when she inserted it.

*clack*

Silently the painting transtormed into a door.

Amantine took the candle and disappeared on the other side, leaving behind her chamberbed in total darkness.