Just One Dance

I smiled to the gentlemen nobles, curtsying to them as they paraded past, looking for their partner for the first dance of the evening.
It was just a façade for me. At twenty and four years old, still unmarried, I knew that no one would be looking at me. With a face as plain as mine, I was easily overlooked by the men looking for a more beautiful partner. For a more beautiful wife.
Still, I held a faint hope, that maybe this dance would be different. That maybe, something would change. That I would be found pleasing to someone, and I too would find him pleasing in return.
Yet, I knew. That it would only be a matter of time before my parents would consider sending me to the nunnery. I was a burden to them already, their third daughter of seven children, the only one unmarried, when I should have been married before my younger brother and sisters. At least at the nunnery I could devote myself to God, to serving him.
Which, if I had had any inclination to do such a thing, I would have chosen that route two years ago myself.
But the thought of sitting indoors all day, praying or doing whatever else that nuns do, literally made me ill. Perhaps if I'd been less of a wild child, less inclined to go wandering in the woods and take up the arts of sewing and painting and heaven forbid, cooking, I would have found a husband already.
I straightened as the last of the nobles passed by, unsurprised, but still hurt that once again I'd been passed by. I hide it with a smile, stepping back off the dance floor to allow the partnered men and women to have the full floor for the first dance.
My hands clenched briefly on my skirt, as I heard the first refrains of the Winterhall echoed about the room. My favorite dance, and once again, I would not be dancing it. I stepped out onto the balcony, leaning against the railing to smell the roses below.
"You do not like to dance?" A voice asked from the shadows.
I jumped, surprised to see a newcomer standing there. He dressed as a noble, so I hurriedly straightened in order to properly curtsy. "I love it, actually, sir" I said politely.
"Then why are you not within, partaking of the activity?" He asked stepping out of the shadows so I could see his face. A wound, only recently scabbed over, like he'd been cut by a knife from above his right eye to below his left, marred his face.
I frowned, turning to reach down to the rose petals, pulling a few free. He had a handsome enough face, and the scar helped to highlight his vivid green eyes, but he would want to have it not be as visible once it was fully healed. "Obviously because no one has asked me sir." I said turning back to him. "May I? The petals will help that heal much faster." I said showing him the petals. It was nice that he'd engaged me in conversation, one highlight to what was going to be another dismal evening.
He frowned. "Those do not heal, wounds M'lady."
I smirked. "Obviously you have not learned the art of healing then, good sir." I said, taking it as a yes that I could. I scored the petals with my thumbnail, placing the scored edge against the scab. "For if you know the secrets, all plants have a healing purpose."
I shouldn't have been so bold, but at this point, I was beyond caring. Who wanted to marry me? If anyone did, I would have been asked back before this point.
"And how do you know the secrets?" He asked, after I pulled the petals away.
I shrugged. "You learn a thing or two when no one asks you to dance." I curtsied to him as I heard the last refrains of my favorite dance. "Place scored rose petals there every evening, for a few minutes and you'll never even know you were injured there, M'Lord, by the next new moon."
He nodded thoughtfully, glancing inside. "I will keep that in mind M'lady." He probably wished to be away from me.
I would obliged him. "They'll be starting the next dance soon." I told him turning back to the roses. "You should go inside and find a lady to dance with."
"And are you not going inside?" He asked, leaning against the banister with me.
I glanced at him and shook my head. "I hate this particular one." I told him pushing away from the bannister. "Good evening M'Lord." I turned, lightly bounding down the steps into the garden below. If I had any saving grace, it was that I could run down a flight of stairs in heels breaking my neck. An attribute to running wild in the forest during my youth. I had a keen sense of balance from all my adventures.

-Inspiration from watching Pride and Prejudice (Keira Knightley version.)